Fourteen firefighters may lose their jobs if planned cuts go ahead, ‘The Gazette’ has learnt.
The retained fire crews, who work in the community and respond to call outs via a pager, who are based at Shanklin and Sandown fire sations, where unaware of the job losses ahead of a delegated decision due to be taken by cabinet member Cllr Barry Abraham on Tuesday, January 25.
In papers seen by ‘The Gazette’, the Isle of Wight Council plan to replace the retained firefighters with five full time crew members based at Shanklin. ‘The Gazette’ can also reveal that the proposed plans would come into effect within months, with the removal of a pumping appliance from both Sandown and Shanklin stations. It was previously planned to shut Shanklin fire station and sell it off to free up capital, to help fund the building of a new Bays station - part of the fire modernization project. Council bosses shelved the project after massive budget cuts and asked Fire chief Paul Street to go back and revisit other options to provide safe fire cover for the Island. The new plans would marginally improve fire cover at night compared with closing Shanklin station. There are hopes to replace both Shanklin and Sandown fire stations with a Bay station if funds can be freed up.
