Union man's horror at fire cuts plans

He insists this wouldn't impact the service, but Mr Jones said: "The FBU is astonished
to hear this. This is a densely populated urban area, which includes stretches of the M3 and M25.

"The closures, in conjunction with the high level of traffic congestion in the area, would lead to dangerously increased response times. Quite simply, delayed response times can make the difference between us rescuing casualties or recovering bodies."

Mr Pearson further suggested there was no need for stations to be manned 24 hours per day with dedicated staff, pointing out most call outs occur during rush hours.

But Mr Jones, who claims Surrey was rated 36th out 48 authorities for response times, said: "Two thirds of all fire deaths occur at night when people are sleeping. Spelthorne has suffered 3 Fire deaths over the last 13 months and fire fighters have rescued far more people from fires, road crashes and other incidents in that same period."

Mr Pearson is keen for the brigade to use greater numbers of 'retained' - part-time - staff for the night-time periods, another policy with which Mr Jones strongly disagrees.

"There has been a reduction in front-line firefighters of 14% between 2004 and 2009 and he wants further cuts, in the full knowledge 25% of Surrey's fire engines are not available during office hours on weekdays due to an ongoing inability to recruit sufficient retained staff."

Mr Jones added: "The FBU does support Mr Pearson's view that the south of the county needs better fire cover, but disagrees this should be at the cost of the existing cover in the north."

Plans are due to be reviewed in April.