Exmouth Fire Station is currently manned 24/7 by firefighters who are trained to a very high standard in several disciplines.

As well as their primary roles of fighting fires and attending road traffic collisions, our local firefighters are also trained in some specialist disciplines of Swift water rescue, rope rescue and mud rescue, which is important to note as our river estuary is 7 square miles and has a considerable amount of mud which can catch unsuspecting individuals out very quickly.

Mud rescue capability used to be a discipline of our volunteer Coastguard Rescue team but that has now been withdrawn from Exmouth Coastguard rescue team and the nearest Coastguard mud rescue teams are based at Teignmouth and Lyme Regis in Dorset.

We also need to consider that front line resources that operate out of Exmouth Ambulance station is one Ambulance (double crewed) and one RRV(single manned) and on some occasions to meet demand a second double crewed ambulance.

In some areas there is an MOU in place for on duty firefighters to attend as SWAST (South west Ambulance Service Trust) Community responders prior to an ambulance unit arriving so as to assist the ambulance service in their saving of life.

In Exmouth SWAST are reliant on Exmouth duty fire watch to act in assisting ambulance crews by gaining access to properties so as to enable ambulance crews to attend to a patient who maybe in a situation where they cannot unlock the door. This function used to be carried out by the local constabulary.

The uniqueness of the skills and the equipment/resources at Exmouth is a specialist 4 x 4 fire truck which deploys to both Woodbury Common and Dartmoor and has also deployed to the flooding on the Somerset level. It has also been deployed as part of the severe weather plan at Haldon Hill.

We need to remember that the population of Exmouth is upwards of 35,000, probably nearer 40,000 and that the holiday accommodation at Sandy Bay holds 20,000 people during the six week school holiday if it is at full capacity. Not withstanding all the other visitor accommodation and properties of multiple occupancy.

In the mid 90's, Exmouth Fire Station was only day manned and was covered during night hours by retained firefighters. This was changed to 24 hour cover because of the appropriate risks that were prevalent at the time. Those risks have not changed, in fact personally I would argue that those risks are greater now than they were in the mid nineties.

As a local man who has known many firefighters and watched the service develop over many years.

I personally would like to say that I would like to see the station at Exmouth remain as a 24/7 station as I regard going back to daytime cover only with retained crew at night would be a retrograde step and place the town of Exmouth and the surrounding areas at greater risk.

I would hope that my councillor colleagues and the good residents of Exmouth would fully engage with this consultation and make their representations known to the Fire Authority through this process.

Written by Fred Caygill - Exmouth Town and East Devon District Council Councillor.