EXCLUSIVE: 28% rise in abuse towards West Midlands Ambulance Service staff
3,020 cases of physical and verbal incidents of abuse were recorded across the 2025/26 financial year, up from 2,351 in 2024/25
The number of reported incidents of abuse directed at members of West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) staff has risen to over 3,000 over the last financial year, according to the latest data obtained by Hits Radio.
Data from a submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) request to WMAS has revealed 3,020 were recorded during 2025/26, 812 being physical, with 2,208 verbal.
The total works out on average of around eight cases a day, as well an 28% increase from the one in 2024/25 which stood at 2,351.
Rise is 'alarming'
Other figures show back in 2020/21, 1,671 incidents were reported, the number rising to 1,794 for 2021/22, and again to 1,849 for 2022/23.
It reached over 2,000 in 2023/24 with 2,348 recorded, before making it to those totals for the last two periods.
One of the service's assistant chief ambulance officers, Jeremy Brown, said the increase is both "concerning" and "alarming", and they want to send a clear message that any form of abuse will not be tolerated.
"Our staff are here as a frontline resource, either at a call taking level, or clinically, that are responding to patients and that are there to help the patient," he said.
"We're not anybody's enemy, We are not here to judge, we are just here simply to either ask a variety of different questions at a call taking level or from a response point of view.
"Our aim is to go and be able to help patients, provide the treatment that we need to do, take them to hospital if required, and any abuse towards our staff is just completely unwarranted and unnecessary and actually has a real deep impact on those staff members."
Abuse can have a 'massive impact'
Brown added they provide lots of support, but they have seen people leave their job because of the abuse they've received.
The overall total includes abuse aimed at all members of staff, including those answering incoming calls.
One call assessor has told us it can have a "massive impact", after she herself has experienced things such as death threats made to her and her family and ones of sexual violence.
"It’s not very nice because a lot of people can get really upset about it and you shouldn't really have to deal with it from the general public," she said.
"You feel quite deflated, especially when you're doing 12-hour shifts, because if you've had a lot of abuse over that day you go home feeling quite deflated and down.
"We're all in different teams, and if you've had a bad call, you can take time out, you’ve got your supervisors to lean on, your duty manager, everyone here’s quite supportive and really friendly as well, so it's important to have a good relationship with your colleagues."
The assaulting an emergency worker offence was introduced in 2018, with guidance updated last year by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to encourage prosecutors to consider the full range of available offences when charging assaults, to help deliver swifter justice.