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Fire chiefs are risking people's lives

Essex fire chiefs are playing a dangerous game - and people could pay for it with their lives.

Essex fire chiefs are playing a dangerous game - and people could pay for it with their lives.

No doubt chief fire officer David Johnson thinks his posturing makes him look tough and decisive.

But telling striking firefighters not to come back to work is no such thing.

It's reckless, foolish and grossly irresponsible.

For the sake of a few cheap headlines Johnson is putting the safety of the entire county at needless risk.

He is also slandering his county's dedicated, overworked and underpaid fire crews by implying they would turn up to work drunk, straight from New Year's Eve celebrations.

This is not the behaviour we would expect of a man responsible for running a vital public service.

And never mind that it's the height of hypocrisy for a man who once charged the taxpayer £20,000 when he moved house to now turn round and moan about paying firefighters to go to bed.

We have to ask: which side is David Johnson on? Is he on the side of a safe and efficient fire service? Is he on the side of the nearly two million people whose lives depend on his fire crews?

Is he on the side of the firefighters themselves who have warned time and again that the government's pension changes put their safety and the public's safety at needless risk?

Or is he on the side of the Con-Dems who are hell bent on destroying our public services one after another and don't care how many lives are lost as collateral damage?

Draw your own conclusion from the fact that Johnson would rather smear and bully his own workers than talk honestly about what lies in store for the fire service if these changes go ahead.

But one thing is clear.

If a single life is lost on New Year's Day as a result of Johnson's actions then the finger of blame will be pointing squarely at him and no-one else.

Rip-off rail fare rises must end

Christmas has come early for well-heeled rail executives and shareholders.

For everyone else yesterday's rail fare rises meant an even bleaker midwinter and another heavy blow to households already battling unemployment, pay freezes, benefit cuts and rocketing fuel bills.

This annual festival of greed has become a fixture almost as predictable as Christmas itself.

And rail passengers can draw little festive cheer from the shadow transport secretary's feeble mumblings about "timely information" and a "tough cap on rail fares."

Rail fares don't need capping. They need prising from the grasp of the greedy profiteers who are bleeding our network dry.

This year's honourable exception to the nationwide rail rip-off - publicly owned East Coast - proved conclusively that the only place for railways is in our hands.

Labour urgently needs to listen to rail workers, passengers and the public - and give them the Christmas present of a renationalised rail network.

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