Firefighters will respond to every 999 call during the latest Fire Bridges Union strike which started this morning.

The dispute between the union and the Government over pension reforms continues and a strike runs for 24 hours from 7am today until 7am tomorrow.

Oxfordshire County Council said there would be a mixture of non-striking full-time staff and on-call staff providing cover in Oxfordshire during the strike period.

And an agreement is in place with the local Fire Brigades Union (FBU) branch in Oxfordshire, which would see striking firefighters return to duty if a serious incident took place.

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Assistant Chief Fire Officer Simon Furlong said: "I want to reassure the public that every emergency call made to their Fire and Rescue Service during the latest scheduled national strike period will be responded to.

"This strike is for 24 hours.

"We have a cover plan in place which we have used well during previous FBU-called strikes.

"There is an agreement with the FBU locally that striking firefighters will return to work if an incident occurred which required a significant amount of firefighters to attend."