Coulter says Assembly Drift is preventing him introducing Emergency Workers Protection Law
Rev Dr Robert Coulter MLA, Ulster Unionist Health Spokesman and Assembly Member for North Antrim, said today he was horrified that shots had been fired at an ambulance crew in the Dunclug Estate in Ballymena.
“Apparently, the ambulance crew returned after the incident to give help to a man found at the site of the incident with a head injury. This shows a level of dedication to duty which reflects the very best standards of the service.”
“This issue raised by this is very serious. We need to get a grip on the situation where ambulance crew, nurses, hospital workers, and doctors are attacked when on duty. I have already called for an Emergency Workers Protection Law closely mirroring that in Scotland but, because the Assembly is not functioning properly, I am being prevented from introducing this law which is very necessary. I have done all the preliminary work and the Bill is ready, but because of this appalling political drift, I am being prevented from introducing it.”
“It is high time all the nonsense about who will talk to who and who will participate in what stopped. There is a job of work waiting to be done in the Assembly on behalf of the people and I for one want to get on with it. The need to protect our health and emergency workers is of the highest priority and it is being neglected like so much other public business – rates increases, water charges and so on - because of the lack of political movement.”
“The people want all these pressing issues sorted out and MLA’s should get on with it. People are rapidly getting fed up with all the juvenile excuses for not getting on with the job.”