Work needed on harassment, say ambulance chiefs
THE North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) has conceded that there is “work to be done” after figures revealed about a quarter of its staff had reported being bullied or harassed by colleagues.
Some statistics suggested that black and minority ethnic (Bame) staff were more likely to suffer.
A workforce race equality survey found that 25.8% of white NWAS employees had experienced harassment, bullying or verbal abuse from other staff in the last 12 months, while a slightly higher percentage of Bame staff, 27.5%, said they had experienced similar problems.
A slightly higher percentage of Bame staff (12.8%) reported discrimination than white colleagues (10.6%), although this gap had closed substantially since 2018 when 23.2% of Bame staff had reported experiencing discrimination compared with 13.4% of white colleagues.
Bame staff are also less likely to feel like they have fair access to career progression, with just over half (56.5%) saying they have equal opportunities, compared to three quarters (74.3%) of white colleagues – although the figure had risen by similar amounts for both white and Bame samples from the previous year.
Bame ambulance staff reported being less likely to be verbally abused by the public than their white colleagues, although the figure remained high either way, with 38% reporting bullying, harassment, or verbal abuse from patients, relatives, or the general public, down from 45.7% in 2018.
For white NWAS staff, nearly half (47%) had experienced some form of verbal abuse or harassment from the public, down from 49.8% the year before.
The trust said improvements have been made at the organisation and these are reflected in some of the figures but that bullying, harassment
“remains a priority”.
A NWAS spokeswoman said: “We have a zero tolerance approach to all forms of violence and aggression towards our staff.
“Following a successful social media campaign asking the public to help us stop abuse by pledging their support, a dedicated task group has been set up within and abuse the trust working to look at improvements that can be made to help reduce these statistics.
“We are continuing to use a variety of approaches to ensure staff are as safe and supported as possible in work.
“Equality and diversity is extremely important to us and internally we support staff through training sessions for both staff and managers and encouragement of development opportunities for staff from ethnic minorities.
“We recognise the difference in experience between different ethnic groups of staff and were pleased that the work undertaken is showing improvements, although there is still work to be done.
‘‘Our staff survey for 2019 is out now and we are hoping that these figures will have improved this year based on the work we have done.”