An overwhelming 70% of Narberth residents surveyed have signed a petition to safeguard Narberth's life saving Co-responder Service.

Local campaigner Di Clements has collected nearly 600 responses from the 900 households that she visited for support for the Retained Firefighter's petition.

"The response has been incredibly strong," said Mrs Clements. "Most surveys and petitions only get about 10 – 20% return rate so to get nearly 70% is incredible.

"But people have not only signed the petition but have also written letters of support, many of them with real-life stories of how their loved ones have been saved by the unit. This is something that the people of Narberth feel very strongly about."

Narberth's Co-responder service is an emergency vehicle manned by trained firefighters which provides a rapid response to 999 calls. In rural areas the Co-responders often preserve lives until the arrival of a fully equipped ambulance.

But the Welsh Ambulance Service, which decides when to call out the Co-responder service and also pays for them, stopped using the Narberth unit last summer.

Local MP Simon Hart added: "The good news is that the message is getting through. The Ambulance service did not use the Co-responder at all between August and mid October last year but it has been out 14 times in January."

Mr Hart was able to raise the importance of Co-responder units with David Cameron at a recent summit at Number 10 looking into rural issues.

"This petition has now gone to the Fire Brigade and they are able to prove to those who take the decisions how important this service is to Narberth."