4. How does the Minister ensure that the fire service benefits the people of South Wales West? OQ58647

I continue to work with the fire and rescue services across Wales to ensure that people, communities and the environment are kept as safe as possible from fires and other hazards. In the longer term, we remain committed to ensuring the sustainability and safety of the services and to broadening the role of firefighters.

I'm grateful to you for your answer. I wanted to draw your attention to the terrible fire at Windmill Farm, a much-loved rural hotel and wedding venue on the Gower peninsula, in the heart of my South Wales West region. The blaze spread rapidly across the property, and firefighting efforts were delayed by an insufficient water supply to operate the hoses and the time taken in transporting a bowser to the scene. Having met with the owners of the venue myself, I've seen first-hand the stress, heartbreak and financial cost that has been borne as a result of the fire. So, I think it's crucial that, regardless of administrative boundaries, all local fire authorities can come together to ensure that crucial equipment such as bowsers are located in areas that best serve the needs of local communities.

In England, fire and rescue authorities must attempt to enter into reinforcement schemes or mutual aid agreements with other fire and rescue authorities for securing mutual assistance. They're also obliged to respond to incidents such as fire, road traffic collisions and other emergencies within their areas, in line with their mutual aid agreements too. Therefore, Minister, will you commit to working with the fire and rescue service and Welsh Water to ensure that vital firefighting equipment such as bowsers are installed in the right places to maximise geographic cover across Wales, regardless of which fire authority boundary someone lives in, to ensure that a tragedy like that won't be repeated?

I thank the Member for his supplementary question, and my heart goes out to the people whose premises were destroyed in this terrible, terrible fire. I'm aware of the incident that he refers to, of the operational challenges in terms of access to water for Dŵr Cymru and the Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service. It's an operational matter for those services, but I'd be more than happy to follow up to see, actually, if more can be done in our regular meetings with the fire and rescue services to ensure that these things, if there are any concerns, are acted upon proactively rather than reactively in the future.

In South Wales West, we have different boundaries for the police service and the fire and rescue service, with the ambulance service on an all-Wales basis. Has the Minister considered consulting on reorganising the fire service so that its boundaries mirror the police boundaries?

I thank Mike Hedges for his question. I think what Mike means is not necessarily—. Some of the fire and rescue service boundaries are aligned with those of local health boards, but the footprints are not the same in terms of the area that they cover. I could say that there aren't any plans to align those boundaries, as I understand it. However, what we are focused on at the moment is actually where organisations can work together or co-locate; we know that that has a positive result, not just in terms of the services working together, but in terms of the relationships that have been able to be built up between them. Just a point of interest on that, in the Member's region, the mid and west fire and rescue service covers Swansea and Neath Port Talbot, which are both near South Wales Police, but the two organisations have a long-established relationship and share the same control room, and we've seen the co-location of services where we've got ambulance and fire and rescue, and that's something that we're keen to support as a Government. 

Question 5 [OQ58641] is withdrawn. Question 6, Peter Fox.