MC
I think there is some merit in your argument, however you have missed a few very important facts:
1. The MAJORITY (not all I know) of WT stations are somewhat busier than the MAJORITY of RT and thus may attend MORE incidents. That the RT may attend more of those at their station (in comparison with their WT colleagues) due to their commitment is not denied.
2. The job of a Ff is not just attending fires, indeed this is less than 10% of the role, that remaining areas are those that their RT colleague may not be doing at present. CFS, Comm Ed, Admin being some. These are now within the NOS and demonstrating competence will be essential.
3. You say "The retained system proves that incidents nationwide are handled more efficiently by well trained & highly experienced men that are able to bring additional skills into an incident assisting in the successful conclusion in most cases. " Whilst I am not denying the professionalism of the RT staff I do not consider that they handle incidents more efficiently, nor that there is any evidence to support this rather rash claim. Indeed there may be some who would argue that your point of 'well trained & highly experienced men' suggest the WT staff! I agree that additional skills, such as electrician, builder etc are useful at incidents, however it is not unusual to find that Ffs of either duty system are, or have been, of these professions. A good manager/IC, whatever their duty system, makes use of these skills.
In my experience there are some excellent RT personnel, and some awful WT. I cannot, however, fully defend a position that the training given to both is equal. There are elements of the WT courses that are wasteful of resources - such as many days of hose running (PS marching and 'bull****' are generally gone now - not fully but in my opinion they are importnat as the present loss of discipline is lamentable), but the opportunity to give a greater depth of knowledge and skills is not to be ignored. That the RT gain skills through add-on courses is true, however they do not, generally, receive the same level of development. This is not the FAULT of either set of personnel, rather a result of their duty systems and the managements inability to resource. This has to change with IPDS and the ways of ensuring equal development are challenging IPDS practitioners as we speak. One solution is to make the RT course modular over say three months, with self-study. The WT course is likely to reduce with the remaining develpment for both being 'in-service'. To give all employees the same training time this is a possible way of achieving 25, or so, initial Ff development days then a BA course.
For RT to develop to the same NOS then both the organisation and the individual will be expected to devote more time than has previously been the case, it will be interesting to see how this pans out. I know of few RT staff who could commit to MORE devlopment time, they already give us one training evening and a tremendous availability, how can they give more time to personal development whilst keeping a personal life and a main job? Time will tell.
PS I have little experience of a station with 24x7 RT, in y experience the vast majority are restricted and so equal about half that. More than that few of the WMs are really carrying out that role (see the NOS) yet are being paid more than their WT equivalents (all our stations had SubO in charge of RT stn or WT watch). I would trust them all in charge at fires but would doubt some in their management roles - not their fault either more an expression of their skills versus the expectation within the NOS. Just points of note.
