The Suffolk Hyde Affair - Doc 198 Suffolk Fire Strike Latest News

Lowestoft Fire station
PO Box 54
Lowestoft
NR 32 2QA
Tel 01502 403842

1st June 1999

Dear ACFO Seager,

I am instructed to write to you with regard to disciplinary matters by Miss Sarah Davies who is the Suffolk Fire Service personnel manager. Miss Davies appears to be a little misguided with respect to the provision of witnesses prescribed under the Fire Service (Discipline) Regulations. Mistakenly she seems to think I have authority to request your attendance as a witness to a disciplinary hearing. Clearly that privileged authority (instruction to attend) only rests with the hearing body. It definitely does not reside with the clerk Miss Davies. Of course unlike you she has no trained knowledge of the Discipline Regulations.

Despite knowing I have no right to order you to attend a disciplinary hearing I have no desire to upset Miss Davies. Hence I thought it best to follow here order.

In consequence, I am writing to you in my capacity as the representative for Ff Hyde.

I would be pleased if you would agree to attend his hearing as a witness for his defence. This will include the presentation of a multitude of documents in which you are mentioned and central. As such this evidence will benefit greatly from your explanation and expert interpretation of the material facts of the case.

I look forward to having seen your plea in support of Ff Stebbing’s (see Doc 199) in 1995 and your unswerving written commitment to the ideals of natural justice I naturally assume your willingness to assist.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours faithfully

A Wigglesworth BSc, MBA, GIFireE.