Firemen - Today's Telegraph

[CrabInCab]

From today’s Telegraph.

Sir - I have been a fireman for 24 years. I serve at a relatively quiet station in the stockbroker belt of Surrey. However, I have been witness to a confirmed fatality for every one of the years I have served, whether through fire or accident. I cannot begin to number the injured persons I have assisted. (Note: firemen do not leave the job through "stress": we know what to expect when we join.)

Even if my watch hits a quiet spell, tomorrow could be the day I have to put my life on the line, doing my duty. I do not have to wait for war to break out. It can happen any day.

My "quiet" little station is next to busy commuter rail links to London. It covers one of the busiest sections of the M25. It lies between this country's two busiest airports, Heathrow and Gatwick. Should a major disaster occur, through accident or terrorism, I think there is a good chance of it happening on my patch.

What price would anyone put on their own life? Am I not worth that price, for the one time that I might have to give my life, to save others?

From:
Chris Loxton, Fetcham, Surrey


Rant on

Well Mr Loxton I have been a member of the armed forces for only 4 years admittedly, however I have also been witness to countless fatalities, in addition to that I have lost 1 close personal friend, not strangers, for every year I have served, and known many more in passing. Note: members of the armed forces leave through stress because they are stressed; you however know what to expect when you join (six months a year off, before leave; at least 200 rescued fluffy kittens a year and a pension 2/3rds of you final part time salary; hardly surprising you don’t leave through stress!)

Even if my Sqn is going through a quiet spell, tomorrow could be the day I’m on the receiving end of a Mortar of .50 Cal round let alone departing for a hot and sunny destination again. Doing my duty, day in day out on average (using the same time accounting as you) 98hrs a week. I don’t have to wait for a war to break out either because the Great British armed forces have been in conflict, somewhere in the world, for every year since 1939.

Mr Loxton, you lost the public support last week. Today you lost any remaining support from the armed forces with your cheap shot.

:mad: :mad: :mad:

Rant off

[Jackonicko]

send it to the Telegraph

[propulike]

An argument truer than the one used by the firefighter. And you didn't mention that he already receives more pay than the people used to fill his place while he risked the very lives he's going on about saving over a pay claim.

I'd love to see that in print. Send it off.

[Talking Radalt]

"Even if my watch hits a quiet spell, tomorrow could be the day I have to put my life on the line, doing my duty. I do not have to wait for war to break out. It can happen any day."

Well, look at that. This statement applies to all servicemen. Difference is, a lot of the inherent danger in our line of work isn't in the form of "natural" danger, it's caused by concious thought on the part of malicious individuals (from whom we are also genuinely protecting the likes of civvy firemen and their cosy Western Democratic SkyTV lifestyle), and therefore is dealt with far more stealth and surprise than any house fire, making it equally if not more, stressful and hazardous.
Every time Firetwat Sam is called to a house fire he is, by default, forewarned and thus psychologically, physically and practically prepared to face that danger.
Alas the compliment of a Royal Navy ship for example, currently live with the very real possibilty of tea-towel-wearing henchmen paddling a lilo laden with Semtex alongside and detonating it.
Without any warning.

Back to work Sam and quit whinging.:rolleyes:

Crab, here's a head start:

Press Office
Telegraph Group Limited
1 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London E14 5DT

[CrabInCab]

Brass V Jenks?

Very noble what he did, but I am afraid I will not be following his shining example. Any retired pers are more than welcome to put there name to it should they wish.

;)

[victorinox]

Well it’s finally time to put my head above the parapet.

I agree with the firemen’s strike!!

Why? Well until Tony B Liar finally gets his way this country will remain a democracy and so it will remain the right of it’s citizens to air their views, just as you and I are doing. And if that means that a group of people have a grievance with their employer and it cannot be sorted after 3 years of talking then it is their right to strike within the boundaries of the law. I do not know of any fireman that wants to strike but they do want a decent wage for a dangerous job and I think they should get it. That other professions are also underpaid is not their fault but a symptom of successive governments unwilling to pay for their services and relying on their goodwill to prop up under-financed institutions (sound familiar)?

I’m sure that one of the points that has raised most hackles is the often quoted 40% pay rise, well why not after all the government gave another body of public sector workers just that last year, namely themselves!! But seriously, that was just an opening-negotiating gambit as the government’s offer was always going to be minimal.

Fireman do have a dangerous job and on a day-to-day basis, far more so than the majority of servicemen. That they have been able to minimise the risk over the years is a credit to them. It is only through hard and professional training that few are lost in the line of duty. Consider how you would feel going into a building that could at any moment reach a temperature of 500 deg almost I an instant due to Flash Over (when the contents have vaporised but not combusted, air turns it into a hydro-carbon bomb which is almost undetectable until too late) or that the building could collapse at any moment or that hooligans have hidden gas canisters in rubbish skips and set them alight just for fun and then watch to see what happens. These are just some of the things that they come across.

Don’t forget, it is not the firemen that told the troops to man the Green Goddesses. Do you know that the Army have been told to ask the police to arrest any firemen that try to help in a life-threatening situation? Or that the baby seen cradled In a Wren’s arms had been brought of the building by a strike-busting fireman?

So stop whinging, if you are working a 96-hour week then something is wrong and it is not the firemen’s fault. Sure they are paid more than a junior serviceman but unlike them, the police and nurses they do not have subsidised housing but have to pay for themselves as soon as leaving college.

PS and yes I am a serviceman and have a reasonable amount of time under my belt.
;)

[CrabInCab]

Victorinox, you missed the point; we're not winging about doing a 96 hr week, we knew when we joined, we cope and I don't have 45 applicants after my job!

[StopStart]

Victorinox

Yes you are right, I wouldn't fancy going into a burning building that's been stuffed full of gas cylinders by the local little sh*ts - that's why I didn't become a fireman. I assume those that did were given the same choice?

The populist view of firemen charging into blazing infernos to drag out the nun and the 10 orphans once a day is becoming a bit tired. Yes there are examples of extreme bravery in the annals of the Fire Service but it is by no means a daily occurrence.
The Fire Service are bounded by strict Health and Safety regulations such that you will not see the brave fireman charging into a derelict building to rescue a blazing sofa. The fire will be tackled as best they can whilst maintaining their own and the public's safety, something which is remarkably sensible.

Talk of hydro-carbon-wot-nots and flash over do-dahs is all very dramatic but not particularly relevant.

Indeed it was not the Firemen who told the troops to man the Green Goddesses; a particularly bizarre point to make. You are obviously inferring that it's not the firemen's fault that the armed forces are having to go round putting out fires. I'm afraid I'd take issue with that at a fairly basic level. If they weren't on strike then the troops wouldn't be manning the pumps - it's as simple as that......

I agree that perhaps the Fire Service are due a pay rise as are many others in the public sector. I also believe that any such deal has to be done in concert with a total modernisation of the Fire Service. They have been quite happy to sit on the deal they made 25 years ago as it provided for a very good set of working conditions, thank you very much. Many firemen have second jobs – some because they feel they are underpaid but the majority because they can. 4 days in 8 are spent off duty. £21k for half a year’s work sounds pretty good to me for what is basically manual labour. You do not require any qualifications aside from the physical fitness and the ability to work as part of a team to be a Fireman. For a young person, just out of school, with no qualifications it is a great job to get into – if you can. It’s that or the Army – but why go there and earn £11k out of training when you can get £18k with the Fire Service? That's why people are queuing up to do it.

I will concede that there does need to be a better structure to their pay, one that reflects additional qualifications and perhaps one based on merit such as exists in the Armed Forces. Do well, get promoted, get paid more. But again, this would have to come as part of a total modernisation of the Fire Service. But then the Fire Service are resisting moves to give them extra qualifications. They refuse, for example, to be trained in the use of defibrillators claiming them to be too technical a piece of equipment. Paramedics use them. How much are they paid? Less than a fireman. Air hostesses are trained to use them. Rocket scientists?

They are many half-truths floating about this strike. Gilchrist et al say it takes 4 years to train a fireman. A retained fireman then says, er, it takes 6 weeks. You say the Army asked the police to arrest firemen; in fact it was the senior fire officers that asked firemen to stay away and not assist as they add disruption, interfere with the established command structure and aren’t insured whilst they’re on strike. The picture of the baby in the Wren’s arms was a bit of stage managed PR, we all know that. I’d be surprised if you saw it as anything other than that.

The Firemen need to wake up. They are being led by an utter donkey – a socialist fool who set out to embarrass the Government and reassert the power of the unions over them. He expected 70s style public support but discovered too late that the majority of us left the 70s mindset in the, er, 70s. He expected that the Army wouldn’t cope and chaos would reign supreme. They did and it didn’t. The strike also backfired by proving that combined operations centres work, and work well. They will be hard pushed to argue that down now.

Finally you make the tired point that junior servicemen have their subsidised accommodation to offset their low wages. Indeed they do. To go back to basics, the military establishment requires that personnel can be posted around the country on a regular basis to further operational needs as well as the career requirements of the individual. It would be unreasonable to expect people to buy and sell houses every 2 to 3 years. Servicemen don’t choose to live where they do, their employer sends them there. This means either the remotest part of the backside of Scotland or the most expensive part of central London and all points in between. The employer ensures that the serviceman is not unduly out of pocket because of the Services’ actions in posting them there. If Firemen were posted around the country from a central training establishment then they would have cause to argue if they were sent to expensive London against their wishes. But they aren’t so they don’t. Bloke living in London wants to be a fireman in London so he becomes one. That’s how it works.

Your average squaddie just out of training does indeed get very cheap accommodation. He also gets to share one room with 2 or 3 of his mates. He also gets a nice man come round every couple of weeks and inspect it for him – whether he likes it or not. Would the Firemen accept those terms for cheap accommodation?

Finally (!) you declare CrabinCab to be whingeing. I assume you’ll be balancing this with a letter to The Telegraph accusing Fireman Loxton of a similar crime? Whilst his description of Service life may seem slightly AmDram to those of us at the fluffy end of the military, it is how he sees it. It is not a whinge but a rebuttal of the original bleeding hearts letter.


PS. Just to add - I will not for a second claim that my job is particularly dangerous or generally arduous. I’m a truckie and probably the most dangerous thing I’ll ever face is forgetting to pack my beach shorts in my brightly coloured Samsonite when I next go “to war”.
;)

[European Crash]

StopStart - what a jolly sensible and well thought out reply. ISS B+ for that effort.

Our anger should not be directed at the fire fighters - after all, they neither ordered us to man the pumps, nor indeed insist that we join an all-volunteer defence force. We perhaps should be introspective. The thread of a number of replies is 'Woe is me - I'm in the military and don't I work hard?'

Well we do and we don't. Having served on 'OP DENY CHRISTMAS' a number of times I have sweated buckets in most unpleasant parts of the world; however I have also enjoyed unparalleled access to a range of sports in company time and have taken part in a number of expeditions which are little more than thinly disguised (and heavily subsidised) action holidays. Yes, our operational tempo is high (and may peak in the New Year - who knows?) and sacred cows such as Wednesday afternoon sports are a thing of a halcyon past. Furthermore, I am quite well paid for the privalege of risking life and limb on an irregular basis. I am not defending the fire-fighters - although this strike has been an 'own goal' for them and they probably need all the help they can get - but I am challenging the 'We're in the Forces and aren't we bl00dy good and no one can do it better" attitude. We are professional but so are a lot of other people. This is a volunteer force and we can withdraw our services by PVR'ing if we are p1ssed off - and many of our colleagues do. In the civilian world, a lot of ex-service personnel have difficulty coping with the cut and thrust of it - talk about op tempo to someone in the finance industry, for example (or civil aviation for that matter). It is a sad fact that 1 in 4 homeless people in the UK are ex-service personnel (qv Shelter charity) and although there are many pre and post service factors influencing this dreadful statistic, many service personnel do lack perspective on life in general. Yes, we do get ordered to do some particularly unpleasant and dangerous tasks - but so do a lot of others.

[smartman]

EuroCrash

I too am a (ex) 'senior' officer. The difference between us, clearly illustrated by your message, is that you're a blunty -------

[swinging monkey]

Smartman,

You took the words right out of my mouth, thank you very much.

Euro Crash, what is your point?? and why shouldn't we direct our anger at the left wing commie firemen??
Of course it's their fault you numpty...
They knew what they were doing when they joined up, didn't they?
They knew what the pay was
They knew the working shifts etc.
They knew what the job entailed
Are you getting the message yet??

The fact is, that despite knowing all that, they still went on strike, thus leaving it to the services to 'bail this country out again'
I most certainly do blame the firemen, without any hesitation and with no qualms whatsoever.
You say that you have been subject to Op Deny Christmas a number of times - whoopy sh*t! But so what, who hasn't?
In 32 years, I've spent more Christmas's out of the country than I have in it, with my family.
I don't moan about spending Christmas out of the country on Ops, away from family and friends. But I would be pretty pissed off if I was away from them simply because of a bunch of commie firemen, wanting a 40% pay rise. And all for 6 month working year! Yeh, I could hack that, no problems.

Your comments about being able to play an unparralled range of sports, presumably every wednesday afternoon, give away your position as a humble blunty/scribbly, and frankly pi** me off. I'd give anything to be able to plan a sports afternoon. But sadly, ops flying gets in the way just a little, oh how sad for me!
I have not heard anyone from the services say 'no one can do it better' that's utter bull****, and if you had any honour and respect for the crews of the GG's, then you would retract that comment immediately.
'Woe is me, and don't I work hard' Well actually, Yes we bloody well do. We work a damned sight harder, for a lot longer hours, in much poorer conditions and for a lot less money than the firemen, and that's what you should try and remember.
Please get back under your desk, keep your mouth shut and your comments to youself.
Finally, make sure you don't hurt yourself on that paperclip:D

My loyalty is to the Boys and Girls who manned the GG's, and they have my utmost respect for the most outstanding job they did. What a shame (and a disgrace) that your loyalty isn't directed towards them also.
Rant Over

The swinging Monkey
'Caruthers, pass me a large G & T'

[ManxSpeedBird]

EVERYONE

I think Firemen get paid enough, I think what all the firemen have forgot to tell the public that they actually get:-

basic wage of £16,000 PLUS
Free food and drink when they are on duty,
a fantastic pension, 2/3 of wage
call out money,
night shift pay
and overtime.

There not that badly done to!!!!!!!!

I say let them go on strike. HM Forces have done a fantastic job so far.

[victorinox]

MANXSPEEDBIRD, just how much is you family worth to you? What if your house was ablaze and you could not get in to rescue them? What price for professional people and kit to do it? What price a minutes delay due to a reduction in staff?

[smartman]

victorinox -------------

4% --------------------------------------

[swinging monkey]

Victorinox

No one in their right mind can put a price on their family's head, certainly none that I know anyway. But your argument just does not stand up........
Do you think that a young Sgt ALM or AEOp gets paid enough every time he goes down that thin little cable to pull out a family of four from a yacht that's sinking??
What about when my mates and I go up into the mountains in our big yellow egg whisk, in all conditions, at all times of the day and night. Do you think we get paid enough ? What is your price for a whole family, or for the crew of a sinking trawler?? Or the passengers on a North sea ferry? How much do think they are worth?
The answer of course is that there is NO price.
Nothing is more valuable than human life, nothing.
What pisses me off, is the fact that people like me (and many many others) gladly risk our lives day in and day out, but we seek no publicity or fame by telling the world about it at every opportunity. Because that is/was my job.
I'm not bleating about it. I'm not saying that if the firemen are worth 40% then so am I!. And I'm certainly not withdrawing my labour and holding the country to ransom. Presumably by your tone, you believe the firemen to be right by taking this action??
And let me see, what price a minutes delay by reduction in staff? Hum, don't quite understand that, why should there be any delay whatsoever? Why should reduced manpower = responce delays?
Yes, the firemen deserve a good wage, but look at the facts:
As ManxSpeedBird says, they get a good wage, £16k basic, free food, 2/3 pension, Christ, just how much more do they want? Why not give them all a free house, a free car and a knighthood after 10 years. Would that make them happy?
I know quite a few firemen (we occasionally get to work with them) and they will tell you themselves that the number of perks they get is immense. Free this, free that. (and most of them will secretly tell you that they are not unhappy with their 'lot')

I leave the mob in a few weeks time, after spending 32 years offering to risk my neck every day simply to save others. I have no idea how many lives I have saved, and I'm certainly not bragging about it, because that is what I have been paid to do. It's my job!
But I wish that I had been as well looked after during that time as the firemen have. And I wish I was going to leave with anything remotely close to 2/3 of my salary as a pension. But I'm not, and I'm still not bleating about it. Because at the end of the day, no one forced me to do the job, and it was my decision.
Take a good long look at the firemen V. Look at what they get as standard compared to the likes of others who do just as important a job, but get paid far less, in far worse conditions, with far more obsolete and outdated kit.

The swinging Monkey
'Caruthers, it's nearly time to hang up the immersion suit'

[European Crash]

My comments have clearly upset the complacent. I certainly do not criticise the service personnel manning the Green Godesses (qv other postings) and apart from some initial reports in the liberal press depicting the Service crews as a 'Dads' Army' set up, praise has been heaped on them by everyone (well, almost - except, perhaps the FBU).

We do whinge (and PPRUNE is evidence of this) although it could be argued that we have no legitimate outlet for our concerns, our lot is not quite as bad as we collectively paint it. I pointed out in my earlier posting that sports afternoons are a thing of the past (haven't seen one for over 12 years) but I think that commentators may be missing the point - if we do not like the op tempo, we can leave (subject to the usual constraints). Grass is generally not greener on the other side of the peri-track and although flying wide-bodies may be well-paid and precictable, many former colleagues do look back fondly on their time in the service (when they were also young, free and didn't have a mortgage!).

I work in a particular organisation where some military personnel can routinely knock-off after lunch (though, sadly not in my case). Still, many purport to be busy.

Blunty with a brevet.

[Anton Meyer]

1 of the most important points here is that of refusal to modernise. It is totally unacceptable to demand a whacking payrise and cling on to practices which have been proven by our guys to be obsolete. I cannot imagine that a single fireman, if awarded the demanded rise, would actually give up a second job performed in those 3 or 4 days off. Of course not. More cash - thank you very much. It would be interesting to see what would happen if they were offered a substantial rise and forbidden to take on another job - so the general public could be sure that they were " resting " after the shift in preparation to perform well during the next one. Nurses and most other poorly paid public sector workers are unable and, quite frankly, too exhausted to take on any more work.
It would free up jobs for others. If they are unable to perform at an outstanding level and give 100% without the 4 days off shift system in place, how can the FBU justify allowing them to work during that time? Why is that time necessary?

Just a thought.

[swinging monkey]

Spoke to a firemen 'friend' today.
Found out that apart from all the other perks they receive, they also get free BUPA cover for them and their family:mad:
What about that then?:(
In the forces at the moment, I doubt that we barely qualify for the NHS!!

European Crash, do I detect a hint of backpeddling going on with you? You haven't 'upset the compalcent' you have simply shown your true colours, and your misguided loyalty.
Haven't seen a sports afternoon for over 12 years eh? But youv'e been able to go on 'several' heavily subsidised expeditions eh? How wonderful for you. You must be the model officer we are all aiming to be.
Oh and 'if we don't like the Op tempo, we can leave' what an utter load of sh*t you spout! I love the Ops tempo, it's what we flyers thrive upon. It's just a shame that the Ops tempo gets constantly bu**ered up by muppett blunties like you.

This is not the forum for blunties, of any denomination, so get back to your desk, in your office, in your 'handbrake house' and leave this forum to the people it was designed for - the professional flyers.

You are a fool Sir! (your not Admin Guru in disguise are you?)

The swinging Monkey
'Caruthers, time for another G & T, thers a good chap'

[kilo52]

In France the Emergency Ambulances are manned by the Fire Service and their personnel are all trained paramedics.

Having had occasion to require their services this Autumn in respect of my Wife (at our Cottage in France) I can only express my deep admiration for their professionalism. They arrived fron 7 miles away in 10 minutes and had included an extra crew member who spoke English.

The sight of my Wife being comforted by a burly French "Sappeur Pompier" in his thick serge uniform talking to her in pure Scouse will stay with me forever.

I understand that Firefighters in France receive £14000 PA.

[opso]

victorinox

My family is worth more to me than I earn, but what relevence has that to the fireman's demands? Or are you suggesting that they should earn the sum total of everyone else's salary...circa several million pcm?

Or, maybe a life is worth a million pounds? On average, 1 person per night has their life saved by the fire brigade (the figure is slightly lower than that, but I'm willing to round up). So 55,000 fireman doing 12 hrs for £1,000,000 - works out to be £1.51 per hr! Given that they are complaining about £6 per hr, I guess that puts human life at about £4million!

[BEagle]

Without wishing to make any comment on the rights or wrongs of the firefighters' current industrial action - beyond praising the efforts of the Srevicemen and women who have been doing such an excellent job, I thought that it might be interesting to think about how much 'fire safety' has changed since the last firefighters' action 25 years ago:-

In 1977, fewer houses had central heating and more houses had open fires, more people smoked, there were few fire-retardant fabrics in domestic furniture, many people used 'electric blankets' which they often forgot to switch off, electrical wiring in many houses was frequently overloaded due to the increasing number of electrical appliances being used in homes which were built years earlier and didn't have sufficient power sockets, so multi-plugs were often plugged into each other to provide more outlets. No-one had ever heard of a smoke alarm. On the road the wearing of seat blets wasn't compulsory, there were no air bags, cars had less crashworthiness and the incidence of drink/drive related accidents was much higher.

Back in the 1950s things were even worse. There were often dangerous things in homes called 'drip-feed heaters' which literally burnt paraffin all night. These things, if not properly looked after, were always in the news as having caused fatalities. Old electrical wiring was virtually lethal, it was frequently frayed and circuits were fused at a central fusebox with wire-wound fuses - not in plugs or sockets. TV sets produced a lot of heat, as did 'wireless sets' and 'gramophones' using thermionic valves.

But now we live in a world full of huggy-fluffy safety rules, often seen as rather nannying, but many of which have served to make the night hours far, far safer than they used to be. So it's hardly surprising that the incidence of night-time 'shouts' has dropped as a result. So perhaps the increased level of domestic safety which we now enjoy might be just one reason to investigate the potential of improving the matching of resources to requirements?

[Axel-Flo]

Victorinox....... no problem rescuing your own family from a blazing building as "the right kit" doesn't have to be a nomex or other material, that is ideal for looking cool with your jeans while on picket duty next to a brazier (wouldn't want to get sparks falling on your Gucci jumper would you). No just put on your soldier 95 outfit as the "Goddess" crews have been wearing and crack on in there!:mad: :p

[PercyDragon]

Just slightly going off on a tangent here.... something that everyone working for the Government seems to be always ranting on about is how badly paid they are.

From the job I do (financial services) I come in contact with people from a very wide variety of occupations, on a regular basis, and I get to find out pretty acurately what it is that they get paid.

The oft quoted 'average salary' in the UK is given as around £21,500 pa. One would therefore assume that half the population were getting more than that, and the other half less.
But this is in fact totally wrong. You see, the 'average' is distorted heavily upwards by the very few 'fat cats' who are on £100K and over.

The true national earnings figures are as follows.

Only 1% of the population are on £100K and over. 3% are on £50K and over.
The national 'median' salary (ie the salary that is most common in the UK) is, in fact, around £13,500 pa.
If you are earning £21,500 then you are in the top 25% of the
population.
Incidentally, only 7% of the UK population are in the 'higher rate' tax bracket.

It baffles me as to why the government keeps going on about the 'average salary being £21,500', because it just serves to p*** off the 75% of the population who are earning less than that.

Makes you think, doesn't it?

[Jackonicko]

Percy, that's a fascinating statistic, but do you have a source for it?

(The £13,500 'median').

Genuinely interested.