Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Question 753: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government in relation to the operation of the emergency call service if there is an official policy which sets out the circumstances in which the fire service is to be called out to all emergency calls when medical assistance is required in view of the fact that fire service personnel are trained as emergency first aid responders. [1147/11]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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Arrangements for the receipt of and response to emergency calls when medical assistance is required are matters in the first instance for the HSE/ Department of Health and Children. Emergency calls from the public are made through the 999/112 system, and are passed to the relevant health service provider by the 999 system operator in accordance with agreed procedures.

Local authorities have a region-based service delivery model for their statutory duty under Section 10 (3) of the Fire Services Act, 1981 and 2003 for the receipt of and response to emergency calls for fire service assistance. Regional Communication Centres in Castlebar, Limerick and Dublin are operated by the three relevant local authorities, which liaise with the 999 system operator, and use a system of agreed "pre-determined attendances" or responses to mobilise fire service resources to certain categories of incidents/ emergency calls.

On the issue of fire service personnel being trained to the Pre-Hospital Emergency Care Council's (PHECC) first responder standard, it is correct that significant numbers of personnel in fire authorities outside Dublin (where Dublin Fire Brigade provides an ambulance service for the HSE) have been so trained over the past decade. This has enabled them to provide immediate assistance to casualties whom they encounter in the course of their normal fire service response activities – such persons may routinely include victims of smoke inhalation and burns, and those injured in road traffic accidents or other incidents. The development in fire services of a strongly collaborative, casualty-focused approach in Road Traffic Accident extrication techniques has been greatly influenced by this training. The first responder training also enables fire authorities to meet rigorous statutory obligations under safety, health & welfare legislation.

It is not currently policy to have fire service personnel deployed to undertake the statutory functions of other agencies, other than as noted in relation to Dublin above, and the first responder training provided is not intended to extend the fire service into an emergency service which would respond where medical assistance is required.

My Department maintains routine contact with other relevant Departments, and there has been very significant collaboration with the Departments of Health and Children, Justice and Law Reform and Defence on major emergency management issues in recent years. The National Directorate for Fire and Emergency Management, which I established within my Department in June 2009 to develop national policy and drive consistent achievement of value-for-money fire services by local authorities, will be engaging in a series of bilateral discussions with other emergency services on issues of further collaboration where potentially beneficial arrangements in relation to emergency service provision for the public may be identified.