FIREFIGHTERS and fire stations across Essex could be cut as the Government presses public bodies to save money.

Essex Fire and Rescue Service has launched a comprehensive review of operations, ahead of likely funding cuts and a council tax freeze.

The fire service says it cannot rule out job losses or the closure of fire stations. However, if the review says they are needed, new fire stations could be opened in better locations.

Fire chiefs in Essex fear they may have to cut as much as £7.5million – a tenth of their budget to meet Government demands.

Under Essex Fire and Rescue’s fire cover review, both full-time and part-time stations could close, with firefighters losing their jobs.

Deputy chief fire officer Gordon Hunter said: “While some of this saving required can be found from ‘back office’ functions, it is not feasible to respond to a financial challenge of this magnitude without also considering frontline resource allocation as well.”

He warned against pre-empting the conclusions of the new fire cover review, but said the service could not rule out redundancies among the county’s firefighters who currently number almost 1,400.

He said: “I can’t categorically say firefighters won’t be made redundant. It would be silly of me to forecast the outcome of the review before it has started.

“We have been reviewing our capability and part of that process has been reviewing the number of officers we have.

“But we won’t know the outcome of that until the review has been carried out.

“For the past two or three years we have been managing our vacancies on the front line as best we can.

“We haven’t been hiring new recruits as much as we used to. There has been a lot of natural wastage.”

Mr Hunter said, as part of the review, there was a distinct possibility some fire stations might have to close.

He added: “If we were creating Essex Fire and Rescue Service today, as a new organisation, we wouldn’t have our resources in exactly the same position as they are at the moment.

“We regularly look at our fire cover and this has been brought forward because of the cuts the new government is banding about.

“What we are trying to do is to see how best, by reviewing what we have, we can still deliver a good service with decreasing budgets.

“It could mean new fire stations in better locations.”

The fire cover review is expected to take as long as four months, with the findings going before the Essex Fire Authority in November.