By Paul Sims
The Daily Mail
CUMBRIA, England — Emergency services were told yesterday they should be prepared to ‘risk their lives’ to protect the public.
At the inquest on victims of the Cumbrian gun massacre, coroner David Roberts said it was disturbing that paramedics were prevented from reaching the injured because of red tape which cost vital minutes.
And a senior police officer said the response had been severely hampered by slavish adherence to health and safety regulations. ‘The public have a right to expect the emergency services to put themselves at risk to help them,’ he said.
On the day of the rampage, when crazed gunman Derrick Bird murdered 12 people and wounded 11 others, ambulance crews were ordered to remain at ‘safe rendezvous points’ for anything up to two hours until the police gave them permission to treat victims.
This dithering was compounded by a catastrophic breakdown in communication between the different services.
A total of 13 ambulances, three air ambulances and four rapid response vehicles were held back for up to 90 minutes because police officers were unaware the crews were waiting for their go-ahead before helping the wounded.
Yesterday, after listening to 70 witnesses during 18 days of harrowing evidence, the inquest jury returned verdicts of unlawful killing on each of Bird’s 12 victims. They also found that Bird had killed himself.
Mr Roberts said that though he did not believe the misguided safety measures had cost lives, they could easily do so in future incidents.
‘It does not take a leap of imagination to see if this incident were replicated, it may be that the ambulance service or paramedic assistance would be needed for someone to survive who would otherwise have died,’ he said.
Mr Roberts said he would be writing to the Home Secretary urging him to review health and safety rules relating to the emergency services.
These rules were also blamed at the inquests into the London bombings on July 7, 2005, for causing delays.
Last night, one of those caught up in the Cumbria massacre on June 2 last year described the rules preventing paramedics from attending scenes as ‘appalling’.
Vivienne Tregidga, a PR consultant who waited for an ambulance with one of Bird’s victims, said: ‘It was left up to people who didn’t have enough training or equipment to help victims.
‘We all pay taxes to have an emergency service and when there’s an emergency they don’t turn up.’
An independent report into the emergency services handling of the killing spree is expected to be published on Monday. It is anticipated that it will call for an overhaul of the controversial health and safety policy.
Its author, Assistant Chief Constable Simon Chesterman, who leads policy on armed policing for the Association of Chief Police Officers, has also called for greater co-operation among the emergency services.
‘I think the public have a right to expect the emergency services to put themselves at risk to protect them,’ he said.
‘Clearly there were a number of scenes where officers and members of the public were asking for ambulances,’
‘If I was commanding the incident, the overarching aim would be to protect the public from harm.
‘We cannot go on with this confusion. The police service and the ambulance service must get their act together.’
Bird, a taxi driver, first shot dead his twin brother, David, 52, and then family solicitor Kevin Commons, 60. In the days before the massacre he had convinced himself that the two men were helping an inquiry into his tax affairs.
Bird Ð who vowed to make Whitehaven as famous as Dunblane Ð then drove to the town’s Duke Street taxi rank where he shot dead taxi driver Darren Rewcastle, 43, and injured several others.
He went on to kill mother-of-two Susan Hughes, 57, retired security worker Kenneth Fishburn, 71, part-time mole catcher Isaac Dixon, 65, retired couple James and Jennifer Jackson, 67 and 68, farmer Garry Purdham, 31, estate agent Jamie Clark, 23, retired Sellafield employee Michael Pike, 64, and pensioner Jane Robinson, 66.
Within 90 minutes of Mr Rewcastle’s death 30 armed officers were in action, but despite being given permission to shoot to kill they never got close enough to engage Bird.
He was finally found in woodland near Boot, more than three hours after police discovered his first known victim, after turning his .22 rifle on himself.
ACC Chesterman, from West Mercia Police, said: ‘If you said to me, “Was the Cumbria Constabulary response reasonable in the circumstances?” Yes it was.
‘Could it have been better? Yes it could and we learn every time that these tragedies happen.’
Cumbria Police assistant chief constable Jerry Graham insisted that at no time before Bird’s body was found was he prepared to declare an area safe.
But crucially, he and his force admitted that they were completely unaware of the controversial ambulance policy currently in place. ‘At no stage was I specifically requested by the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) to give clearance for any member of their staff to enter the crime scenes, or for police officers to escort ambulance staff in order to assist casualties,’ he said.
NWAS head Peter Mulcahy told the inquest there was a huge tension among ambulance crews over the rules surrounding such an incident.
He said: ‘It is not in the make-up of ambulance staff not to go and help people.’
But he said there was a real risk of sending people to their deaths, and the health and safety considerations of staff were paramount.
A spokesman for the NWAS said it would have been liable under health and safety insurance legislation had any of their staff been killed or injured. The service did, however, accept that lessons had to be learnt.
The inquest heard that police and the ambulance service had difficulty communicating because they used different wavelengths on their radios. The system is now being replaced so all 999 services will eventually use the same wavelength.
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