Fire Service Mr. Drew To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what the estimated cost is of each regional fire control centre; and what stage each regional project has reached. Angela E. Smith Good progress is being made on the project at regional level. Three regions have already established their local authority controlled companies that will operate their Regional Control Centre. One Regional Control Centre Director is in post and the recruitment of others is in hand. Regions have completed preliminary planning and scoping work around all the major activities they will need to undertake to transfer controls to the RCC network. Detailed planning will start in the next few months once the IT contract has been awarded and the timetable for transfer to the new system has been agreed. Each Regional Control Centre will be leased from the owners of the buildings. Details of the rents, lengths of leases and the dates when the buildings are due for completion are set out in the following table. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |Region |Lease length (years)|Rent (£ per annum exclusive of VAT)|Target practical completion date|Rent commencement date| ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |North East |20 |1,156,009 |30 March 2007 |13 January 2008 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |East Midlands |25 |1,205,000 |29 June 2007 |20 January 2008 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |South West |20 |1,213,500 |16 May 2007 |16 November 2007 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |West Midlands |25 |1,358,311 |20 December 2007 |4 October 2008 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |North West |25 |1,197,500 |1 July 2008 |1 January 2009 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |Yorkshire and Humberside|20 |1,198,808 |1 July 2008 |14 April 2009 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |East of England |25 |1,349,322 |1 October 2008 |21 April 2009 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |South East |25 |1,445,000 |14 May 2008 |14 November 2008 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |London (estimate only) |— |— |Q1 2010 |— | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A public procurement process under EU rules is still under way for the London regional control centre