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Emergency Services

asked Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to encourage the co-ordination of fire safety and emergency services across the European Union. The noble Lord said: My Lords, this summer I visited Slavutych, the town in the Ukraine built to replace Chernobyl following the 1986 nuclear explosion. As I entered the small, commemorative museum, my eyes fell immediately on the photographs of those who arrived first on the scene and perished at Chernobyl—the brave men and women of the fire and rescue services. Chernobyl affected not only neighbouring Belarus and Russia but also the rest of Europe. Still today in Chester I look out on the north Wales peaks whose market in sheep meat remains tightly controlled. We are still one Europe and one world when manmade and environmental disasters strike and, because accidents happen increasingly across national borders, our response must equally be transnational. This is the subject of tonight’s debate. These threats are not diminishing, as quickening climate change accelerates the incidence of environmental disasters that devastate local communities—searing heat waves in France, severe snowfalls in Germany, floods in Britain, landslips in Italy and wild fires in Greece and Spain. There are still acts of terrorism—as in London, Madrid and Paris—or failures of technologies, as with the Buncefield disaster that startled my noble friend Lord Brookman from his bed the morning it happened, and fires in tunnels through the Alps and under the Channel. At home, the recent NAO report on the £330 million programme for the fire and rescue services points to successes such as the response to Buncefield, but also to failures, such as in procurement and management, all pointing to the need for a UK fire lord or tsar. However, the EU is our concern tonight. It, too, lacks recognition of the pivotal roles of the fire and rescue services in protecting communities throughout Europe. The European Commission and the member states are not talking properly to each other, certainly not on a structured or professional basis—a victim perhaps of a short-sighted interpretation of subsidiarity. Similarly, the Commission’s silo approach to these cross-cutting issues inhibits a co-ordinated response. We need a clear and single point of entry into the Commission to provide an observatory and a data-collecting point. We also need to co-ordinate trans-European emergencies and we need member states to help one another. What can my noble friend do to advance that? This problem is further exacerbated by the mosaic of the different member states’ organisation of their fire and rescue services. In the UK, oddly, FRS is dealt with by the emergency medical services, whereas France and Germany do their health through the emergency services themselves. Sweden and Bulgaria have national agencies, whereas Britain remains local; consequently, our local services know too little of EU developments and therefore fail to give the British view in Brussels. Does my noble friend recognise a departmental confusion in the United Kingdom? EU FRS matters are dealt with by the Cabinet Office. This bypasses her own Department for Communities and Local Government, which is surely better placed to canvass competent local authorities on EU fire and rescue service issues and thus improve the European Union legislative proposals, standards and practices. At present, the firefighter’s voice is second-hand and so second rate. The lack of a fire lord or a fire tsar also impairs our response to European Union social legislation, which affects the fire and rescue services in Britain. The dismantling of the British opt-outs in the working time directives will scupper the use of part-time employees in Britain. Ironically, in protecting our workers we may lose the right to exceed working time hours as appropriate and negotiated by workers through collective agreements. Indeed, I note that the driving hours directive has already dried up the availability of part-time drivers used in the service. With the free movement of workers across Europe, we must have certainty throughout the single market of common and verifiable standards of competency among those who practise in the fire and rescue services sector. The lack of a fire sector skills council in the United Kingdom and common examinations reviewing civil emergency skills likewise hampers us. I ask my noble friend to address these national deficiencies, because they impact on the European stage. European Union social law must not inadvertently undermine our domestic fire and rescue services. To create sensible EU law and practice we must have accurate statistical data in Britain. We are proficient at the national data, but our EU partners are not, nor are these data properly standardised. Thus, in the United Kingdom, we record delayed deaths subsequently reported from an earlier emergency incident, whereas in Europe that does not happen. In the European Union, these deaths are recorded locally, not nationally as in our case. An example of this is that the EU legislative proposal for substituting reduced ignition propensity cigarettes for existing slow burn will need sound and comprehensive data across the European Union to convince us that the unwanted deaths from smouldering stubs can be stamped out. Will my noble friend encourage the collection of good and comprehensive data across the European Union? I now turn to the Government’s lukewarm response to the French President’s proposal for an EU civil protection rapid reaction force. The Commission has already provided use of EU funds to transport firefighters to EU disaster hot spots or to pay for aerial water bombers dowsing wild fires across national boundaries. Indeed, the United Kingdom has received a grant of £180 million to compensate for the disastrous floods in 2007. However, the UK is not actively engaged in the rapid reaction force proposal, where the British firefighters can help abroad. Our view that Britain will never need others’ help is daft. Pooling EU resources and humanitarian aid at times of national disasters is sensible and sound. The UK should get involved in the Barnier proposal now if for no other reason than protecting the many Britons who visit, work and live across the European Union. We should promote the civil protection force and ensure good liaison with the developments within NATO, too. Likewise, the deplorable incidence of hotel fires abroad leading to family tragedies at home is allowed because we have a disparate set of 27 laws applying to hotel safety. This mosaic of law must cede to a sensible EU directive. It will help us all to sleep better in our beds at night, whether in Corfu or in Carshalton. Britain’s viewpoint on these matters is missing from the EU Fire Safety Network, an organisation funded by the EU civil protection unit, which is based in the Brussels environmental directorate. I am told that Britain’s CLG-nominated fire resilience representative attends only intermittently, with inadequate and infrequent reports back. Will my noble friend tell the House how such cross-cutting issues that affect DBERR, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Cabinet Office and the Department for Transport will be properly communicated in Whitehall? We cannot do that if we are absent from Brussels. The safety of British families and businesses is not helped by snubbing Brussels. If Britain does not speak up, British trade and industry are vulnerable to the misapplication of EU laws in the field of fire and rescue services. The construction products directive requiring the use of the CE mark is not systematically monitored in Britain, because of the lack of resources in local government trading standards. This means that British export firms are poorly advised on relevant EU law governing the circulation of their goods and services within the single market. The REACH chemical regulation, with significant cost implications for the fire sector companies, are added to the already strict UK hazardous substance control regimes, with sparse assessment of the cost to related industries. The EU services directive remains similarly unexamined. Nor is the understanding of single market codes and standards promoted by the self-financing approach to the BSI. We need something more hard-headed and designed for the entrepreneurs to brief themselves in order to succeed. In conclusion, I hope that we understand the necessity of spreading our concern at the time of these disasters wider than the United Kingdom for the protection of our people, not only here in Britain but also in the European Union. I thank Dennis Davis, my colleague from Chester and the former chief fire officer of Cheshire, and his associates. Not only has he worked hard for many years to raise these issues at the European level, but he has helped in the preparation of the debate this evening, which I bring to the attention of the House.