Lives will be put at risk if a proposal to remove night-time cover at Falmouth's fire station goes ahead, one of the town's fire fighters has warned.

Justin Ashburn, from Falmouth fire station, said removing the permanent fire fighters from the station between 6pm and 8am and relying on staff responding from their homes, would delay response time by at least five minutes in a situation where every second counts.

His words came at a meeting of Falmouth town council, at which members unanimously expressed their "disgust" at the plans by Cornwall county council, which are aimed at cutting its budget.

The proposals also include removing the night-time cover from Camborne fire station, which result in no 24 hour fire cover anywhere in the county.

Mr Ashburn, who was joined at the meeting by another four fire fighters from the station, said: "The potential is there that people will die as a result of this, because of that delayed response."

He added that not only would the lives of the occupants be put further at risk, but also those of the fire fighters responding, due to the fire developing in the additional time it would take to get there.

Mr Ashburn urged the members to contact the county council with their objections.

The town councillors also heard from John Sweeney, speaking on behalf of the chief fire officer at Cornwall County Fire Brigade.

Mr Sweeney stressed that the proposals were purely due to cuts to fulfil budget requirements, rather than because of any safety risks. He claimed that by not employing full time staff at the two stations, this would save around £700,000 a year.

He said: "This is purely a proposal and that's why it's gone out for consultation. It's by no means a done deal. It is not as a result of any risk assessment. It's a cut. There's no fat to trim off the surface now - we have to trim the surface to meet the budget requirements."

Mr Sweeney said that the loss of night-time cover at the station would result in the loss of 28 jobs - 16 of which would be from Falmouth. However, this would come from people naturally leaving and not being replaced, rather than redundancies.

But angry councillors were unanimously against the plans and agreed with a motion put forward by councillor Dr David Sterratt, to strongly object to the proposals on the grounds of them being detrimental to public safety.

Dr Sterratt said: "The thing is, the fire service is not something you can tinker with. I can't stress enough how upset I am at this. I think people will die - I don't think there's any doubt."

He believed that there were other ways of reducing the county council budget, adding: "We can all do without a newsletter from the county council."

Many of the members raised the point that Falmouth was growing in size, with more and more students attending University College Falmouth, producing a need for more safety cover, rather than less. Falmouth Docks were also particularly at risk if night-time cover was lost.

Councillor Allyson Biggins added: "I just can't believe that we're even sitting here considering it."