Brian Walsh (Galway West, Independent)
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357. To ask the Minister for Health his plans to provide clarification in relation to the role of fire services in ambulance assist calls, by publishing national guidelines in this regard; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17646/15]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Keeping Communities Safe is the outcome of a fire services review process undertaken in 2011/12, which considered the roles to be performed by fire authorities. It concluded that there are both ‘core’ and ‘discretionary’ fire service roles. The provision of specific assistance by fire service crews at the request of the National Ambulance Service (NAS) is regarded as a discretionary role, in so far as it is not a statutory function of fire authorities.

As I recently indicated, I am very supportive of the development of emergency first responder (EFR) capability across all our emergency services, including our fire services. Fire services are well placed geographically and this would be an excellent enhancement of existing emergency medical response capacity and resources in communities across Ireland. In addition, it would very neatly complement the voluntary network of community first response teams which is already in place.

The Deputy will be aware that fire services collaborate closely with other emergency services in the interests of the communities they serve. In a number of areas, there are already local arrangements between the NAS and fire services to provide EFR assistance for 112/999 calls, in particular for cardiac incidents. Given the potential value of such arrangements to get help to people as quickly as possible and the obvious patient benefit, I would very much like to see consideration at national level, between the NAS and fire services, as to how best to approach this issue, particularly in terms of operational interaction and clinical governance. This is being done for community first response and that may be a good model for fire services emergency response.