Questions and answers

Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)

Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

Question reference: S6W-39801

Asked by: Katy Clark, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 06 August 2025
Current Status: Answered by Siobhian Brown on 21 August 2025

To ask the Scottish Government, further to the answer to the fourth supplementary to question S6O-02531 by Siobhian Brown on 20 September 2023, in light of the minister’s comment that Scotland is “maintaining frontline services by having a higher number of firefighters than there is in other parts of the UK”, whether it can confirm how many firefighters there are in Scotland, and how this compares with the rest of the UK, also broken down by how many firefighters from (a) Scotland and (b) the rest of the UK are currently available for operational service and are employed (i) in a full-time equivalent (FTE) role or (ii) on a retained duty system (RDS), and how it ensures that, when calculating these figures, it does not double-count firefighters in Scotland who hold dual contracts with the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service as both FTE and RDS staff.

In answering Parliamentary Questions in relation to firefighter numbers, the Scottish Government uses nationally available Official Statistics from the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) and for comparative numbers, the Welsh and UK Governments.

Current Official Statistics for the SFRS in 2023/24 (statistics for 24/25 will be published on 29 August 2025) show that at 31 March 2024 there were 3,419 wholetime operational staff, 55 Retained full-time and 166 Operational Control staff all of whom are considered to be wholetime firefighters. There were 2,708 Retained Duty and 269 Volunteer firefighters which are considered to be On-Call firefighters. Both the wholetime and on-call firefighter numbers are added together to show the total number of firefighters in Scotland. The full Scottish Statistics can be found at FSOS2023-2024Statistics.pdf. Comparable statistics for Wales and England are available at Personnel (headcount) by employment type and Fire and Rescue Service area and Fire statistics data tables - GOV.UK.

SFRS statistics count individual staff who are on dual contracts twice, once in their wholetime operational role and once in their On Call role as they are two distinct and separate jobs with separate contracts. Scottish Government does not hold details on Scottish or UK firefighters that are currently available for operational service and employed on an FTE or RDS role.

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Question reference: S6W-39801

Answer