The Guernsey Fire and Rescue Service start negotiating their pay award in the middle of 2010.

A spokesman for the Guernsey Fire and Rescue Service – the Town brigade – said their pay negotiations were not due to start until the middle of next year.

‘We’ll want to have the details of what has been agreed by then, but we have time and there’ll be no knee-jerk reaction,’ he said.

While there was a certain amount of overlap, he said, the two groups were ultimately separate entities, with one employed by Public Services [airport] and the other by the Home Department.

‘It’s human nature that if a colleague gets more than you, you will want the same but we don’t know the facts yet,’ he said. ‘It can get complicated when you start going into allowances because some things are pensionable and others are not. There could be ramifications if they have had a big pay rise, but at this stage it’s too early to say.’

He sympathised with the airport firefighters’ problems with recruitment and retention and cover arrangements.