NO matter by what yardstick it is measured, fire safety in several Lancashire towns - including those in the Accrington area in East Lancashire - looks likely to be reduced if part-time firefighters based there are sacked and fire engines are scrapped.

Fewer of each inevitably means a reduced service and reduced cover.

But this departure is evidently deemed within safety limits - both by Lancashire's Combined Fire Authority and HM Inspectorate for Fire Safety.

Yet is not doubt cast on these expert views when we find the Home Office, even in the light of the confidence of the Inspectorate and the Fire Authority that the cuts proposed for Accrington, Leyland and Lancaster will not put safety in jeopardy, asking the fire chiefs to think again?

It may be that the fresh round of consultation that Home Office minister Mike O'Brien ordered them to hold with the local authorities involved was so that the concerns voiced by the MPs for the affected towns were seen to be heeded, but, even so, the recognition by this government department of the necessity, surely, suggests that there is cause for misgivings. Now, the process has been completed - and the Fire Authority stands by the original proposals which were driven by wide-ranging budget cuts.

Few would envy their responsibility in having to tailor resources to need within the constraints of tight budgets.

But if these fire crews and fire engines which are set to axed were engaged in the first place within such circumstances to meet a manifest need, who can say with certainty that they are no longer needed?

We just hope the decision is the right one. For this is not one of those cuts in services that entail reduced hours at the public libraries or grass verges being cut less often. It comes down to putting the lives of people and the protection of their homes and workplaces at a greater risk, no matter what they say.

If they have got it wrong, it will be to the people that they will have to account, not the balance sheet.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.