CONTROVERSIAL proposals for two fire services to work more closely together have kicked off in a money-saving deal.

Hereford and Worcestershire Fire and Rescue Service has announced that it wants to deepen a project to collaborate with Warwickshire to "address future challenges".

Both services have already agreed their own budgets up to 2016/17, but say they now intend to explore negotiations over working more closely together beyond that date.

The deal, which both services are calling Project Arrow, aims to build on a loose collaboration between both organisations already, which includes help during periods of high demand and major incidents.

Although this county's fire chiefs have ruled out combining into one service, they say areas like health and safety, technical support and staff development could be ripe for joint working.

Safety tips on reducing fire risk, something offered to the likes of employers and schools, is another function being examined.

The first detailed report going over each fire service function and the potential for joint agreements will be published by the end of 2015.

Councillor Derek Prodger, chairman of Hereford and Worcester Fire Authority, said: "Although it is probably some time away the more we align our practices now, the better we will be at working together if or when any closer collaboration occurs.

"Project Arrow is about continually improving our working relationship to ensure we share our expertise, skills and experience to secure the future of our fire services.

"It’s about quality of service, improving resilience and reducing costs wherever possible."

Councillor Izzi Seccombe, leader of Warwickshire County Council, said: "Whilst this is very much a project for the future and will address challenges that we will face beyond 2017, it is absolutely right we should look right now at ways that fire services can share processes and policies to enable us to gain the benefits that working together can potentially bring."

The fire service in Herefordshire and Worcestershire is cutting 34 jobs in a bid to save £6 million, going from five crews on engines to four.

Fire chiefs originally announced a proposal to remove 10 fire engines and close four rural stations, but shelved the plans after a public outcry which saw 27,000 people sign a petition.

The fire service has still got to find £1.7 million of the £6 million worth of savings, and has opted to remove secondary engines from Tenbury and Ledbury to save cash.

It has also been hit by the strikes which have stung the fire authority's purse-strings by £166,000 so far.