Back to the topic about SES responses being longer because members live further away; how does that excuse a long response time? Even if their members lived at the station, CFS could still get to an incident first, because of the distance SES has to travel to get there.
The only the SES could have similar response times to CFS is to have the an SES unit in every town with the CFS.
Personally, if I was the patient that required lifting, and had to wait an extra 15 minutes for the SES, when the fire station is just down the road, I'd be asking questions...
Shouldn't the closest resource be responded regardless of what service?