Front line fire fighters have called on the Government to abandon its scheme to build a new regional fire control centre.

The Fire Brigades Union said its members in the region believed the money would be better spent on more staff, training and equipment.

The union has consistently opposed the plan to replace emergency fire control rooms covering East and West Sussex, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, the Isle of Wight and Oxfordshire, Kent and Surrey with a single centre based at Fareham in Hampshire.

The union said the South East regional control was set to be fully operational by September 2011. The cost of the rent will be £54m over 25 years, it added.

Nearly all (98 per cent) union members polled in a survey in the region said the regional control centre plan should not go ahead.

FBU regional secretary Karl Horan said: "South East fire crews have almost no confidence in the Government's ability to deliver this new system and think it should be scrapped.

"This project is being forced down the throat of local fire services by a central government which thinks it knows what's best for local services. We see the mess Government is making of other major IT projects like tax credits and the NHS system and we don't want to see that happening in the fire service. These plans are already chaotic, years behind schedule and running over-budget."

A spokesman for the Communities and Local Government Department said the project was aimed at creating a more resilient fire service.

"In today's world of industrial accidents, terrorist attacks and large scale natural disasters we need to build resilience at national, regional and local levels. Given these threats, doing nothing is not an option."

The spokesman said the Government was committed to delivering the scheme on time and on budget.