Page 4097 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 22 October 2019
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frontline workers in the ACT. Data from ACT Policing shows that the number of reported assaults against police has been generally trending upward since 2011. From July 2011 to June 2015, for example, there was an average of 29 assaults per year recorded against police, compared with an average of 52 assaults per year from July 2015 to June 2019.
Violence against firefighters and paramedics is also a serious concern. The impact of repeated or sustained exposure to occupational violence experienced by first responders, including police, firefighters and paramedics, has recently been captured by various national reports which highlight that assaults may be associated with increased levels of psychological distress and poor mental health outcomes for these workers. These reports also identify the larger costs of mental health disorder claims by police, firefighters and paramedics.
While assaults against these workers can be captured under general assault provisions within existing ACT legislation, establishing a separate assault offence for police officers, firefighters and paramedics is important to recognise the discrete criminality of this offending and the particular occupational vulnerability experienced by these workers. A separate assault offence is also consistent with similar reforms in other Australian jurisdictions. Creating this new offence also means the specific conduct would be reflected in an offender’s criminal record, which enables better informed decisions involving the assessment of a person’s criminal history, for example, by police, the courts, prospective employers or volunteer agencies.
The bill provides that the offence will apply for assaults against emergency workers, which is defined to include police officers, firefighters and paramedics, as well as patient transport officers. Patient transport officers drive ambulances and provide patient transport to and from healthcare facilities and also clinics and private residences. Patient transport officers wear the same uniform as paramedics and may be tasked to attend emergency situations as a first response, as well as operate an intensive care ambulance in conjunction with a paramedic.
The offence will apply where a person assaults an emergency worker while in the exercise of functions, which includes any time the worker is on duty. It will also apply in circumstances where the worker is not exercising functions or on duty, where the assault is carried out as a consequence of or retaliation for action taken by the worker while exercising a function or because the person was an emergency worker. The offence will attract a maximum penalty of two years imprisonment. The prosecution will be required to prove that the person knew or was reckless about whether the victim was an emergency worker. However, in certain circumstances a person will be presumed to have known the victim was an emergency worker.
Secondly, the bill will create a new offence for driving at police and an offence for ramming police vehicles. This will send a clear signal that those who ram police will be held to account and face significant penalties. These offences aim to reflect the serious criminality of dangerous driving activity targeting police officers and police vehicles and deter others from engaging in this type of violent conduct. The offences are based on provisions adopted in Victoria in 2017 which were introduced to
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