FireNet Community
FIRE SERVICE AND GENERAL FIRE SAFETY TOPICS => Operational => Topic started by: Midland Retty on March 19, 2009, 12:30:40 PM
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Does anyone know yet if Firebuy's "National Identity Uniform" for the UK Fire Service has been finalised? Or has it all now died a death?
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Look at the Firebuy website, it has been out for ages and was shown at the Emergency Services show last November. It is great quality and an hideous colour. Fortunately the colour is receiving a verypoor reception and has yet to be taken up by any service! Strange how every one of their, very little publicised, consulatations came out with dark blue as the preference - yet they produced a delivery driver grey! Stranger still most ofl the services who are going for new styles are going for dark blue..................
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I retired from the fire service last year and was dismayed at the proposed uniform
The colour scheme as you say is hideous. Also there was too much emphasis on a "corporate" image as opposed to an emergency service image.
One of the main issues I had was that the colour scheme and indeed lack of markings meant that the uniform looked like any corporate wear worn by a number of professions and didnt actually do anything to show that the wearer was a firefighter.
This has inherent problems. The uniform didn't look "official" enough. For inspectors or firefighters in non emergency situations but where there presence called for an image which stated that they had authority for all the right reasons we found people saying " who are you" instead of " oh you are from the fire service"
The proposed uniform has been on the firebuy website for yonks fireftrm, but if you notice there is a lack of high resolution photographs or detailed information. We were told during the very poor consultation process about the colours not permitted to be used in the uniform because :-
Cant use blue or black because the police use it
cant use red as that is used by the royal mail / parcel force use it
cant use orange because the highways agency use it
cant use gold cos thats used by whomever
cant use such and such cos so and so use it
And on and on; so much so that only grey was left The fact is we need to look different from other emergency services, but the argument that blue is used by police is a non starter. My local bus drivers wear blue shirts with eppaulettes. My local hospital porters wear blue shirts the same shade as police officers. No one says to them "oh you cant wear blue in case you look remotely a bit like a copper!"
Im sorry but a uniform still has to be semi formal, so that people immediately know at a glance they are dealing with personnel from the fire service who maybe present on official business, and may need information and co-operation fast without too much messing about in establishing identity etc. Most of all it has to look smart and professional and again readily identifiable to members of the public who may spot them and need assistance. Making it a corporate " anonymous" almost civilinised set of clothing is not the way forward.
Im afraid the current uniform doesnt have enough conspicuty or formal presence, and looks like Joe Bloggs walked into a print shop and asked the words "Fire Rescue " to be printed on their shirt which is most concerning.
Im yet to see a brigade apart from Hereford and Worcester actually adopt it. Police paramedics and Coastguard staff have good functional - identifiable modern uniform - why cant the fire service have it in their new national identity scheme? The fact is that the service is further being dumbed down
It isnt a bout posing - it is about showing identification, readily and easily to members of the public for legitimate and safety reasons.
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There is very little info available on the firebuy website. And it hasn't been updated for quite sometime, which made me wonder if the whole thing had been mothballed.
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Chieftain Retty, As a young trendy, and a fine example of sartorial elegance myself, I am prepared (for a fee of course) to design a standard uniform (especially for female fire-fighters).
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I'm not talking to you Mr Todd!
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I think the idea of a 'National Identity Uniform' sounds like a good idea.
Chieftain Retty, As a young trendy, and a fine example of sartorial elegance myself, I am prepared (for a fee of course) to design a standard uniform (especially for female fire-fighters).
I would of course be willing to model the female firefighting uniforms 8) for you Mr Todd (for a fee of course) ;)
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I think the idea of a 'National Identity Uniform' sounds like a good idea.
Chieftain Retty, As a young trendy, and a fine example of sartorial elegance myself, I am prepared (for a fee of course) to design a standard uniform (especially for female fire-fighters).
I would of course be willing to model the female firefighting uniforms 8) for you Mr Todd (for a fee of course) ;)
I think that a female firefighters uniform designed by CT and modelled by Cat would be something to behold. Anyone out there good at cartoons? (for no fee of course).
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Pink!!!!!! With a pink baseball cap ;D