While staff turnover has hovered around 3 per cent since the Productivity Commission began measuring firefighter attrition four years ago, it is now at 6.3 per cent according to its latest report on government services released today.

While the number of full-time firefighters only fell by two positions to 348 between 2014 and 2018, the demographic breakdown points to a shifting workforce.

While 2.8 per cent of the workforce was aged over 60 in 2014, 7.4 per cent are in that age bracket now.

Around 6.3 per cent of the workforce used to be under 30, but in 2018 that fell to 4.3 per cent.

An ACT government spokesman said ACT Fire and Rescue was planning for future recruit intakes in order to meet the expected retirements over the next two years.

He said six new firefighters recruited from other Australian fire services would start on February 7, while at least another 18 would be hired through the next recruit college. Applications open on February 4.

Emergency services minister Mick Gentleman said in a statement the data proved ACT Fire and Rescue was one of the most multi-skilled services in Australia, boasting the nation’s second fastest response times to structure fires, with above national average results for containing building fires.

However, when compared to other major cities, the response time fell to the third best and fourth best when call-taking time was excluded. The government spokesman could not explain why.

Firefighters had a massive year nevertheless, responding to 12,313 emergencies and incidents in 2017-18, the highest number in the past decade.

Their median response time was six minutes to structure fires, and the ACT had the lowest rate of hospitalisations due to fire injuries in the country for the second year running, at 10.1 per 100,000.

However the number of fire callouts has fallen by about a third since 2008-09 to 963 in 2017-18.

The government spokesman said that decline was happening in most Australian jurisdictions, likely driven by community awareness and newer, safer buildings.

Instead, the largest number of legitimate callouts related to road crashes and other rescues, as well as assistance with floods and storms.

Storm and flood callouts have more than doubled in the past decade, from 888 in 2008-09 to 1733 in 2017-18.

That figure was also a huge leap from 2016-17 figures, where 1098 callouts in that category were recorded.

The rise in firefighter responses to floods and storms did not carry across to the ACT State Emergency Service, which received 277 storm and 83 flood callouts in 2017-18. All up the SES responded to 677 emergencies last year, a reduction of 42 per cent on the previous year.

Asked to explain the disparity, the government spokesman said: "The ACT experienced less storm activity during that period."

He added that while the SES are the response agency for storms and floods, ACT Fire and Rescue pitches in when requested.

The number of false alarms generated automatically by systems has also fallen slightly over the last 10 years, but still accounted for 5248 callouts last fiscal year - over 40 per cent of jobs.

Toast burning in an apartment block can automatically trigger a call to firefighters and they have a legal responsibility to attend, investigate and rest the alarm system, the government spokesman said.

However fake callouts from malicious parties have more than halved since 2008 to 48 in 2017-18. That number has been dwindling for the past decade. The government attributes the fall to more effective community fire safety messaging.

Concerningly, the number of Rural Fire Service volunteers has been tumbling since 2013.

At that time there were 1621 volunteers, or 419.6 per 100,000 people.

In 2017-18, there were only 1160 volunteers, or 278.9 per 100,000 people.

The ACT has traditionally had one of the lowest rates of volunteer firefighters per 100,000 in the country.

The government spokesman said the fall was due to more regular updating of the membership database.

The Rural Fire Service will do a recruitment drive in April, and ACT Fire and Rescue is also setting up five new Community Fire Units, expected to bring in up to 60 new members.

Community Fire Units are included in the  Rural Fire Service figures in the Productivity Commission's report.

Meanwhile the SES has been boosting its ranks since the Productivity Commission began measuring its numbers in 2013-14.

At that time, there were only 257 volunteers, but the ranks swelled to 326 in 2017-18.

SES volunteers spent 7733 hours responding to emergencies last fiscal year, putting in 3961 hours due to storms, floods and bushfires, and 2846 hours on search and rescue. They spent 896 hours helping out ACT Fire and Rescue and ACT Ambulance, as well as doing temporary building repairs.