BBC website is reporting the sentence handed down to the County Council over the tragic deaths of four firefighters in 2007: http://www.bbc.co.uk/new...ry-warwickshire-20637819 This is the one where the senior Fire Officers were charged with manslaughter, later dropped.

On the one hand, the fine is pathetically low. But what does fining a council - the local people - actually achieve? A £500,000 or £1m fines just robs local communities of funds,, and in these difficult times may even lead to cuts in the county fire service. I am aware of many huge mistakes that occurred here. One of which originated by the fact that more than one county fire service attended. I am also aware that at the very highest level in Government, work is going on to make fire service kit, PPE, and most importantly, training & procedures more uniform to allow a seamless joins operationally where different counties meet. This and other initiatives were born or motivated as a result of this dreadful fire. I believe that this is where time and effort should be spent rather than transferring one pot of cash from one public dept to another. I also hope the Govt think again about fire service training. IMO, it's largely broken and ineffective. Training budgets are being slashed, and training depts out sourced. Operational firefighter's time taken up with installing smoke detectors for the public rather than preparing for emergencies, plus promotion standards have fallen in recent years. I have been say for years that this brave new world of putting training last on the list of priorities will end in tears. Perhaps some of those tears have already been spilled. It's important that lessons learned are acted on.