Emergency Workers (Protection) Bill

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams) on the Bill and thank him for asking me to be one of its sponsors. I have enjoyed working with him and learned much from his experience, as we negotiated with the Home Office and representatives of the emergency services, who gave us the benefit of their wisdom and experience. I certainly hope that the Bill will become law and that it will protect emergency service personnel who need and deserve our protection. It is one of the most wicked things that people think it is funny deliberately to try to entice into a trap and set upon people with a sense of public service who attend because it is their job to protect the public. It is a waste of resources. It wastes the time of emergency workers. It is dangerous and it undermines the ethos of public services that we should support and develop. I will support anything that tackles that. The Bill is one step among other measures, including the respect agenda, which is an important aspect. In my constituency, a gang of boys on the Bemerton estate regularly call out the emergency services, especially the fire brigade. When the firefighters arrive, the boys throw stones at them. Things are getting worse and I am concerned that they will get out of hand. The Bill recognises the seriousness of the offence and will cut into criminal behaviour at a certain level, so that it can be dealt with before it spirals out of control. The Bill is well judged and it has my support. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his wisdom in choosing this matter to bring before the House. It keys in excellently with our respect agenda. The Bill has my full support and I wish it well—as I do the next Bill, so I shall keep my contribution as short as possible so that it, too, can get through.