Rising congestion is slowing down firefighters on their way to incidents, it has been claimed.

Attendance times have increased by 34% since 1994/95 which Mark Rist, director of response and resilience at Kent Fire and Rescue Service (KFRS), blames on “increasing pressures from traffic”.

Data from the Department for Transport shows that annual number of miles racked up by vehicles on the county’s roads has rise by 12% since 1994.

There has also been a 225% increase in the number of closures due to road works over the last five years.

KFRS’s attendance times when called to primary incidents – including fires in homes, buildings, on roads and other outdoor spaces – now take crews an average of nine minutes and 13 seconds to reach.

This is up from six minutes and seven seconds in 1994/95.

During that year, crews were called to 153,420 primary fires – significantly more than the 61,204 last year.

But Mr Rist said that, while attendance times are rising, the severity of fires and number of deaths and injuries have continued to decline.

He said: “Whilst we've seen our attendance times at primary fires increase we haven't seen the resulting increase in negative outcomes which is down to our investment in training and equipment for our professional firefighters who do an excellent job when they arrive.

“We are facing an increasing range of diverse and complex incidents many of which tie up more firefighters for longer.

“We have to conduct water rescues and rescues from height and we are dealing with the effects of climate change and new fuels which means the service is busy.

“We face increasing pressures from road traffic in Kent and Medway.

“We have a mix of rural roads and urban roads, increasing traffic flows and of course the impacts on major roads of being our coastal county that feeds into Europe.”

Fires firefighters also attended 101,448 secondary fires – small outdoor fires that do not generally involve people – over the last 12 months.

Average secondary fire response times have risen from eight minutes and 35 seconds in 2010/11 to more than nine minutes and 47 seconds.