LABOUR WRONG TO AXE MANCHESTER'S FIRE CONTROL CENTRE - LEECH

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Sat 13th Aug 2005

Manchester Withington Liberal Democrat MP John Leech has condemned the Labour Government's decision to locate the Regional Fire and Rescue Service for the whole North West at Lingley Mere in Warrington.

This will mean the closure of the current Greater Manchester call centre at Swinton, which has recently had significant financial investment.

John, along with 126 other MP's, had called for an independent assessment of the business case before the Regional Fire Call Centres were set up.

John Leech said today, "Given the Government's appalling track record on IT schemes, the size of the North West Region and the fact that civil servants have warned that there is a "high risk" of "total project failure", the Government should not be pressing on with one centre for the whole North West. Why are they trying to fix something in Greater Manchester that isn't broken?"

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