MPs call for firefighting aircraft after record wildfire year

The UK needs firefighting aircraft, restrictions on disposable barbecues and a national awareness campaign to cope with the growing risk of wildfires, a committee of MPs has said.

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee said this year's record fire season had destroyed homes, scorched thousands of hectares of countryside, stretched fire crews and exposed weaknesses in how prepared the country is.

Homes lost close to Birmingham

The fires that cost 19 families their homes in Stourbridge, on the city's doorstep, were among those cited by the committee. Its report also pointed to fires that led to the army being deployed in south Wales, and to blazes in the Cairngorms, Staffordshire and Suffolk.

Fire and rescue services in England and Wales dealt with 1,132 wildfires between 1 January and 16 August, more than in the whole of 2025. During the August heatwave, millions of people received an emergency alert on their phones warning of a very high wildfire risk. At one point fire chiefs said they were under "incredible pressure", with 11 major fires in 48 hours, several of them in the region around Birmingham.

"No longer fit for purpose"

The cross-party committee said wildfires could no longer be seen as rare or exceptional events, warning that climate change was making them more frequent and more severe. It said they should be treated as part of the UK's long-term challenge of adapting to a warmer climate.

It said the current system for getting aerial firefighting support was "no longer fit for purpose" and called for a detailed plan to give the UK its own aerial firefighting capability before next year's fire season. The report also highlighted problems securing water supplies during major incidents and co-ordinating resources nationally.

Barbecues and cigarettes

MPs welcomed the government's temporary restrictions on selling disposable barbecues during the summer heatwave, but said they should have come sooner. A disposable barbecue was blamed for a fire that destroyed four homes in Stoke-on-Trent in August.

The committee called for a funded national prevention campaign and said using disposable barbecues, lighting campfires and dropping cigarettes when the fire risk is high should become "socially unacceptable". It stopped short of backing any single approach to managing land, instead calling for a "toolbox" including grazing, cutting, peatland restoration and controlled burning where appropriate.

Alistair Carmichael, who chairs the committee, said: "What we've seen as serious wildfires this year is going to be normal in years going forward. If we don't get serious, if we don't have a strategy, if we don't put money behind it, then that is going to keep happening."

"We can't force the government to start spending money, but if they find themselves in the situation that they were this year, again next year, they will not be able to say that nobody warned them," he said.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said improving wildfire preparedness was "a major government priority". It said ministers would hold a summit this week with fire and rescue leaders and land managers, and pointed to a pilot of six teams of specialist firefighters who can be sent to major wildfires anywhere in the country.