Tam should receive all and every commmendation there is for hissuperb act of bravery.
His actions are sadly in the minority these days as regards the "policies" of the emergency services, in that the public come last in being protected.
The Tayside Management should be stood down ,,returned to less decision making pastimes, and replaced by individuals who can lead by example.
Well done ,Tam!

John Bennett, Lincoln, U.K.

THe saying goes that rules are for the obedience of idiots and the guidance of wise men and this appears entirely appropriate to this case.
as has been said was the man supposed to stand by and watch a fellow human being die because his bosses had not provided the correct equipment, of coarse not he should be commended for courage above and beyond.

This guy is in the business of saving lives and showed his dedication by being prepared to take exceptional risks to do soIf anypone deserves punishment it is senior management for failing to ensure that cheap and simple equipment was not to hand.

Gerry Waclawiak, Leeds,

Tams actions on the 6th March have reverberated around the world. The comments and support he has recieved from the contributers to this site have made the past three weeks bearable for Tam, his family and his fellow firefighters. The response has led our ' managers ' they dont like to be called officers anymore, to introduce training to improve firefighter safety at incidents. However they have as yet failed to indicate wether firefighters will receive training in water rescues. The Fire Brigade Union branch at Perth have passed a vote of ' no confidence ' in the management of Tayside Fire & Rescue and will continue to fight for the right to be trained and equipped to do the job they love. I will be forwarding a report on Tam's actions to the Royal Humane Society on behalf of the FBU.

Jim Malone Brigade Secretary FBU Tayside, dundee, scotland

Tam Brown is a hero. We need his sort.
The authorities cannot demand this of their employees, but what he did, beyond the call of duty, should be recognised and respected. To even consider Disciplinary Action or Dismissal is the daftest thing I`ve heard for a long while. Bless you Tam Brown, and confound the Jobsworths who`d not have the guts to do as you did!

M. Joseph, Wrexham, Wales

Thank heavens there is somebody (Steve Hill) who can see sense and not stick to what the rule books say. In my opinion Stephen Hunter is the person who should be disciplined, especially since he did not ensure that fire engines were equipped with the correct poles and ropes. Here we have someone who did not do his job properly and is trying to shift blame on to someone else.

Reginald Hill, Belfast, N. Ireland

May I suggest that readers write to Mr Brown's boss congratulating him for the quality of his staff and asking him to send their deep appreciation of his bravery to Tam Brown.

If you agree you could suggest that he recommends Mr Brown for
the Queen's Fire Service for Gallantry.

Gerald Hartup, London, England

As the wife of a Volunteer Firefighter, and a Mother of 2, I say Thank you, Tam for going in and rescuing that girl. Iam so proud of you. My husband went into a burning building to rescue someone, and I couldn't have been prouder of him.They both made it out ok.
It takes a special kind of person to be a firefighter. To have that special person restricted by rules doesn't make sense
to me.
You should be praised for what you did. Be proud of yourself. God Bless you.

Maureen, Ambler, USA/PA

I commend Tam Brown for his actions, and think it's disgraceful that the fire department is considering disciplinary action. "We have no statutory obligation . . ." That's ridiculous!

Giancarlo Ubaldino, Toronto, Canada

I do think it is completely reasonable to have a rule saying that Firemen shouldn't have to risk their lives by jumping in a freezing river without proper saftey equipment. It's unfair on firemen if they HAVE to risk their lives in such a reckless way.

However if a fireman courageously chooses to risk his life to save a drowning woman by ignoring the regulation then all involved should congratualte him. The rule should say he doesn't have to not that he isn't allowed to!!

Tam Brown you are the kind of man that the rest of us all look up to and I hope that you make it through this ok.

Josh, Cardiff, UK

I would like to thank all of you who have taken the time and trouble to voice your opinions. It is very comforting to me as a proud firefighter to know that so many members of the British public are behind me. I felt, and still feel I had no choice on tuesday March the sixth. A twenty year old girl was dying in front of me, I simply did what any firefighter would do..........I went to her aid.
I do not consider myself a hero, I consider myself very fortunate to have been in a position to help to help her.
Your comments and support mean more to me than any of you will ever know. Many thanks from the bottom of my heart..Tam Brown.

Tam Brown, Perth, Scotland

This is an absolute disgrace!. Tam Brown should be given a bravery award, not castigated. He did not put his colleagues' lives at risk by his actions and saved a young person's life. The senior officer should be sacked for not ensuring that the men under his care were properly equiped. He therefore put their lives at risk by his dereliction of duty and bringing the service into disrepute. I should think the service has lost recruits by his response. I have also been told by a senior fire officer, following the dreadful Easter floods in the Midlands a few years ago, when a lady senior citizen was trapped in her ground floor flat, that the service does not have a legal obligation to rescue people from flooding. Pray, who does? He also added insult to injury be asking why she didn't use her mobile phone to summon help when her land line was under water.
Unbelievable.....

A O'Donnell, Banbury, Oxon. UK

Tam Brown, have you ever considered emigrating to NZ? We need and admire men like you.

Stephen Hunter, the UN hires people like you.

George Kerr, Otago, New Zealand

I see an early retirement or change of career for Mr. Hunter [fire chief]. Political correctness has really gone totally and absolutely mad with Stephen Hunter and his illogical rationale of thinking. Based on Mr. Hunter's illogical rationale, does he suggest, if he is the chief on the scene of a house on fire and the firemen can hear people shouting for help from inside the house. Will he oppose any fire man who is brave enough to carry out the rescue because "firefighter safety is paramount"? I applaude and salute the courage of Mr. Brown and wish every firefighter follow his footsteps. There should be a hearing on why staff were not supplied with proper equipment and the fire services neglected in its duty of care to Mr. Brown. He was not supplied with the necessary equipments to perform his tasks efficiently and effectively. Bravo Mr. Brown

sebastian, London,

I presume that Mr Hunter will now be investigated by the HSE under the Work Equipment Regulations and prosecuted for failure to provide his employees with correct equipment under the Health & Safety at Work Act to enable them to undertake their job in a correct manner. Clearly if the correct equipment had been provided then the fireman in question could have carried out this task correctly and not needed to breach the rules in place.

Or is Mr Hunter stating that providing correct equipment is not necessary as a rescue should not have been attempted and that the firefighters should have simply stood on the banks and watched someone drown whilst stating "Health & Safety rules mean we can't intervene".. Mr Hunter should be thoroughly ashamed of himself and even worse is his moral highhanded speech in attempting to defend his decision.

Helen, Manchester,

I don't doubt that each Service - Police, Fire and Ambulance - has protocols of behaviour for attendance at emergencies. This is good risk management.

But to then apply a threat of disciplinary sanction for courage shown beyond the call of duty, when such bravery is traditionally celebrated in this country, makes the Fire Service look like pedants and foolish in the extreme.

Drew Wells, London, England

What a sad state of affairs this once great country has come to when some senior jobsworth thinks that following petty rules and regulations is more important than saving a life....Give that fireman a medal, don't condemn him for not following procedure.

mick enright, ipswich, suffolk

Stephen Hunter, chief fire officer of Tayside Fire and Rescue, admitted that fire engines in Perth were not equipped with the correct poles and ropes, but insisted that Mr Brown had broken the rules.

It seems to me that the chief fire officer is trying to cloud the issue to cover up his own inefficiencies.

Perhaos, instead of insisting that Mr Brown has broken the rules, he should explain to the public precisely why his fire engines are not equipped with the correct poles and ropes.

Richard Walmsley, Bedford, UK

The job of the fire and resue service in Tayside (and elsewhere) is to save lives and preserve property. That's their job description and requires no politically correct amplification. Perhaps, like many others in public bodies, Tayside's Chief Fire Officer thinks that his service's primary duty is to comply with task measurement criteria, give consideration to the data protection act, participate in audits, contribute to the overwhelmingly unnecessary health and safety debate or get involved in any other government-inspired diversion that prevents them from doing the job we are paying them to do! Mr. Hunter might do well to apply some commonsense to his job - or resign.

Tony Henton, Bognor Regis, England

I think that he is a brave man, and should be commended for his acts. I live in Des Moines, IA, USA. and our fire departments here are trained in water rescues & the ones located near the rivers have boats and jet skis that they can operate in case of a water rescue. I think all major cities near rivers, or any body of water for that matter, (which is most of the large cities here...) should be trained in water rescues. It only makes sense.

Dan Sterrett, Des Moines, Iowa, USA

Ridiculous.
Why don’t people like this ever take the time to think about what they are saying? If they did they would realise that it is making them look incredibly petty, and exceptionally stupid.

Well done Tam.
Your superiors are prats!

Gareth, London,

Surely he should have stuck to the rules, let the woman drown, then sued his emplyers for "personal trauma". That would have been much more in keeping with the spirit of modern Britain.

John Richardson, Bishop's Stortford,

The system is coming to this.

Well done mate, screw the system if it responds like that.

David, Aspin, France, Pyrenees

It is beyond any doubt that our emergency services must be protected to the absolute full at all times. Quite rightly a hearing should be carried out to establish why the crew were so poorly equipped to properly deal with this situation, and I think that the person who's life was saved may also like to be present to give her opinion of the actions of this fireman.
We must never ask or encourage them to risk their lives, but in this case someone is very privileged to have had them do so.

Lee, Woking,

I think the fireman's boss should be thrown into the river and then asked if he wants to reconsider his position.

Phil Alexandrou, Preston,

Well done Mr Brown,you have courage,your employers don't.

S Farmer, Blackburn, Lancashire

Rescues a life and faces disciplinary action... for risking his life... what? He most likely jumped in that water as a human being, not as a fire fighter, or even more so as a fire fighter. Given that they don't have to but he did and should be praised for his bravery and quick reaction. Unbelievable! That girl should obviously not have jumped in there in the first place if it was only a 'cry for help'.

Diana, London,

What kind of person would be prepared to see another human being die because they could not tick the right box on a health and safety checklist? I thought that saving lives was the reason that people became firefighters in the first place. If my house caught fire I would want someone like Tam Brown to be on the fire engine that responded, I salute his courage. His bosses are unfit to be public servants at all, shame on them.

Paul , Belfast,

How very Britain-today. Zealotry. Bureaucracy. Petty officials who won't see the wood for the trees and never use their sense to say this is, simply, a good exception to the rules. The place has tied itself down - rigid, conformist, utterly unswerving in following regulations. Naturally, the enforcers always excuse themselves by saying they act with good intentions. What's that saying about the road to hell?

cb, guildford, surrey

I wish Victor Meldrew had read this report.

Ray Grace, Haltwhistle, Northumbrland

Anywhere else in the world he would he a hero. Only in hopelessly PC, Blairite Britain would he be disciplined.

Roger Tilbury, Worthing,

"no statutory obligation..." is that beauracrat headed for a career in politics?!
Fireman Tam should be congratulated. He apparently went beyond the requirements of his duty and saved a life and to face disciplinary action is a travesty. Perhaps the next step is to throw Stephen Hunter into the Tay then mime rescuing him with the poles and ropes that the firemen haven't been issued, no doubt due to "streamlining budget cuts". If he survives, he may have learnt a lesson, if not, they can put his no doubt higher than the active firemans wage to better use!

Pete North, manchester,

Even the CFO should concede that no 'book of rules' can ever be written that will cover every emergency situation. It requires common sense and judgement by the man on the spot and that means reviewing the options and assessing the risk. In this case it would appear that options were limited and a decision had to be made in seconds. Tam Brown took an extreme risk, putting his own life at stake, and was successful in saving another person's life. Successful or not, a bravery award appears to be more in order than a politically correct bollicking based on a rule book.

Peter Hunter, Lincoln, UK

How many medals for bravery have ever been won by people who stuck to "standing regulations"?

Firefighters are expected to risk their lives. It is part of their job description - both the informal one the public expects of them and the formal one they sign with their employer (since safety equipment is never flawless). If we ask someone to risk their life in the course of their duty, then we should give them the absolute right to determine what is or is not acceptable risk when they are at the scene. And both the training to make that decision, and full support after they have made it.

Anyone who does not appreciate this is not fit to be placed in a position of authority over firefighters. But before he resigns, he should be the one to pin the medal on Tam's chest.

Ian Kemmish, Biggleswade, UK

The man should be awarded the George Cross.

After all, he clearly risked his own life well beyond the call of duty.

Best regards

Nigel Sedgwick, Beaconsfield, UK

"Firefighter safety is of paramount importance to us.
.....fire engines in Perth were not equipped with the correct poles and ropes"
It seems the wrong person is being disciplined!
The Chief Fire Officer should resign after these statements
and Tam Brown should be 'disciplined'. His punishment should be to have to read a letter of apology from the CFO
that the engines were inadequately equipped.

Keith Robotham, Chester now Bengtsfors, UK/Sweden

Tayside Fire and Rescue are quite right in their decision. Fancy a fireman wanting to throw himself into the water to try and save someone. He should have stood idly by and watched the woman drown, safe in the knowledge that he was not breaking any employment laws. Just think where we'd all be if every emergency service started saving peoples' lives against regulations. It would be anarchy!

Steve Lee, Gillingham, England

The fireman, Tam Brown, is a real hero. His act was premeditated; not an act of pure reaction nor, as is often the case, purely a circumstance which one finds oneself in.

Maybe he should be reminded of the rules, tongue in cheek, but to reprimand and punish him is just another example of stupidity in the way we are being indoctrinated by laws, rules and PC to think and act.
PS. As the local fire station was not properly equipped to deal with the situation, perhaps some one else in the fire service should be facing the disciplinary actions ??

Mid J., Guangzhou, China

No good deed goes unpunished.

Larry Maler, Tampa, Florida, USA

Rules are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men.

Ross McInnes, London, UK

Yet at the same time, 'Do not go in the water' is and must be, the first rule of saving someone who is drowning. If six people had jumped in after her with the same thought, how many of them would still be alive? I agree that what Mr Brown did was brave, and he has saved a girl's life, but it remains true that what he did was reckless, and the public recognition is partly due to his sheer luck.

Will P, Oxford,

What a horrible example of the saying that "no good deed goes unpunished"!

It is incredibly wrong to train a man to value, protect and rescue people, provide him with inadequate tools, and then punish him for risking his own life to save someone. This man is a hero, not a bad employee!

If Mr. Brown had stood by and let her die he would be haunted by the experience for years to come and perhaps be called a coward by some. Would his legalistic supervisor then praise him for his absolute upholding of the letter of the law? I wonder...

Lia D., Dallas, Texas USA

I find it disgusting that someone doing a very good job might get disciplined for it. I am sure he knew the risks to his life and he made the decision to go ahead and save a womans life, which he successfully did. We should be praising him for his courage not disciplining him for his stupidity.

Michelle Dei Cas, Chipping Sodbury, UK

They have a point. Sad, but you should only rescue others when don't have a good chance of dying yourself .

Kevin Lax, Shanghai, china