Thats as maybe Daz, but teachers and nurses do not generally have or are allowed to have a second income.
Lee
This thread was started by a retained firefighter you may not understand what this means.
A high proportion of the country can not afford or justify the cost of having firefighters sat at a firestation waiting for call outs so the stations have retained or on call firefighters these men and women recieve a small retaining fee (less than most window cleaners would earn in a day and a half) for being on call then the get paid for any call outs they attend, the money they recieve for this is not a living wage. So if you go to a retained firestation it is more than likely no one will be there, most people find this shocking as their expectation is that stations are manned 24/7.
Most retained firefighters have a full time job from which they can be called away at anytime for me this is window cleaning, when i get called out and im on fire service time my hourly rate is less than half my window cleaning hourly rate. Other firefighters are shift workers who provide cover inbetween their shifts.
Having retained stations saves this country millions, retained firefighters pay tax on their full time jobs and their retained earnings, and some even lose money at times serving the comunity. It can be rewarding being a retained firefighter but knowing what i know now i would not join the fire service.
As for full time firefighters having second jobs if they have permission and are legit in their window cleaning business whats the problem, thousands of people have second jobs including teachers. If people are tax dodgeing then i have a problem with that.