Hmmm..a recent post by Magwitch also had a clicky-linky for an article in The Sun, which was the second similar story that I'm aware of, too. I’m not sure whether it was you that brought it to my attention or Magwitch, but both have left me rather annoyed. The particualr service with whom I’m employed operates a system of choosing whether you wish to have a disturbed or undisturbed meal break. However, this is done at the start of the shift, before you’ve had chance to be hammered into submission by the relentless calls to non-emergency emergencies or (albeit a more unlikely senario) nine solid hours of toe-curling trauma. The very suggestion that any ambulance crew would rather be sat with their feet up, swilling tea and watching Jeremy sodding Kyle, than saving someone’s life is bordering on the ridiculous. I, personally, am very insulted by the suggestion. However, I would rather be sat with my feet up, swilling tea and watching Jeremy sodding Kyle, than running twenty miles on blue lights to find that I’d been called to someone that had a scab fall off their knee during the night, and were concerned because the underlying skin was slightly more pink than it was before. Herein lies the true problem. If we spent less time attending the utterly pointless, and the general public who are so quick to burn us in flames actually took some responsibility for their own, non-life threatening malaise, there would be enough ambulances to enforce such EU rulings as meal-breaks, without anyone having to wait so long for an emergency response. Since the implementation of Agenda for Change, I have seen no increase in the number of staff, yet a reduction in the number of hours in the working week, and the usual increase in the total number of calls. With these changes, I have never worked so hard, or been so exhausted in my whole life. The number of incidents that I attend has more than doubled. To then be told I’m uncaring by tabloid journalists, and those who comment upon their ramblings, is both upsetting and insulting. I’d like to see them work a twelve hour shift without a break, then finish three hours late, because someone ploughed a lorry into an old folks’ home, at five minutes to their finishing time! Rant over. For now. Oh...hang on. The rant isn’t over. See that Fireman? That one with his feet up and a second job, when he earns more than a Paramedic anyway? You don’t see his kind of bad press about them, do you? Where are our Press Officers? Rant IS over.