By Donna Macallister
Aberdeen Press and Journal
SCOTLAND — A union has defended the right of Scottish Ambulance Service crews to take an undisturbed meal break after it emerged that 80% of staff had opted out of answering 999 calls during their rest periods.
Unison’s Edinburgh-based regional organiser, David Forbes, said yesterday that crews were working harder and under more pressure than at any other time and needed to have their rest breaks.
He said the solution lay in providing more staff and ambulances rather than denying workers their meal breaks.
The comments came after it emerged last night that more staff were refusing to answer 999 calls during their breaks than did so last year.
In 2010, 540 staff agreed to be disturbed, out of a total of 2,407 eligible staff.
This year, 502 staff so far have opted to be disturbed out of a total of 2,413.
The policy, which applies to all NHS staff in the UK, was criticised following the death of a Moray woman in October last year.
Trainee technician Owen McLachlan refused to respond to an emergency call after Mandy Mathieson suffered a cardiac arrest at her home just “two minutes” from his depot in the village of Tomintoul because he was on a break.
Miss Mathieson, 33, did not receive help from emergency services for half an hour and was pronounced dead at the scene by an ambulance crew sent from Grantown, 15 miles away.
In April, three-year-old Martyn Gray’s parents battled in vain for 45 minutes to save his life at their home at Crieff as the local ambulance crew was on a break.
Mr Forbes said statistics showed there were more 999 calls now than in the past.
“There should be sufficient resources in the local area,” he said.
“Our hard-working crews should not be getting held up as the guilty party.
“Can you imagine driving 60mph in Edinburgh all day without a break?
“People are just saying: I need that break, I need to be able to walk around and relax and unwind.”
Ambulance crews are on an eight-hour shift rota but half an hour is unpaid. This time is allocated as an undisturbed rest break, but those who agree to work through their break if an emergency arises are paid an extra £250 a year.
A paramedic who works in a rural area and asked not to be named said he, and probably the vast majority of rural staff, had volunteered to be available during their half-hour rest break.
He believed more crew members would make themselves available if they were paid more money for doing so.
He added: “Those two-and-a-half hours per week that I am available are worth £1,600 per year, but I get paid £250 per year.
“I would be looking for something that brought it in line with the figure we’re missing for making ourselves available.
“But whether or not that would be a big incentive for crews working in big cities I do not know.”
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