PLAID CYMRU councillors have submitted a motion to Wrexham Council opposing plans to scrap the town's second full time fire engine.

As well as that, the plans would also likely include halving the number of fullt-ime firefighters available in the local area.

The motion, which is scheduled to be discussed in September's full council meeting, will feed into the North Wales Fire and Rescue Authority's deliberations on proposed changed to its Emergency Fire Cover.

Options two and three of the consultation involve Wrexham losing one of its three fire appliances (fire engines) and crews, leaving around 60,000 homes covered by one full-time and one retained engine and crew – which would not always be available.

Councillor Carrie Harper, who is moving the motion, said: "The Fire Authority has put forward two options that we find completely unacceptable for Wrexham."

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Cllr Harper added: "Back in 2016, the same proposals was put forward and it took a mass campaign to reverse that threat. So here we are again with the Fire Authority considering cutting frontline services without addressing other potential savings at the top of the organisation and its plans for a £48 million training centre.

"Our first priority is to defend the service we currently have in Wrexham - the second and third proposals would see the entire number of firefighters for north Wales reduced by 12% or 19%.

"Neither is acceptable to Plaid Cymru - we need to maintain services in our region while also recognising the need to enhance the emergency cover further west."

Currently, the crew in Wrexham deal with over five incidents per day, which equates to 1,572 per year, in addition to a large volume of community work. 

That is almost double the nearest station across Wrexham, Flintshire and Denbighshire, with Deeside the next highest at 867.

Cuts to one fire engine and 24 jobs would significantly affect the ability to respond to all those calls.

The Leader:

Chief Fire Officer Dawn Docx said: “Essentially, emergency cover means being able to provide an equitable service across our diverse communities – diverse in terms of location and geography, in terms of the types of incidents we respond to, and also in terms of the people we serve, no matter who you are.

“We aim to achieve this by managing our resources, our budget and our people as effectively as possible.

“Balancing this against the current challenges to providing our services is also key – especially when our part time or on-call firefighters are not as available as they have been traditionally, when the risks faced by our communities are changing, for example with climate change and when the financial challenges are greater than ever.

“And it’s not just about responding to incidents – preventing them from happening in the first place is far better for everyone involved. Our prevention and protection work is therefore equally as important to helping to keep you safe.”