Police and firefighters’ unions have joined calls to urgently review mandatory sentences for assaulting emergency service workers, after a paramedic was hospitalised but fell through gaps in the law because she was not treating a patient at the time she was attacked.
The Victorian Ambulance Union wrote to Attorney-General Sonya Kilkenny on Thursday afternoon demanding an urgent review of the Sentencing Act, saying the prosecutor’s decision to withdraw charges of assaulting an emergency services worker after a paramedic was attacked while in uniform but not treating a patient rendered the laws worthless.
Police Association of Victoria secretary Wayne Gatt joined the campaign on Friday.
“Paramedics are there because the community needs them, just as police do,” Gatt said. “It shouldn’t matter whether they are treating a casualty or eating their lunch in uniform – if you punch them, assault them or target them in any way, you’re a particularly vile and cowardly type of lowlife.
“The law should protect them, protect police and protect all emergency service workers – full stop.”
United Firefighters Union secretary Peter Marshall confirmed he would also support a review of the laws, introduced more than a decade ago.
