Thomas Gould
Question:374. Deputy Thomas Gould asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage the average response time for the fire brigade in Ballincollig, County Cork. [11526/22]
View answerTuesday, 1 March 2022
Questions (374)
Written answers
The provision of a fire service in its functional area, including the establishment and maintenance of a fire brigade, the assessment of fire cover needs and the provision of fire station premises is a statutory function of individual fire authorities under the Fire Service Acts, 1981 and 2003. Furthermore, under the Local Government Act 2001, arrangements in relation to staffing in each local authority are the responsibility of the relevant Chief Executive of that Authority. My Department supports fire authorities through general policy setting and preparing legislation, providing a central training programme, issuing guidance on operational and other related matters and providing capital funding for priority infrastructural projects.
Following the City boundary extension, in 2019, the retained fire service in Ballincollig - previously part of Cork County Council's fire service - was incorporated in the City Council fire service. I understand that a number of the City Council's retained firefighters from Ballincollig Fire Station have been successful in securing whole-time positions in the Council's fire service. This has resulted in vacancies in the retained fire service in Ballincollig. Cork City Council deployed a crew of whole-time firefighters to Ballincollig as a temporary measure, but I understand that arrangement has now ceased and that fire risk in the area is being managed by an appropriate arrangement of fire cover response from the network of fire stations in the region, together with statutory and community fire safety measures.
It is important to note that the non-availability of any particular fire station does not mean that fire risk management, including fire service response, is diminished. The systemic approach to fire risk management, which has been the policy in use in this country for a more than a decade, has seen a welcome and steady downward trend in fire losses in Ireland. While each fire death is one too many, the fire death rate per million of population, averaged over three years, stands at 4.2, a figure which is one third of what it was 10 years ago.
Provision of a retained fire service in Ballincollig remains the objective of the City Council, and a new recruitment campaign is underway for retained firefighters in Ballincollig. It is hoped that suitable candidates will be interested in taking up roles as retained firefighters, and that the local business community will consider facilitating any staff that go forward for this valuable community service.
In relation to average response times of individual fire stations, my Department does not collect that granular level of information. That information would be available from the relevant Council.