Physical assault and non-physical abuse is up 12% between January and the end of April this year compared with 2024

A 999 call handler (credit London Ambulance Service)

London Ambulance Service (LAS) has released figures showing this year is on course to be even worse than 2024 for physical and verbal abuse directed to staff by patients and members of the public.

Physical assault and non-physical abuse is up 12% between January and the end of April this year compared with 2024 – with a shocking 781 incidents compared to 691.

The impact of abusive behaviour on LAS teams is highlighted in the latest episode of BBC’s fly-on-the-wall documentary Ambulance. Staff in LAS’s Newham control room are trying to help thousands of patients on 999 calls when a malicious caller repeatedly rings to ask female staff to come to his home and other inappropriate questions about their sexual preferences.

At one point he rings seven times in an hour while at the same time beleaguered staff are directing four separate callers on how to give chest compressions to people whose hearts have stopped beating until paramedics arrive to help.

To manage this the staff are told to start terminating calls if the man does not require an ambulance, whereupon he becomes aggressive and calls them “scum”. In the scenes caught on camera, emergency call co-ordinator Jude encapsulates the feelings of the whole control room team when he says: “It’s a very stressful job and you want to do everything in your power to make sure those in dire need get answered. When you have to deal with someone that’s abusing the system it has an effect. It plays on people’s minds.”

The abusive caller’s number was passed to the police who then go and visit his property to get him to stop. At the end of the shift some of the staff recollect how unpleasant the caller has made their day. Jude reflects all he can do is to take time to remember the people they all have helped that day: “We have made a difference to a lot of people in some of the worst situations they have imagine to be in. You have to take that into your next shift.”

Additional figures released by an LAS staff survey show that 55% of staff working in 999 control rooms experienced harassment or abuse from patients, their relatives or members of the public at least once in the past year. Almost a quarter of them had experienced it on more than ten occasions in the past twelve months. Meanwhile, more than a quarter faced unwanted sexual behaviour patients or the public during the same period.

Violence and abuse against staff has been on the rise in recent years: there was an increase of 11.3% of all violence, aggression and abuse incidents directed to LAS staff in 2024 compared to 2023.

Physical assaults increased by 8% in 2024 compared to 2023, while verbal abuse increased by 13% in 2024 compared to 2023. This works out at approximately seven reported incidents every day against ambulance crews and call handlers in London.

It prompted the service to join an ambulance-sector wide campaign, #WorkWithoutFear, highlighting the effects that daily abuse can have on staff and volunteers, and making it clear LAS will push for the prosecution of perpetrators and the toughest possible sentences.

LAS’s director of 999 operations, Stuart Crichton, said: “Whilst the vast majority of our callers and patients are extremely courteous towards our staff, abuse – either verbal or physical – is unacceptable. Each of these calls also mean we are unable to answer the phone to someone who may be in a life-and-death situation.

“Where this is no medical reason that could explain why a person is abusive or violent, we will work with police and partners to make sure we can take action and whenever possible push for prosecutions to prevent this behaviour and protect our staff.”

LAS has a violence reduction team as part of its ongoing work to protect staff and volunteers. The officers work closely with the Metropolitan Police, supporting victims who want to take their cases to court and helping to secure tougher penalties. The trust introduced body worn cameras in 2021 and introduced CCTV and audio recording equipment on all ambulances to aid investigations and help support criminal prosecutions.

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