A SCOTTISH Fire and Rescue group commander has told a Peebles meeting recruiting firefighters is "challenging".

Keith Langley spoke at a gathering of the town’s community council (PCC) last Thursday to allay fears, following the swimming pool fire on June 19, that the area does not have enough on-call personnel.

Mr Langley said: “In Peebles, SFRS (the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service) has difficulty to staff the second appliance – historically we have struggled with that.”

Mr Langley talked PCC members through a timeline of the swimming pool fire – from the first call to the Edinburgh control room at 2.51am, till firefighters were stood down at 6am.

That Sunday morning, Mr Langley said sickness and holidays caused the on-call Peebles pump not to be available for the first time in 38 weeks.

PCC member Peter Maudsley said: “From my understanding an appliance was there in a very short space of time but the fire did a lot of damage.”

Mr Langley added: “Very few people (who could train as firefighters) live and work in Peebles and are prepared to commit to 80 hours a week.

“We are facing challenges in recruiting on-call firefighters across the Borders.

“Staffing is a challenge, it is not unique to Peebles, it is across Scotland.

“Since June 19 we have recruited one new firefighter and have another in line.”

PCC chairman Les Turnbull said: “We are a vibrant town with lots of hotels and we do hope SFRS is able to guarantee, should the shout come, that it is able to respond.”

Mr Turnbull added that there could be 1700 to 1800 new homes in Peebles in the future and wondered if fire service provision is factored in to these developments.

Mr Langley replied: “Modern buildings are far safer with hard wired alarms and nationally fire deaths have dropped by 60 per cent.”

It was stated that there are between 150 and 200 calls on the fire service a year within Peebles but that many are for car accidents.

Mr Langley added that firefighters in small towns, such as Peebles, take extra risks and face pressure because they know many of the people they are trying to help.

Mr Turnbull said: “We do appreciate the risks our retained firefighters in the town are put under.”