Test Valley Green Party says a vehicle fire that tore through protected heathland near Ringwood has laid bare the risks of squeezing fire and rescue budgets.
Smoke from the blaze drifted as far as Portsmouth, Swanage and the Isle of Wight, with residents across Romsey and villages bordering the New Forest reporting the smell of burning on the wind.
Hampshire and Isle of Wight crews, backed by mutual aid from Dorset and Wiltshire, have battled the fire in punishing rural conditions, and the party says their efforts deserve gratitude, not further cuts. Dorset and Wiltshire’s own service has spent 2026 fighting proposals to close eight stations and cut 96 posts and eight engines, a reduction the Greens argue is reckless given the fire severity now being seen locally.
The party also points to a wider pattern of underinvestment closer to home. Southern Water has applied for a drought order to draw more water from the River Test, despite recently pleading guilty to pollution offences linked to illegal sewage discharges from Fullerton Sewage Works in 2023.
The party’s demands include:
- A national wildfire prevention strategy funded by taxing fossil fuel company profits.
- Protection of Hampshire’s fire and rescue service from further cuts.
- Investment in water storage for farmers, households and businesses, with fines for illegal sewage discharges ring-fenced for river restoration.
- Opposition to new North Sea oil drilling and other pro-fossil fuel policies.
Jacqy Munro, Chair of Test Valley Green Party, said: “The Green Party is the only party truly focusing on the climate emergency, and highlighting it as an existential threat to our food supply, our nature, our health, our economy, our safety and our national defence. The devastating fire in the New Forest shows how close to home this threat is.”
“Instead of downgrading Net Zero, we should be accelerating our move to renewable energy and taking the urgent steps the Green Party has proposed to cope with this wave of heatwaves. Our water storage is low, our rivers are being polluted, and nobody is offering up a solution. The Green Party is.”