Fire chiefs rubbish recreation ban rumours

[dutchman]

SPECULATION West Midlands Fire Service plans to strip pool tables, dart boards and televisions from the city's fire stations were rubbished this week.

Recent reports suggested the fire service planned to crackdown on firefighters 'downtime' between emergency calls, taking recreational items such as pool tables out of stations and replacing sofas with office chairs.

The rumours prompted a furious reponse from firefighters, but this week the fire service moved to quell the speculation.

Speaking to The Observer, Tony Prosser, the service's assistant chief fire officer, said the sofas were being replaced due to health and safety regulations, but talk of a ban on pool tables, dart boards, and televisions was wide of the mark.

"It's not a matter of getting rid of relaxation facilities for our firefighters, that's not the case that all," Mr Prosser said.

"It's a matter of improving the facilities we already have for our firefighters. The snooker tables and darts boards remain.

"We have some of the best firefighters in the country and they deserve a little downtime in between call outs to recharge their batteries."

But the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) remained critical of the way the fire service had handled the matter, and claimed moral was low due to the recent announcement of a 40 per cent cut of 'back room' jobs in the service.

Rose Jones, executive council member of the West Midlands branch of the FBU, said: "The fire service has already spent over £70,000 bringing in corporate chairs to replace the old comfy sofas.

"Morale is already low across the fire service, and so are industrial relations between them and the FBU. Moves like this only add to it."