THE mayor of Holsworthy has led the town’s concerns regarding the potential loss of fire service contracts.

In his address to Devon County Council’s health and adult care scrutiny committee, Cllr Jon Hutchings said: “The scheme in our community of Holsworthy was borne out of tragic deaths within the town when our local ambulance was already committed on other calls. The wait was over an hour for another ambulance. The scheme has developed and matured over the last 26 years into an essential part of the community and surrounding areas emergency response.

“Holsworthy, I believe, has six community first responders, three have employment out of the town, one is not available at present, and one only responds when working in pairs. When alerted, they can choose to accept or decline to respond and then proceed at normal road speed in their own vehicle. The fire crew, when alerted, respond to all calls, are sent in a dedicated blue light vehicle supplied by the fire service. The fire crew are available by virtue of their retained fire contracts 24/7.

“Why, if the volunteer scheme is shortly to take over, did Holsworthy Fire Station have approximately 200 category one medical calls in 2024 and over 70 so far in 2025? Not only are they covering our community and surrounding village, they often go to Bude and even Launceston. The fire co-responders only respond to category one calls which are the most urgent and life threatening. The response times for category one is seven minutes so how can you sustain that in a rural area using volunteers?”

Cllr Hutchings also questioned the disparity in training, stating that the understood that the volunteer responders have two medical procedures available to them that the co-responders have not been offered training for, while adding that the fire co-responders have skills concerning severe trauma.

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