During a GMTV interview on November 13, Labour Party chairman Dr Ian Reid MP informed viewers there were 40 applicants for each firefighter's position, that firefighters work only four days a week and that a large percentage of these firefighters have a second form of employment.

Firefighters receive £21,000 a year. Divide this by 52 (weeks a year) and the total is £403.84. If this figure is divided by four (days a week), the average firefighter's income is £100.96 a day.

I wonder how many people in the South East earn more than £100 a day?

Now take into consideration the firefighters' £9,000 wage increase that their union and its members are demanding and again divide this figure by 52. It equals to £173.07 a week.

This divided by four and added to the firefighters' present wage results in £144.22 a day.

I agree firefighters' pay needs to be reviewed. My suggestion would be that they receive a flat hourly rate of pay that would be less than their current rate and that an additional payment be made for every emergency call-out, which would be increased or decreased to reflect the amount of danger the firefighter has to encounter.

For example, if blue watch is on duty and attends one house fire and a cat rescue and the following white watch is called out to attend three house fires, a chemical accident and a train crash, it seems to me, under the present wage system, all those firefighters are paid the same amount of money although the workloads are completely different.

-Lord Brett Reginald McLean of Hastings, Parliamentary Spokesman for Hastings and Rye, The Rock 'n' Roll Loony Party