Andy Burnham considering extra funding to tackle wildfires

Andy Burnham has indicated he is prepared to put more investment into climate resilience and tackling wildfires, after the epidemic of blazes that has scorched Britain this summer.

The Prime Minister told ITV News he would not “flinch from anything that is about the core resilience of the country”.

He made the comments after the number of wildfires in England and Wales surpassed 2025’s record-breaking figure at the start of August.

The hot weather turned the UK into a tinder box, with blazes sparking across Yorkshire and the rest of the country.

The National Fire Chiefs Council said that at least 1,132 wildfires have been recorded across England and Wales in 2026 so far – a record high for the amount between January and this time of year.

Phil Garrigan, NFCC chairman, said progress was “encouraging” as firefighters tackle the blazes but added that the country was “not out of this yet”.

“This has undoubtedly been an incredibly tough period for fire and rescue services, but we are beginning to see incident numbers reduce and that is welcome news.

“Conditions remain exceptionally dry in many parts of the country and it only takes one spark to start a serious wildfire.

“We have seen first-hand the devastating consequences these fires can have for communities, wildlife and property.”

Mr Burnham convened a Cobra meeting, sent out a special fire alert to the nation’s phones and banned disposable barbecues to try and get a grip of the crisis.

He told ITV News that fire and rescue services do “require more investment, and I've been quite honest about that”.

“I hate to put it this way, but after fires we may see more floods in the second-half of the year as we go into the autumn because that's the long term prediction.

“And again, are our Fire and Rescue services properly set up to do that? Well no, there's more we need to do.

“So I won't flinch from anything that is about the core resilience of the country.

“Yes, we are making commitments on defence spending but we also need to improve our own domestic resilience as well.

“I’ll take all those tough decisions as Prime Minister.”

UK fire services do not have any specialised “water bomb” aircraft, which are used on the continent to put out wildfires.

Last year, for the Langdale Moor fire - the biggest in the country at the time - North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service repurposed other helicopters to try and extinguish the blaze.

This took six weeks to get under control as a major incident was declared and the flames surged towards homes, businesses and RAF Fylingdales.

There have been calls for the Government to fund the specialised choppers used in Europe to douse the flames.

Mr Burnham added: “I think there are some challenges that we need to face up to when it comes to infrastructure, and for instance fire and rescue services who had a very, very tough time out there.”