A major fire broke out at a business premises in East Auckland on Friday afternoon, sending thick smoke into the air as professional firefighters were off duty due to planned industrial action.
According to a report by Chris Marriner of Stuff, the fire, which started at grocery business Pita House on Cortina Pl in Pakuranga, was reported at about 12.07 pm, just seven minutes after members of the New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union (NZPFU) stopped work between 12 pm and 1 pm.
Fire and Emergency New Zealand (Fenz) said the strike action significantly delayed the response. A local business owner told Stuff that by 12.30 pm, only a Fenz four-wheel-drive vehicle was at the scene, with fire trucks arriving later. Nearby businesses were evacuated to rugby fields as flames intensified, Chris Marriner of Stuff has reported.
Fenz said a standard response time would have been seven minutes, but because of the strike, crews took about 30 minutes to arrive. Witness Tyrone Burne said strong winds fuelled “large, dark orange flames”, and smoke could be smelled across a wide area, as quoted by Stuff.
A spokesperson for Hato Hone St John confirmed one person, in serious condition, was taken to Middlemore Hospital. Stuff understands the injured person works at Pita House.
Fenz deputy national commander Megan Stiffler said the fire threatened a neighbouring property and blamed the delayed response on the industrial action.
“Due to the location, it took 30 minutes for the nearest volunteer crews to travel to the incident,” he said. “The nearest career station is Mount Wellington, and they would have arrived on scene within seven minutes,” as quoted by Stuff.
Stiffler said Fenz had urged the union to cancel the strike, adding that Friday’s incident reinforced its concerns.
“We previously sought to establish a process to which we can call in NZPFU members if there was a large-scale incident but were rebuffed,” he said, accusing the union of “gambling with the public’s safety” by “rejecting calls to set up a process to respond to more serious incidents,” Stuff has quoted.
The NZPFU said Fenz was responsible, responding on its Facebook page: “Fenz say they have contingencies. Fenz could have prevented this. They could have averted this strike at any time,” Stuff has quoted.
Union vice president Martin Campbell told the NZ Herald Fenz’s comments were “disgusting”.
“To be frank, it’s incredibly disappointing that Fire and Emergency are blaming firefighters and 111 emergency dispatchers for their failures to actually present a fair and reasonable offer for over almost two years now to the membership, and has allowed the situation to drag on to the state that, unfortunately, today’s terrible event has occurred,” he said, as quoted by Stuff.
“I think it’s a little bit disgusting, to be perfectly honest, that they’re throwing stones at a moment when, obviously, the building is still on fire,” he said, Stuff has quoted.
Campbell said firefighters attended the scene as soon as the strike ended at 1pm.
Government ministers Brooke van Velden and Simeon Brown supported Fenz and criticised the union. Van Velden, the MP for Tāmaki and Minister for Workplace Relations, thanked volunteer firefighters and said: “Enough is enough. The NZPFU needs to stop gambling with people’s lives and safety and stop these strikes.”
Brown, the MP for Pakuranga and Minister of Health, said the incident caused “awful scenes” in his electorate.
“I am angry on behalf of those impacted as this fire happened while the NZPF union was striking. Union action that delays a response to an emergency is quite frankly reckless and the union needs to put a stop to these reckless strikes which endanger lives, homes, and businesses,” as quoted by Stuff.
Nearby dog grooming business Eastside Pups was also at risk. Worker Katie, who asked not to publish her surname, said there were ten dogs and two staff inside when the fire started in Pita House’s chimney.
“It was taking ages and I was actually freaking out because we have dogs on the premises that we’re looking after and we weren’t sure whether we had to evacuate,” she told Stuff.
“It was getting really quite scary and the flames were getting closer,” Stuff has quoted.
Katie said volunteer firefighters brought the fire under control within 15 minutes of arriving. While disappointed by the slow response, she said she was unsure about the reasons behind the industrial action.
“Maybe it’s just bad timing,” she said, Stuff has reported.
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