Simon Kirby, MP for Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven pleased at concessions from the Government on firefighters pensions.
Mr Kirby said: “I work hard to represent all my constituents and I know how concerned firefighters were at proposals to change their pension arrangements. I was happy to stand up for hard-working firefighters who are genuinely concerned about the future of their pensions.”
“That is why I arranged the meeting with the Minister to press again the concerns being raised by firefighters regarding their pension rights.
“I was very pleased that the Minister clearly listened very carefully to the points I made and there was welcome movement on issues like ill health retirement and fitness levels.”
The National Framework for Fire and Rescue England will ensure that no individual automatically faces dismissal if they fall below fitness standards and cannot be deployed operationally. The Government has also included an additional requirement that, should a firefighter fail a fitness test through no fault of their own, the fire and rescue authority will consider suitable alternative employment, and if that is not possible, and the employee is at least aged 55, consider an authority initiated retirement.
These principles will ensure that no firefighter faces a situation where they are forced to retire without access to a fair pension where they lose fitness through no fault of their own.
The Government have published an addendum to the National Framework and are making the necessary Statutory Instrument to bring it in to force.
Mr Kirby added: “I voted for the Statutory Instrument to make sure firefighters get a fair pension with strong transitional protections.”
Nancy Platts, Labour Parliamentary candidate for Brighton Kemptown & Peacehaven, said: “Conservative MP Simon Kirby has let down local firefighters by voting for changes to their pension scheme that will leave them worse off. If he really valued firefighters he would have voted to annul the regulations and advised the minister to work towards a negotiated settlement as we have seen in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland.
“If you ask any firefighter, I doubt they will share Mr Kirby’s sentiments that this imposed new pension scheme is fair. Firefighters risk their lives to save ours and they deserve better than this.
“The Labour Party frontbench secured a full Parliamentary debate to hold the Government to account because the proposed changes to the firefighters pension scheme were based on an assumption about a dangerously low fitness standard, which would put public safety and the lives of firefighters at risk.
“If a more robust fitness standard is implemented it would mean that the assumptions on which the Government’s pension regulations are based would no longer be valid. The result would be that a number of firefighters who try to maintain fitness would be unable to meet these operational standards into their late 50s through no fault of their own.
“None of the statements made by the Government have reassured firefighters and there is still the very real possibility that after serving their communities for decades they will be in the position of having no job or pension. Instead firefighters will be forced to choose between taking a significantly reduced pension or having their pension deferred. Mr Kirby is just repeating the spin and misinformation that we heard from the Conservative Fire Minister in the Commons recently.
“This Conservative/Liberal Democrat Government has presided over 48 separate periods of strike action by firefighters in England since September 2013 and, after more than three years of dispute; they have failed to negotiate a fair and sustainable solution.”
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