Emergency Workers (Protection) Bill

I too welcome the Bill introduced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams) and I congratulate him on his campaign to raise the issues it addresses. These are important issues affecting our emergency workers; we have heard today how they suffer from the modern scourge of unwarranted assaults while they are trying to save lives. Although the measures in the Bill would evidently attract support from Members on both sides of the House, my support stems from the fact that Greater Manchester has one of the worst records for attacks on firefighters, so I shall focus on that branch of the emergency services. There have, unfortunately, been some 350 attacks on firefighters in Greater Manchester in the past two years. The Manchester Evening News has run an effective campaign to focus attention on the issue, and I commend the paper and its reporter, Neal Keeling, for doing so. It is clear that within Greater Manchester, Salford, which is one of the two local authorities covered by my Worsley constituency, has a technical problem with assaults and attacks on firefighters—a record that Salford’s MPs would like to lose as soon as we can. A recent example from Salford highlighted in the Manchester Evening News concerned a fire engine being vandalised and burgled as the fire crew worked to rescue a woman and her 12-year-old son from their burning home. To damage a fire engine while the fire crew is working to save lives is seriously to risk loss of human life. Hon. Members will have read the articles and briefings cataloguing the increasingly severe nature of attacks on firefighters, involving, as we have heard today, many cases of arson and the setting of deliberate traps for fire crews. Yesterday, Councillor Fred Walker, Chair of the Greater Manchester fire authority, told me of the problems encountered by our fire crews. Fires have been deliberately set at the bottom of a terrace in a cul-de-sac. Fire crews raced to the scene and found that they had been cornered—bricks and other objects were thrown at them while they tried to put out fires. Also of great concern to Councillor Walker is the trend, described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West, of causing fires in abandoned buildings after laying traps specifically to hurt firefighters attending the scene. I find the callous and deliberate nature of those attacks absolutely chilling. It is vital that both our fire services and the police treat each incident of attacks and assaults on firefighters with the seriousness that the incidents deserve. As I have mentioned, Greater Manchester comes out badly in the statistics compiled by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, as do Merseyside and the West Midlands. However, other areas such as London record a very low number of incidents, and there seems to be an issue of under-reporting. The fire service and elected Members serving in fire authorities also want to see attacks and assaults on fire crews treated seriously following prosecutions. There is seen to be a difficulty when a fine is imposed, given that most offenders are juveniles who do not have the means to pay a fine. It is welcome that antisocial behaviour orders are increasingly used to deal with those who attack firefighters; given that most of those concerned are juveniles, parenting orders also have a role to play. Councillor Walker told me that he would also like the courts to make increasing use of community penalties. There are a number of worthwhile community schemes, jointly run by the fire service and organisations such as the Prince’s Trust. Greater Manchester fire service has a young firefighters scheme, which focuses on boys and young men in target areas where there is the most violence against crews. The aim is to work with the type of kids who are non-joiners—who do not engage with these services or with out-of-school activities. If those young people can understand the work of the fire services at a younger age, it can help dissuade them from getting involved in attacks on fire crews as they get older. The Prince’s Trust also has a 13-week scheme for young people, run in conjunction with the fire service and football clubs such as Manchester United. Young people completing the scheme get a certificate of attainment, which can improve their employment prospects as the scheme is highly regarded by employers. I commend the fire service and the Prince’s Trust for their community schemes, because those can both help young people and develop better support for the fire service within the community. Although I have focused on attacks on firefighters, attacks on doctors, nurses, paramedics and ambulance crews are of equal concern and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ann Keen) for highlighting those concerns. It is right and timely that we should focus on the issues faced by our emergency workers. The Government’s respect agenda gives us an additional framework so that Members of Parliament and councillors can work with the police and emergency workers to deal with the problems in their area; I fully intend to do so in my constituency. We also need better recording of incidents, and better follow-up of incidents by the police, resulting in prosecutions wherever possible. Finally, we need imaginative and appropriate sentencing to deter future attacks.