Fire bosses say they have dropped their opposition to the reorganisation of the service to 'make the best of a bad situation'.

Both East Sussex and West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service bosses will work with the Board of the South East Fire and Rescue Control Centre Limited, which has been set up to manage the reorganisation.

The company will run East and West Sussex services from a regional room in Fareham, Hampshire, which will replace nine control rooms across the South East from 2010.

It follows a controversial Government decision to close 47 fire control rooms and replace them with nine regional centres across the UK.

All nine services opposed the plan to regionalise fire and rescue control centres, preferring to keep the service more local.

But after the Government decided to press ahead with the project, it was agreed a joint company was the best way to run the centre.

Each of the nine Fire and Rescue Authorities is represented on the board.

East Sussex Fire Authority chairman Mike Murphy said: "I have never been happy with it being taken away from individual fire and rescue services.

"But the Government has a policy and we are doing everything we can to make it work as well as possible.

"The Government says it is better for resilience to terrorism but I thought this new centre would be a bigger target.

"But I would be very surprised if anyone from East Sussex travelled to Hampshire for work because it is a long way to go each day."

A West Sussex Fire and Rescue Service spokesman said: "It isn't something we actively sought and is being imposed on us by the Government.

"We were quite happy with our current set up but it is happening and we are going to have to live with it and we are trying to make it work as well as possible.

"We have not been fully convinced about the benefits, whether it will save money or provide a better service to the public.

"There is a strong possibility there will be redundancies."

The control rooms will move one by one into the Hampshire-based centre over a 14-month period. Work on the site at Kite's Croft in Fareham is currently under way and the building is due to be completed in May.

The first Fire and Rescue Authority to start operating from the centre will be Hampshire in May 2010 and the last will be the Isle of Wight in September 2011.

The project is being steered by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

The current chairman of the new board is West Sussex County Council, with Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes Combined Fire Authority as vice-chairman.

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