Ambulance Crews: The Enemy Within

Lorraine

Just to clarify, separate issue from refusing the deal. However, I heard on the radio that those news reports at the time were not accurate. Someone from the ambulance service was on the radio discussing how it works and when the ambulance is on it's way to them taking their break they can and do get interrupted for calls. However, at the point when they take their break they are essentially 'switched off from the system' , they literally do not and cannot hear any calls.

Dean

I used to work part-time in a riding stables. If some minor emergency occurred, like a horse escaping from its stall, the grooms would slam down their mugs and run to where they were needed.

I've also seen a vet attend the yard on Christmas day, at about 9.00am, because he had been called.

Still, at least grooms get a Christmas box from the livery owners.

Kevin

It's not a tea break. It's a 30 minute unpaid meal break - the only break most crews will get in a 12 hour shift.

Lorraine is correct, during the 30 minute break crews generally have no way of knowing what's going on because the dispatch system has made them unavailable.

However, I think the offer made to the crews is pretty darn good - much, much better than the deal the I got. Not accepting it does make them look greedy.

I've been a paramedic for nearly 13 years and I'm disgusted that anyone would suggest that an ambulance worker "would rather let people die than interrupt their tea-break". No they would not. Really.

Bob

I work for the Scottish Ambulance Service as an emergency medical technician, and I am dismayed by the attitude of many of my colleagues, in particular those who rejected this generous (in my humble opinion) offer of a settlement. On behalf of all right minded folk within the service, I apologise :-(

(and I'm not a member of a union, so unfortunately was not asked my opinion of the deal offered)

ThigArLatha

Personally I think the governments in Holyrood/Westminster should look into making these jobs Crown Offices.
Police Constables are sworn into the position of Crown Office of Constable.
They are NEVER off duty whilst in their country (with certain exceptions for certain Metropolitan Police Officers)
Breaks are taken subject to the "Exigencies of Duty".
If we accept that certain jobs are essential then it stands to reason that they cannot be endangered.
Firefighter, Paramedic and Ambulance staff, Police Officer, Coastguard and a few related occupations in these fields need to have this.
Swear the Ambos/Trumpton into being Constables and set up Firefighters Federation, Paramedic Federation etc

James

Of course, it's not really a "tea break", and anecdotally there are (at least I've been told) cases where paramedics are so exhausted by the time they get to it that it would scarcely be in anyone's interests to send them out on a call.

But of course, if that's the case, then you don't fix that problem by paying people extra. I suspect there are underlying problems with the way the service is organised that has turned this issue into the problem it is, but the union response is embarrassing and depressing.

Chris Birney

Isn't this how it works on the tube as well. You sign a contract saying that the tube will run on Boxing day and then after a while you decide you need triple pay to work boxing day, and go on strike.

Graham

Firstly my thoughts go to the families involved in these incidents, but I do wish the press and public would try to understand that we are not talking about a "teabreak". It is the unpaid half an hour that has been forced on ambulance services in a 12 hour shift under Restructuring/ Agenda for Change/ Needs of the Service etc. To my way of thinking this half hour is no different to my day off or the time I am off between shifts. Like some of the other people commenting on this article, I have quite often be responding to 999 calls with a blood sugar level lower than that of the patients I am attending. Is it really right that an ambulance crew is forced to do the equivalent hours that say an office worker does in a full day before their meal break is even considered?
The real answer would be to pay ambulance staff for the 12 hours they work and allow them the legally required rest/break periods that they should have. OK in some eyes having our cake and eating it, but at least we might get the time to eat something!

Penne Clayton

My Christmas dinner with family was interrupted this year to rescue and resuscitate an attempted drowning, at a surf beach, where the lifeguards had gone home for the day (fair enough) and people had been told not to swim yet they still did. Unless you have been in the emergency services and experienced what we go through - on OR off duty - I suggest you keep your one-eyed diatribes to yourself.
Sometimes there isn't enough pay in the world to see or go through what we do.

Suggest walking a mile in our shoes....

Mungo

Who does your research Alex Massie, now that you're freelance? Going by this article I'd guess nobody does. You've just read some newspaper headlines, then written a piece that would fit well in the Daily Mail letters page, from Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells. Don't believe all you read in the papers. I used to read the Scotland on Sunday and thought a certain Alex Massie was a thoughtful writer. How wrong was I!

Get out there and find some SAS crews and ask them about these 'tes-breaks' which you speak of. Staff are being painted as the bad guys by incompetent management. The same management are actually putting patients at risk with this offer of £100 per disturbed break (they are reluctant to disturb crews on a break due to the cost, so are downgrading potentially serious calls).
Crew's just want to be paid for the 40 hour week they work. Not 37.5 hrs pay plus lump sums and disturbance payments.

Sam Charlton

i personally am very happy in the way in which the ambulance service is being run. I think they do a fine job the vast majority of the time. As with all emergency services they are swarmed with legislation and on occasion bound to quite ridiculous rules. That are put in place due to the politicians amongst (including union officials) us, and for some daft reason seem to take opinions of pen pushers trying to scrape a career for themselves (like yourself Mr Massie-unrespectfully) close to heart.

Owen Jones

Writer of this piece: You're a slovenly, lazy idiot, who -rather than research a piece correctly and create a decent article- has copy-pasted a few of the most alarmist headlines you could find in order to provoke a pointless and unfounded reaction.

I'd point out that workers of any kind working 12 hours without a break will often faint, lose consciousness, and this is definitely not what we need in front line ambulance crew.

Please, stop this idiotic rampage against ambulance workers, and look at the bigger picture. Maybe criticising the fact that if a break is interrupted they often won't get to take the rest of it later is a good topic?

Or maybe writing isn't for you, and you should just choose another career?

Luke

Mr Massie, were you on heavy medication when you threw together this shamble of an article? I suspect this may be the case. It suggests no understanding of the issue and no understanding of how the ambulance service is structured or run. Perhaps next time you can spend maybe even 30 seconds - a significant increase on this time - on pulling together a coherent article based on more than a handful of Daily Mail headlines to fill some space and generate some attention.
1 out of 10 - Try harder.

S. Holmes

I personally think that because a huge number of calls are utter codswollop, either because the caller doesn't know any better/panic, people are stupid, GPs not seeing patients etc etc, that ambulance crews become desensitised, I know I have.

A few times I have responded to calls that are broadcast over the radio during my REST break to "render aid" and most have been rubbish, someone working the system or a poorly triaged call. So I took it upon myself that I would only "jump" for a call if it was a confirmed cardiac arrest or if a crew on scene request immediate backup.

In summary, calls are rarely anything serious and seldom emergencies. So we are just a "Big yellow taxi service", poorly funded, poorly managed, not respected and abused.

Scott

Did someone mention blue lights?

SeaJones

Why don't you address some real points?

Did you know for instance that ambulance crews in the UK are NOT ROUTINELY GIVEN STAB VESTS.

This is itself ridiculous as I'm sure you'll agree.

Funky

Please do some research about this before just regurgitating articles from the Daily Mail. Particularly the technician refusing to attend, it was later admitted by SAS that he had not been contacted. The break issue is a UK wide problem, not just Scottish.