Death knell for Bath control centre as new Government presses on with fire shake-up

​The Government has confirmed it will press ahead with hugely controversial and expensive plans to regionalise fire control arrangements in the West.

It also announced the end of the equally controversial recruitment quotas for fire services yesterday.

Fire Service Minister Bob Neill promised there would be no more pointless meddling and pledged to cut through red tape and bureaucracy, as he took the axe to regional management boards.

Whitehall says the move will hand power back to local areas, but firefighters continue to say the real difference would come from scrapping the regional control centre.

But the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) confirmed, for the first time since the election, that Labour’s plans to centralise the work of six fire control centres in Taunton, covering a huge swathe of the country from Wiltshire to the Isles of Scilly, will go ahead.

The move sounds the death knell for Avon Fire and Rescue’s control centre at Lansdown on the edge of Bath.

A DCLG spokesman said it was the most “cost-effective” option with the best potential results.

The Fire Brigades’ Union (FBU) accused the coalition of failing to fulfil manifesto promises to scrap centres such as that in Taunton, which is costing the taxpayer £5,000 per day despite standing virtually empty.

Its south west secretary John Drake said: “We want the Government to stop tinkering around the edges, and scrap regional fire control centres, as both parties promised they would in their manifestos. They have abolished the wrong thing.”

The regional centre in Taunton has been described as a white elephant and many firefighters believe closing existing control rooms will put lives at risk because of the loss of local knowledge.

Mr Neill’s decision to end recruitment quotas will reverse a decision that came to epitomise an era where public sector bodies were seen to be obsessed with political correctness.

But the FBU insists he has missed a trick by not scrapping the regional control centre as well. It calculated that, despite not being used as a control centre, the building will cost £430,000 to run between the formation of the new coalition and MPs returning from summer recess.

Mr Drake said: “It has been an absolute fiasco throughout – it has gone through seven years, two governments, and eight fire ministers, and yet we’re still paying.”

A DCLG spokesman said: “The fire control centres are going ahead. The Government has calculated that the best way forward is for contractor EADS to deliver the main system, because it offers the best service and the best value for the taxpayer.”