Police, firefighters join call for review of assault loophole

Police and firefighters’ unions have joined calls to urgently review mandatory sentences for assaulting emergency service workers, after a paramedic was hospitalised but fell through gaps in the law because she was not treating a patient at the time she was attacked.

Premier Jacinta Allan conceded further reform could be needed and that the outcome in this case, revealed by The Age on Thursday, was concerning.

The Victorian Ambulance Union wrote to Attorney-General Sonya Kilkenny on Thursday afternoon demanding an urgent review of the Sentencing Act, saying the prosecutor’s decision to withdraw charges of assaulting an emergency services worker after a paramedic was attacked while in uniform but not treating a patient rendered the laws worthless.

Police Association of Victoria secretary Wayne Gatt joined the campaign on Friday.

“Paramedics are there because the community needs them, just as police do,” Gatt said. “It shouldn’t matter whether they are treating a casualty or eating their lunch in uniform – if you punch them, assault them or target them in any way, you’re a particularly vile and cowardly type of lowlife.

“The law should protect them, protect police and protect all emergency service workers – full stop.”

United Firefighters Union secretary Peter Marshall confirmed he would also support a review of the laws, introduced more than a decade ago.

Allan said on Friday the government was considering further action.

“The law was designed to protect paramedics, and we want to ensure that the intent of that bill prevails,” the premier said.

“Our paramedics and our emergency services workers go out to work every single day on the front line to protect the community, to keep the community safe, to respond in some really difficult circumstances. So I’m really concerned to see the outcome of this court process.”

Allan confirmed Kilkenny was examining the decision and “what further actions the government will take”.

“It’s too premature to speculate at this stage on what that will be because this decision has only just being handed down. The law is there to protect paramedics and to acknowledge the important work they do in often dangerous conditions. So we will examine this and have more to say once the attorney has undertaken that work.”

Greg Barns, SC, the national president of the Australian Lawyers Alliance, said sentencing reform should not be done as a knee-jerk reaction to one case.

“Furthermore, we are fundamentally opposed to mandatory sentencing because it is an example of politicians taking on the role of judges and magistrates. We oppose it in all circumstances,” Barns said.

“This is an emotional case ... that’s the very reason why you don’t do knee-jerk reform.”

Opposition health spokeswoman Georgie Crozier said the laws were hopeless and ineffective.

“The loophole that is there needs to be fixed. And if the government won’t fix it, a Liberal and Nationals government will.”

Veteran paramedic Kathryn McCormack is still awaiting surgery after she was allegedly kicked in the stomach in Mornington on September 13, in a random attack on her and a junior colleague.

The uniformed paramedics were walking along the street after starting their shift when they witnessed a dispute and attempted to calm the situation. It is alleged the 58-year-old Seaford man then crossed the road and attacked the pair, kicking McCormack in the stomach, before members of the public came to the paramedics’ aid.

The man was initially charged with assaulting emergency workers, recklessly causing injury, making threats to kill, possessing a controlled weapon, and unlawful assault.

But during a brief hearing on Thursday, Frankston Magistrates’ Court was told that police prosecutors had agreed to withdraw the assault on an emergency worker charge relating to the paramedics, having “conceded that the complainant in relation to that charge was not on duty”.

However, charges that the man assaulted police who attended to arrest him still stand, along with a host of other charges that will be heard in late April.

“It’s extremely disappointing that the laws that are meant to protect us are not able to be used,” McCormack told The Age.

Victoria in 2014 introduced mandatory minimum six-month jail sentences for anyone convicted of assaulting emergency workers, including paramedics, police, doctors and nurses delivering emergency care, firefighters and prison officers.

But after a string of assaults on paramedics failed to result in the minimum sentences applied, the Andrews government in October 2018 toughened the laws to remove the option for judges to impose community corrections orders.

The 2018 legislative changes made injuring an emergency worker a category 1 offence, for which courts must impose a custodial sentence.

Victorian Ambulance Union secretary Danny Hill said the latest failure to pursue the charge demanded immediate bipartisan action to again overhaul the laws.

“According to this law, a paramedic is not considered to be on duty unless they are treating a patient. Effectively, that means the emergency worker assault laws don’t apply to an offender who bashes a paramedic at their branch, while they are refuelling or restocking the ambulance or while they are picking up lunch,” Hill said.

“Paramedics are never off-duty.”

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