FIRE and rescue authorities will receive £75m to work together in a move the government says will improve efficiency while saving public money.

Some 37 projects across the country will receive funding from the government's Fire Transformation Fund to improve frontline services and save taxpayers over £300m.

Fire minister Penny Mordaunt said collaborative working would help ensure better and more efficient front-line services for the public.

"Fire services have done an amazing job over the last few years in reducing demand on their emergency services; there are fewer fires and deaths," said Ms Mordaunt.

"But this means the service needs to adapt – to meet new demands and to ensure it is working in the most efficient way. That's why we've set up the Fire Transformation Fund.

Bids included emergency services which wanted to work together by sharing stations and services, sharing back office functions, and collaborating on service delivery.

Ms Mordaunt said: "This is exactly the sort of innovation that is needed across the public sector and I look forward to seeing how these projects progress."

Awards included a winning bid from Hertfordshire Fire and Rescue Authority.

It will work with county council services to re-locate library services in four Hertfordshire villages to on-call fire stations.

Meanwhile, Surrey will lead a project with fire, police and ambulance services across Sussex and Surrey to deliver efficient emergency service transport functions.

And Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Authority will work with Kent and Essex fire authorities to establish a procurement hub leading towards a national procurement capability for the sector.

Similarly, Essex Fire and Rescue Authority will lead a syndicate of nine fire and rescue authorities establishing an insurance pooling arrangement open to all fire and rescue authorities.

The government says there has been a 46% reduction in call outs and incidents in the last decade.

But while deaths from fires in the home are now at an all time low, expenditure and firefighter numbers have remained broadly the same.

An independent review last year concluded that fire and rescue authorities need to transform themselves to reflect the entirely different era of risk and demand they now operate in.

The government says fire services continue to spend to their budgets rather than to the risks they have to manage, with "huge variations" between how the 46 different authorities operate.

The cost per head ranges from £26 to more than £50 per year.

Last year's Facing the Future view by Sir Ken Knight found that almost £200m could be saved if higher spending authorities reduced their spending to the national average

But the Fire Brigades Union has warned that any reform of the fire and rescue service must put public safety first rather than resulting in cuts that would cost lives.