SOME retained firefighters in the district will be asked to become emergency first responders for the Yorkshire Ambulance Service (YAS) under new plans set to be given the go-ahead by West Yorkshire fire chiefs.

YAS has approached West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (WYFRS) to develop the partnership to improve response times in rural areas, having already established a similar programme in Humberside.

Ilkley has been identified as one of three fire stations - along with Featherstone and Skelmanthorpe - to pilot the scheme, but the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) warned that firefighters would only take on the extra responsibility for the money and could be forced off work due to the added stress.

Under the new plans, which have been recommended for approval by the Full West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority when it meets tomorrow, retained firefighters would be asked to support YAS in responding to life-threatening medical emergencies within its target time of eight minutes.

An on-call firefighter would be mobilised as a first responder within a six-minute radius of their home or fire station, supporting a YAS response to the same call.

According to data released in June, YAS responded to 69.9 per cent of its 20,200 'Red 1' calls - those deemed to be the most serious and time-critical, such as heart attacks - within eight minutes to the year ending March 31, down from 77.4 per cent in 2013/14.

The first responder would used a marked car to travel to and from each incident, adopting a separate uniform to identify the role they are carrying out.

If the pilot schemes - set to run from April next year to March 2017 - prove successful, the model could be used to incorporate more retained fire stations across the county.

The report outlining the scheme states: "Carrying out the emergency first responder (EFR) role will up-skill the workforce by creating transferable skills, improve response times to life-threatening emergencies within the respective communities, and reduce mortality rates.

"The EFR role will also reduce operational pressures on YAS in rural areas, enabling them to focus resources on the higher-risk, more-populated urban areas.

"In addition to this, it will most likely improve recruitment and retention of personnel at our retained duty system stations, making them more sustainable."

David Williams, secretary for the FBU in West Yorkshire, said retained firefighters would volunteer to take on the new role, but mainly due to pay restrictions placed on them in recent years.

"They will do it predominantly for the money, that's no secret," he said.

"The biggest issue in West Yorkshire is that we had the opportunity to be involved in formal national trials for this scheme, but WYFRS chose not to take part.

"We had the opportunity to mould something nationally, but decided not to and we don't know why, it's really disappointing.

"There are also concerns these plans could expose our members to greater levels of risk.

"If you are a firefighter in a rural setting you might rarely have come across a fatality, but as first responders they could be sent to one every few weeks.

"We could potentially end up losing firefighters due to the stress of dealing with such incidents as part of their dual roles."