Gloucestershire Fire and Rescue Service is 'good value for money' (From Gazette Series)

Gloucestershire Fire and Rescue Service is 'good value for money'

12:03pm Friday 27th January 2012 in News By Liza-Jane Gillespie

GLOUCESTERSHIRE Fire and Rescue Service has been revealed as good value for money by financial experts.

The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) recently published their comparison of costs for the 56 fire and rescue services in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

They calculated that Gloucestershire's Fire and Rescue Service costs residents a total of £34.03 per person per year or just 65p per week – the lowest of all comparable fire services.

Neighbouring counties Oxfordshire cost £37.57 and Warwickshire £42.37 per year.

The statistics considered the cost of all aspects of running the service including firefighters, vehicles and training and then analyse how much is spent on each.

Chief Fire Officer Jon Hall said: "From the comments I receive from the public, I know that residents value the service their local firefighters deliver.

"While delighted with this national acknowledgement, my job is to maintain focus on improving even further both in terms of value for money and performance.

"There is still more we can do to protect people when they are at their most vulnerable, to drive down property loss from fire and to prepare our communities for natural or man-made disaster."