New figures show average response times increasing in most parts of the country – doubling in Northland, and tripling in Auckland and Waikato over the past five years.
In Auckland City, the response time has increased from 25 minutes to an hour and 50 minutes.
National's Mark Mitchell told Kerre Woodham Government needs to look at how to reinforce the front line.
“That might be reassigning staff off day duties back onto the front-line to actually support them because the anecdotal information that I get is that they are under enormous strain and they just don’t have the numbers and they just can’t get to the jobs.”
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