Dresden (dpa/sn) – The Saxon government is adapting the law on fire protection, rescue services and civil protection in the Free State to the challenges. “If it leaves parliament like this, it will be the most modern law in Germany,” said Interior Minister Armin Schuster (CDU) on Tuesday after the cabinet meeting in Dresden. “A lot of crises” were evaluated for the amendment, up to knowledge of the forest fire in Gohrischheide in the last few days. Schuster named the restriction of competition in the rescue service or the equality of helpers as important changes. In addition, for the first time there is a regulation on cooperation to protect critical infrastructure.
According to this, municipalities and counties will only have to advertise rescue services across Europe in the future if commercial providers are among the applicants. According to Schuster, this reduces cost pressure in the emergency services, improves the quality of services and working conditions. It is also planned to “finally create a uniform regulation” for time off, necessary medical examinations and continued payment of wages by employers, including for helpers and volunteers.
In the case of large-scale operations such as the fire in Gohrischheide, a nationwide management and support program for municipalities is intended to help distribute tasks. “It was no longer a situation for a community,” said Schuster. The district’s resources were quickly exhausted. The draft stipulates that the Free State will provide financial help to the municipalities with fire protection in special situations.
In view of the development in recent years “and especially months”, it is necessary that authorities are prepared for a failure of critical infrastructure and its effects. Uniform criteria for the protection of critical infrastructure are to be developed in order to increase resilience.
The draft also includes an experimentation clause for the emergency services. The ambulance should only be used as an “intensive care unit on wheels” for appropriate cases, said Schuster. For other things, alternative concepts are tried out as models, also against the background that there are fewer and fewer emergency doctors and paramedics. Telemedicine can help to provide professional advice in the control center when an emergency call is made as to whether the ambulance is even necessary.
A neutrality clause is proposed, according to which members of the volunteer fire brigade must also perform their service “regardless of ideology, gender, descent, skin color, origin, belief, social position or sexual identity of people in need and of other fire brigade members”. A volunteer firefighter in uniform is also a representative of the state, his community, and has a special duty of loyalty, at least when he is on active duty, said Sebo Koolmann, the government director responsible for civil protection.
