Professional Firefighters will meet with their bosses at Fire and Emergency New Zealand today, following partial strike action that started on Monday.

The Firefighters Union said it’s been warning FENZ about the staff shortages and mental health issues for years, but their concerns have fallen on deaf ears.

New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union Vice President Joe Stanley told Chris Lynch last night “FENZ is refusing to appropriately recognise the impact of medical response for firefighters and 111 call centre dispatchers.”

“From 2013, professional career firefighters have been undertaking medical response to the most serious life-threatening cases.”

St John’s data shows firefighters respond to 96% of all out of hospital cardiac arrests.

“Firefighters have never been remunerated for this work which takes a significant toll on their mental health and wellbeing.”

National’s Fire and Emergency spokesperson Todd Muller said “it is appalling that firefighters risk their lives every day but feel unsupported and unheard by their workplace.”

“Despite a revenue bump that is 40 percent higher than predicted for the 2021/22 financial year after the 2017 merger, the organisation is still unable to address pay concerns, improve working conditions, manage frontline workloads or even invest in the right equipment. 

“FENZ’s frivolous spending has extended to $423,000 on fire hoses that have since been banned after months of concerns that they were failing and putting $10m into a rebranding project with little to show except bucket hats and soft-shell jackets.”