A massive shake-up of fire service cover in the Bradford district could lead to “casualties and loss of life”, a union boss has warned.

The warning came after it was revealed that even more stations in the region are under threat of closure.

The Yorkshire Fire Brigade Union (FBU) said “savage” Government cuts of about £12 million to the West Yorkshire Brigade’s budget over the next two years have led to fire chiefs drawing up plans to scale back cover at stations across the district.

Under the plans, which can be revealed today by the Telegraph & Argus, Shipley and Idle stations will be closed and their crews merged at a new fire station at a location still to be disclosed.

Haworth ’s station – which is manned by a retained crew – is also earmarked for closure.

There will also be a reduction in the number of appliances from two to one at Fairweather Green and Odsal stations in Bradford.

Pete Smith, FBU regional secretary for Yorkshire and Humberside, said the proposed shake-up, which will be put before a meeting of West Yorkshire Fire Authority in September, would be “detrimental to public and firefighter safety”.

“Unfortunately, they are prepared to put lives at risk just to make some cuts to suit the Coalition Government,” said Mr Smith.

“We have already been cut back too far and it is now impossible to cut any more.

“These cuts are savage and there will be a massive incident resulting in casualties or loss of life.”

Stephen Hardy, a spokesman for the fire service and authority, said plans had been put forward as part of the service’s integrated risk management planning process to review fire cover.

Following a similar review last year, the decision was taken to replace ten fire stations with five new stations – with the loss of 135 front-line firefighters – a move described by the FBU at the time as a “bonfire of the fire service”.

It was announced that stations at Rawdon , Otley , Brighouse , Elland, Gipton, Stanks, Hemsworth, South Elmsall, Batley and Dewsbury would close – to be replaced by new stations at Menston , Rastrick and Killingbeck.

Menston was to become a “close call” station, staffed by full-time firefighters who are on-call from nearby night-time accommodation.

As part of the latest proposals, a national resilience command unit, which provides specialist kit such as computers for commanders at major incidents, will be based at Odsal and a back-up appliance will remain at Silsden .

However, since it has been based in Silsden, the resilience pump has been sent to Keighley and Halifax in April and May – effectively leaving Silsden with one appliance.

Councillor Adrian Naylor (Ind, Craven) said a lack of cover for Silsden would lead to “unacceptable” delays in crews reaching fires in the area.

He said there were concerns that crews from elsewhere would not know the area, which would lead to further delays in them reaching the scenes of fires.

Mr Hardy said the public would be consulted, if necessary, on the proposed changes between September and December, following the next authority meeting on September 7.

He said: “Over the next two years West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority will possibly face a budget shortfall of around £12m, so it is inevitable that we will have to spread resources more thinly if we are to ensure there are no serious gaps in emergency provision.

“About 50 options are being explored, ranging from fire station mergers downwards, so until the chief fire officer has finalised the recommendations which he will present to the fire authority, it would be wrong to rule anything in or anything out.”

Bradford Councillor Valerie Binney , the Council’s Conservative representative on the West Yorkshire Fire Authority, did not want to comment on the plans before September’s meeting.

But Shipley Councillor Martin Love , leader of Bradford Council’s Green Party Group, described the proposed cuts as “very short-sighted”.

He said: “I would have thought keeping open as many fire stations as possible would be the way forward to protect people’s safety.

“I can understand that the fire service is being forced into this by huge cuts in Government central funding, but it is another unacceptable face of the Coalition’s austerity programme. They are playing with people’s lives.”