So here we go, all the Gongbeating let's all do 500 firecalls a year and show up to the opening of an envelope with lights and sirens people pass judgment on all.
In case it has slipped your shortsighted attention spans, every member is a V-O-L-U-N-T-E-E-R.
And as such each member offers their time and skills for many varied and different reasons, thats right for different reasons! Not every member wants to attend 67000 firecalls a year at all times of the day and night. They all have different wants,needs and abilities to commit, and guess what that means? They're different to you and I.
So instead of gongbeating along, and trying to enforce your wants and beliefs and ostracizing people in the process, how about celebrating the fact that at any given time, people are not only just willing, but more importantly able to give time back to the community to assist it when its in need.
I think what has been discussed, if you were concentrating, was that SOME volunteers decide to just leave the alarms, tree downs and animal rescues and run out for the 'real' jobs. There's always the ones who will not turn out to jobs in the early afternoon, then lowe and behold, the big one hits, and they're out there wanting to be the first on the appliance.
If you want to talk about giving time, it should be given without condition toward what the call is, and an effort should be made to attend training to keep skills up. No matter how much anyone thinks they know, they can still improve upon it.
There was no point made about those with busy schedules. Its fantastic that people take time out of busy lives to attend what they can. Its the people you KNOW for a fact are in the area, and just don't come down because they either know it all, or don't want to go along to 'just another alarm' that were the discussion point brought forward.