Cost of living crisis 'huge for us' as fire service ramps up preparations

Naked flames, such as candlelight, is one of the risks that firefighters look to address as other measures may be taken to heat homes to adapt with soaring energy prices from October.

Stuart Smith, area commander at Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: “The cost-of-living crisis is huge for us, but the risk is people try to have more open fires in their homes, potentially left unattended.

“We have been preparing for this crisis for a long time.”

It is another challenge that the county’s fire service is preparing for, having dealt with soaring demand this summer.

Between July 1 and August 28, firefighters were called to 45 incidents that required more than six fire crews to attend.

But Mr Smith, who looks after the fire service’s operations at all 28 stations in Cambridgeshire, thinks there will be less incidents to deal with in the coming months.

“We do see a risk of people will take to more naked flames, so it’s making sure people are safe and know what that risk is,” he said.

“Because of the size of the fires in the summer, it drained our resources quickly.

“We do welfare visits in homes and talk about these fires as well as slips, trips and falls so for the cost-of-living crisis, the resource will probably not be as big.”

Some of the largest fires crews have dealt with during the extreme temperatures in July and August were in villages such as Fordham, Witchford, Wimblington and Fulbourn.

Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue, which took calls from other fire services including in Yorkshire during the heatwave, is looking to increase the number of on-call firefighters in its workforce.

Mr Smith said the service will always deal with challenges, but hopes that it will manage the impact of the cost of living crisis as well as it did in the heatwave.

“I think we have done extremely well with the summer incidents,” he added.

“What we’ve seen is everyone pulling together, and the community support is phenomenal.”