McDowell may amend Bill to protect emergency workers

Minister for Justice Michael McDowell has said he will consider a call by gardaí to make it a specific criminal offence to impede or assault emergency services workers going about their duties.

At the opening of the AGSI annual conference last night, Mr McDowell said the creation of such an offence could realistically be introduced and may even happen in the near future.

"The Criminal Justice Bill is going through the Dáil at the moment and I'm certainly open to an amendment of the criminal law of that kind," he said. "It was contemplated before in 1997 and in the context of the Public Order Act and, at that stage, the shortlist of protected occupations somehow extended up to 40 by the time all the trade unions concerned were consulted.

"So I would have to keep it a narrow focused offence, which would protect those who are most vulnerable, rather than a broad thing, which covers everybody from tax inspectors to community welfare officers.

"I think we can do it, and I think there are some people, particularly fire officers and ambulance [ crews] and people like that, who deserve protection and who deserve additional protection by making it an offence to obstruct them or impede them as is the case with gardaí."

Delegates at the AGSI conference will consider a motion calling on its national executive to lobby for the new offence. The motion seeks to make it a new criminal offence to threaten, impede or obstruct anybody trying to preserve the life or health of another.