2023 AEAWA Minutes

Meeting Conducted
12:30 – 14:30.

St John Attendee’s
Scott Higgins, Wil White, Drew Mckibbin and Katie Tran.

Committee Attendee’s
John Thomas and Lee Waller

Committee Apologies
Mike Hardwick, Jesse George, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, and Tania Hill.

Previous Minutes Accepted By
There were no previous minutes to accept and move.

Opening St John Statement
The run through of the agenda and the terms of reference occurred. The aim of the committee is to review each item. This is a subcommittee of the overarching safety committee that for now will be tasked with three specific objectives.

1. Violence and Aggression
2. Manual tasks
3. Fatigue management

The discussions from this committee will lead into policy change with the aim of utilising the safety committee for oversight and approvals.

St John stated that there is a lack of ownership and accountability with a lot of these issues. The objectives are to provide ownership to follow up.

St John believe if issues are identified then this is the forum to recommend change in the form of policy development. The committee will be able to review and identify themes and trends. There will be at least six meetings per year for the committee.

Training initiatives will also be discussed. There will also be independent meetings held across the organisation, Staff can discuss issues with no managers in the room, there will be 20 meetings a year and it is voluntarily to attend.

The AEAWA would like to see the recommendations passed into change, so these efforts are worth it. These meetings will probably occur early January, the foundation for the framework will then be set in place.

The possibility of a fatigue tick and flick on the IR was briefly discussed. Further information on this will be provided at future meetings.

St John also stated there has been a drop in the last week of 100 hours of shift extensions across the metropolitan fleet, however we have just come off the highest levels of shift extensions the service has ever seen. Currently we are back to 634 hours of shift extensions.

Policy Change
The AEAWA asked what policies do we want reviewed? The AEAWA would like the policies to be made available, as many are not even in connect. They seem to appear and disappear off the system. This is not acceptable. The AEAWA stated if the policy is not available to staff, then it doesn’t exist, and he have no appetite to follow a policy that’s not made available.

Closing AEAWA Statement
The AEAWA would like to see the ‘leaders’ and ‘decision makers’ in these meetings to speed up the process. Fatigue affects the entire organisation so multiple departments need to be involved.

The AEAWA also want to get down to the basics, and actually make changes. Not to implement a St John traffic light system for crew fatigue with three lights set to red. That policy is problematic when you have a 0-2% stand by capacity.

In essence does St John want to work with the AEAWA to have a plan that works or plough on with their own agendas and develop implementations that will in all likelihood fail, so they can tick a box to say they have a plan.

If we want change, we also have to fix ‘policy conflict’ within this organisation. Review all the policies and sort the ones that contradict each other.

Next Committee Meeting
Mid December 2023.

Meeting Closed
13:45.

Meeting Chaired By
Scott Higgins

Meeting Conducted
13:00 – 15:00.

St John Attendee’s
Scott Higgins, Justin Fonte, Ben Mann, Taylor Portwood, Drew Mckibbin, Stephanie Freemantle, Carl Vine and a guest from WAPOL

Committee Attendee’s
Lee Waller

Committee Apologies
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Jesse George, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, and Tania Hill.

Previous Minutes Accepted By
There were no previous minutes to accept and move.

Opening St John Statement
The subcommittee will look at all V & A issues to give advice and sort initiatives. St John have some policies and procedures written already and many they believe require writing, there are multiple stakeholders involved in this process; WAPOL, DOH etc, so this may be a lengthy process. If policies need to be changed this is the forum to do that.

Opening AEAWA Statement
The AEAWA always welcome meetings such as these and the implementation of various working groups across the organisation to make change, however we would like to see the same dedication by St John.

It is pointless scheduling meetings for the AEAWA to attend, then deny us being at the table because the workload is high. It is always high. If delegates cannot make the meeting, as St Johns has denied them due to workload then the meeting is to be cancelled and rescheduled.

What the AEAWA do not want is the usual St John railroading of the past. That is holding these meetings, not implementing anything the AEAWA says and recommends, then ploughing through with the St John agenda. The agenda they had before they came to the meeting.

This has been done too many times in the past. Some examples were provided.
1. The Country Recruitment: were St John paid little attention to discussions to railroad their online recruitment process.
2. AP1s in the country: where we met to discuss placing AP1s into country regions were no AP2s and above had applied. Then they ignored most of the communication and put AP1s into positions over AP2s anyway.
3. Community Paramedic extensions
4. This very Violence and Aggression subcommittee were the AEAWA, by request from the membership approached St John with multiple recommendations. They returned to the table with a fixation on body worn cameras.

The AEAWA would like the process to start at the very beginning.

1. Collect the right data
If data from the crews is required to make change, then a proper process to obtain that data is needed.

The AEAWA provided an example. Why is an officer who administers the wrong medication dose to a patient, happy to put their hand up to say they made a mistake. They self-report the issue and an investigation commences.

Unfortunately, that same officer who is assaulted often will not report this as St Johns Operational arm projects a blame culture. There will be an armchair quarter back who wasn’t there, who often finds the officer at fault. The feedback is; you should have done this, and this would not have happened.

There needs to be a non-blame culture for those who self-report or officers will not (unless an injury is sustained) fill out the form.

2. A review needs to occur when the call is received.
When the call is received, how do we ask more questions above what is asked by ProQA, our call-takers are locked to a script that does not aske many pertinent questions. Who can this call be allocated to for further interrogation? We want a 24/7 department to further investigate these potential aggressive scenes.

3. Appropriate dispatching to the call
Why are we then dispatched on a priority 1 to sit for two hours waiting for police. Can’t we just wait for police to attend or go on a priority 2. Waiting around the corner still places crews at risk, as most aggressive patients know we are standing by in the vacinity.

4. Violence and Aggression Training
This can not be just a one off, officers need to refresh these skills each year.

We want the discussion on the BWC to be last on the agenda, we believe things can be done pre this St John intervention.

St John stated that these types of incidents have significantly increased in the country. The AEAWA would like this data further broken down to.
• Gender
• Officer time in the job
• Are weapons used
• Verbal versus physical or sexual assaults
• Regions
• Classifications; Paramedics, Medics, Transport Officers and Volunteers etc.
• Drugs and/or alcohol on scene.

There is a history of under reporting in this organisation and St John need to fix that culture. Unfortunately, there is little trust out there for St John management. This needs to be your first priority to fix.

St John stated there are three cameras and eight stab resistant vests going out on the road Monday 30th October 2023. There are docking stations located at Vic Park and Riverton. In 2-weeks the trial will be moved to O’Connor and Rockingham, then they will go to the Northeast and Central regions.

There have been 168 EOIs in 4 days from officers wanting to wear them. There is considerable feedback and support for these devices according to St John.
The AEAWA are skeptical as we can see the employee relations visits by St John will increase. St John reacted by stating it didn’t happen for the Corpuls. Well, here’s a history lesson. That’s because the AEAWA sorted that in the Fair Work Commission.

St John will sort a page on connect to show minutes, agenda items etc. The current ideas to start this process are.
• Training and policies need a review.
• Investigation training for Area Managers.
• Yearly training for Violence and Aggression.
• Paramedics in the Police Operations center was raised again about being beneficial.

Next Committee Meeting
The next AEAWA Committee is scheduled for Monday 12th December 2020.

Meeting Closed
10:30.

Meeting Chaired By
John Thomas

Meeting Conducted
08:30 – 10:30.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Justin Ingrey, Phil Stanatis, Jesse George, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Todd Jones, Dave Bryant, Rick Candy, and Bronwyn Hearne.

Committee Apologies
Rex Bullock, Chris Smith and Jordan O’Sullivan.

Previous Minutes Accepted By
Justin Ingrey and Jesse George.

New AEAWA Members
There has been a total of 172 new members signed with the AEAWA since January 1st, 2023. The Executive have been running a recruitment campaign which has involved general emails, crew discussions and talks with the new Operational Support Officers, Communications Officers, Direct Entrants, Medics and students within the college.

SOC EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Communications Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the SOC EBA drop down menu on the website). The Communications Officer’s offer was less than favourable and the AEAWA wrote to St Johns advising them of the disappointing offer.

St John wrote back to the AEAWA with a ‘revised final offer’, which was also rejected by the membership. To date no reply has been sent by the organisation. The AEAWA will formally write to St John to ascertain what is happening, as the membership deserve a response. The correspondence sent can be found on the website under the information and Correspondence drop down menu.

Transport EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Ambulance Transport Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the Transport EBA drop down menu on the website). As the Communications Officers and Ambulance Transport Officers EBA negotiations both paused for St John to do their costings.

The AEAWA have still not received an offer from St John for the Ambulance Transport offer. The AEAWA will formally write to St John to ascertain what is happening, as the membership deserve a response.

Paramedic EBA
When is this fight starting. And what do we need to do to prepare. When will the AEAWA send out information on what we are fighting for. A lot of traffic is coming through the info account, it was discussed to get another email address; eba@aeawa etc. So that responses from the fleet when we request the wish list from the membership, don’t interfere with the day to day emails received.

The AEAWA Treasurer Report
The AEAWA report from the Treasurer was tabled. The financials of the Association were discussed, and all recent debit and credits were provided to the Executive. The Executive Committee both reviewed and accepted the report, and any financial member of the Association can request a copy through [email protected].

Meeting Agenda
This is the monthly scheduled AEAWA meeting for all the Association Committees (Executive, Paramedic, Communications, Medic, and Transport). Association correspondence and issues from the membership will be discussed here.

Agenda Items

12-Hour Shift Payments for Transport Officers
Many Ambulance Transport Officers contacted the AEAWA over the EBA item relating to the 12-hour shifts. They way it is written many believe it insinuates that you need to work 12 hours before you get a shift extension.

The AEAWA have informed the membership that this will not be the case in the recent Transport JCC meeting held September 13th. The AEAWA stated.

St John really dropped the ball with this one. With the introduction of the 12-hour shifts a number of employees were under the impression, and in some cases led to believe that as they have moved from an 8.5-hour day roster to a 12-hour a day roster they would be receiving 3.5-hours of overtime per shift.

THIS IS NOT THE CASE – You will be paid a 12-hour rate for the days you work, not the overtime. Unfortunately, no one is advised of this, and it is not until the employee see’s their first pay that they realise their pay doesn’t add up.

Officers are then contacting St John, who then inform the employee they do not get paid the overtime.

All officers should note that those who work these rosters often receive contracts that state your pay is referenced to Appendix 2 in the Ambulance Transport Officers Certified Agreement (as all Ambulance Transport rates are).

Unfortunately, St John never realised that there are NO 12-HOUR SHIFTS IN APPENDIX 2. So, your rate will be calculated differently. Unfortunately, it appears there are various Ambulance Transport Officers working these 12-hour rosters on a multitude of pay rates. St John are in the process of reviewing this.

The AEAWA will write to St John to put the membership at ease and will place that correspondence onto the website.

BCP Levels
Our country colleagues have contacted the AEAWA as they believe the rise in BCP levels have nothing to do with an ‘emergency situation’ but has everything to do with St John falling asleep at the wheel and not recruiting more Paramedics and Transport Officers. This is effectively giving St John a ‘free run’ at rostering and manipulating the data.

It appears throughout the country paramedics are being sought for regional areas. Recently Ambulance Service New South Wales are seeking 500 seen here. It appears either St John are not asking for enough resourcing or Government aren’t providing it.

What ever the case people within the West Australian community are being provided with a substandard service, as there are not enough resources. The AEAWA will write to St John to ascertain why the BCP levels are set the way they are, as there has been no directive from the Minister or Department of Health.

Medics in the Country
Members, especially in the Southwest contacted multiple delegates about this implementation. Suddenly Medics are being placed on the roster to work with Paramedics.

The AEAWA stated that Medics are contained in the Ambulance Transport Officers Agreement, and therefore CANNOT be placed to work with paramedics, we are not at the height of the Pandemic, there has been no Government requests to do so.

This is nothing short of St John dropping the ball again. St John need to go to Health and sort this out, they need to ask for more staff. Whilst they do this the AEAWA have raised a dispute.

NETS
Members want to see reduced RFDS transfers across the state. There is minimal capacity in the country, and whilst crews are tied up doing RFDS calls, emergencies in the community are waiting to long to get an ambulance. This is costing lives.

In Albany Paramedics do not do NETS, in Narrogin there is a vehicle in RFDS hanger to reduce transfers, it appears…. surprise, surprise. That St John do not have a statewide plan, and it is up to the many regional managers to sort out. There needs to be an overriding managerial way of doing things, and there needs to be uniformity.

Recent Country Relief Positions
The AEAWA are in the process of raising a dispute over the recent country relief positions. Many of you would know that previously the agreement was that only AP2s could do country relief. St John approached us, cap in hand, asking if we would support the notion for AP1s in the country, basically they said this was for regions they could not staff, the example given was Newman.

The AEAWA agreed to assist the organisation in this process for Paramedic positions, provided. 1. The initial country relief advertisement stated AP2s and above. 2. If an AP2 and above (inclusive of an AP3 or SM) does not apply for the position, then the relief spot is to be readvertised again as AP1s and above. 3.

If an AP2 or above applies in that round, they would be successful, if not then the AP1 would take the relief position. While we agreed in principle to ensure a fair and transparent process that would benefit the organisation, not cause any detriment to any officer, and decrease the chances of a country station being closed.

The last round of country relief advertisements did not follow the agreed process. It was advertised for AP1s and above, and even though AP2s, AP3s and SMs applied for various positions, the AP1s were allocated those spots, which is a breach of the Agreement.

Meal Breaks
Members have asked about the recent AmbiCad messages stating at the end of the shift, ‘Oh by the way you’ve all had your break’ through the night. Once again, this is a St John mistake. If you were not contacted on that shift, you claim the allowance. This is St Johns inability to run the service adequately.

And yes, you may think with so many, many, many, many, managers in this organisation; in SOC there have been instances of more managers in the room than call-takers, that one of them may find some time to send an AmbiCad message down.

Any back to planet Earth, there have been recent messages sent to the Medics stating the same thing. ALL officers are advised that unless you or your vehicle (if on a night shift) has not been contacted, a global message does not cut it. Claim the allowance, and if its not paid, please contact us on [email protected].

General Business

Employ a Full Time AEAWA Employee
Many believe the AEAWA should employ someone to perform office duties. This should take some pressure off the Executive. The AEAWA are happy to investigate this if that is what the membership would like. It should be noted that yes, it is busy, yes, the Executive have little time off… But boy do we love doing what we do. Further updates will come shortly.

The Triple Time Train
Members approached the AEAWA about the closures through the night of Rockingham, whilst there was only one crew in Mandurah. The week before the old ‘Triple Time Train’ came pouring through all stations, now the depots are closed.

The AEAWA will write to St John and ask if the spin a wheel or something, we have no idea why sometimes it is made available. Whilst other times we shout multiple depots. Its also amazing that Managers seem to be the first officers that board the Triple Time Train, even though they should only be paid at casual rates.

Next Meeting
Tuesday 14th November 2023 from 08:30 – 10:30.

Meeting Concluded
10:30.

Meeting Chaired by
Scott Higgins

Meeting Commenced
12:00 on October 2nd, 2023

Committee Attendee’s
Callan McClure

Committee Apologies
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Jesse George, Conrad Fairhead and Tania Hill.

SJA Attendees
Scott Higgins, Drew McKibbin and Natalie Adams.

After numerous interactions with St John over fixing significant workplace issues the AEAWA have been at the forefront of implementing numerous working groups to reduce stresses within the workplace. Those issues and subcommittees are listed below.

Fatigue Management
St John are establishing a “sub-committee” to aide in fatigue management. A diagnostic review is to be conducted by Melius Consulting Group who will hold focus groups in mid-November to examine improving fatigue management across the service. A fatigue management specialist will then be recruited to review and implement the subsequent recommendations. More information will be provided shortly.

Manual Tasks
St John will establish a “sub-committee” for review of existing equipment and future initiatives such as lifting teams. No developments other than to establish a “sub-committee” has occurred to date, however delegates representing the AEAWA membership will be placed into this committee.

Emergency Driving
St John is conducting an internal review of emergency driving policy, benchmarking it against other states. An external review of student officer training program is to commence in early October.

St John is currently attempting to have the Road Traffic Code 2000 amended by state government to allow for public roads training of emergency driving. At this stage significant changes are required, and progress is slow. A working group will be implemented soon to review these changes.

Health and Hygiene
St John are currently in the process of recruiting an “immunisation specialist” which has reportedly been advertised, AEAWA have been unable to find this “advertised” job as of the day of this meeting. This specialist will review the St John policy relating to the immunisation and vaccination program.

The Rollout of the Alcohol and Drug Testing Program
St John will commence an Alcohol and Drug testing program roll out very soon, no new changes to current policy or processes have been announced as yet.

Workplace Violence and Aggression
St John will form this sub-committee with the first meeting in October 2023. A connect page with support for police investigations such as FAQs and advice will be created for offices to go to for information.

A SOC Officer to be located within WAPOL Police Operations Centre (POC)
Similar to the previous paramedic staffed police liaison officer role, soon St John will be calling for officers to be placed into the POC. Further information will be provided shortly.

PPE Trial for Body Worn Cameras and Stab Vests
The trial will commence mid-October. St John will provide the AEAWA with a standard operating procedure prior to commencement. The AEAWA raised that our members have zero interest in body worn cameras as due to the appalling low level of faith in senior management members feel St John would be more interested in investigating complaints than gathering evidence for criminal proceedings.

The AEAWA raised that previous assaults caught on camera at hospitals, where despite full video recordings were available; nil conviction occurred. The AEAWA again reiterated they need to mitigate officers being in these situations in the first place and they need to implement appropriate plans to get staff home safely once these incidents have occurred.

The AEAWA first raised this on the 20th of June this year. When asked about using STT to review calls for further information for staff safety or not responding to violent scenes until WAPOL arrives advised they would “look into it”. So we await that answer.

Meeting Concluded
12:26

Next Meeting
TBA

Meeting Chaired By
Joe Cuthbertson

Meeting Conducted
12:00-12:30

Committee Attendees
Lee Waller and Callan McClure.

Committee Apologies
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick as Jesse George.

SJA Attendees
Joe Cuthbertson and Natalie Adams.

St John Opening Statement

The Winding Up of the Winter Surge Plan
Currently there have been some fluctuations in ED presentations across the state as the warmer environment depresses the viral load throughout the community. St John called for this meeting to discuss with the AEAWA the wind down of the Winter Surge Plan.

Medic/Medic and Medic/TOM Crews
Discussion occurred around the data of splitting the Medic/Medic crews to the Medic/TOM crews. St John stated they monitored quality assurance, Clinical Incidents and other potential issues around this split and found no problems. St John believe that this is due to those crews having the assistance of STT. This is why there is not appetite to place these crews on 24/7, until STT hours change. St John realise these crews need this support and will not increase the span of hours until STT does.

Currently the plan for 5 Medic/Medic crews per shift is continuing, however St John want to know from the AEAWA under what circumstances can they enact the plan again. The AEAWA stated the commitment was for 10 Medic/Medic crews per shift, we will need to see these resources included in the fleet before we truly discuss a surge plan for next year.

Winter Surge Plan
The AEAWA stated that an organisational surge plan needs to be separated from day-to-day business. The reason why surge capacity destroys us and increases issues within this service is due to us having no capacity. Currently we have 15 ambulances down, call-takers and radio dispatcher numbers are down. It is approaching the point where St John can’t run the Ambulance Service on a Tuesday never mind a surge capacity event. The AEAWA are happy to discuss further surge events, however we will not be at all happy with allowing St John to use a surge plan for daily use.

The Calvary
St John wanted to the discuss the idea of hiring Paramedics for surge capacity events. Hypothetically, winter is bad and ED presentations are high, a paid surge workforce would come in and assist. The AEAWA stated we have zero appetite for this plan and would not support it in any way. It appears that St John most likely would get this money to fund this from DOH, as they are NOT interested in increasing crews on a day-to-day basis… but on a windup winter plan meeting, we are talking about paying for extra staff over winter.

The AEAWA and its membership would like to remind St John that we as a service can’t run effectively across the three other unknown periods ‘Summer’, ‘Autumn and ‘Spring’. The AEA also discussed the previous issues of the Medic/TOM system. Basically, when those crews were split, St John did not back fill the Transport Officers which meant that the Paramedic crews were often left doing the Transport calls anyway. Once again, this identified the lack of resources and capacity in the system.

Meeting Closed
12:00

Next Meeting
TBA

Meeting Chaired By
Alan Clyne

Meeting Conducted
09:00-11:05

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Jesse George, Jon Noble and Karen Gerristen.

Committee Apologies
No apologies

SJA Attendees
Alan Clyne, Tony Fitzgerald, John Backo, Stephanie Freemantle and Florentina Min.

St John Opening Statement

Call Volume
Workload has gone up 20% since last JCC, and the call volume has increased from 265 cases a day to 325 cases. St John believe this work has always been there and that we are now better placed to do that work. There are more crews (50-55 crews a day) and the turnaround times have improved. This also includes the Medic volume working across an 18-hour daily period. Currently the establishment on most days is at 70.

Workload is heavily dependent on APTC, some days crews are doing certain jobs and the next day they are not. Last Sunday PTS did eight country retrievals, which obviously left the metropolitan area a little vacant. KPI response performance is over the 90% benchmark.

CPAT Vehicles
CPAT specific calls have increased, St John want to get the vehicle out more to handle this specific workload. They want to have the same officers on the vehicle to maintain familiarisation. There will two more CPAT vehicles coming online, one at the end of the year and the second vehicle will come online early next year.

Patient Liaison Officer in Joondalup Health Campus
St John are toying with the idea of placing an officer into this hospital to assist with ramped Ambulance Transport and Medic crews. The AEAWA stated what benefit would this provide when a Hospital Liaison Manager is already placed there to deal with ramped crews?

St John will bring further information back to the table to discuss this proposal further.

Leftover Items from the Previous Agenda

Vehicle Maintenance Requests
This system has been sorted, and information has been provided to all Ambulance Transport Officers and Medics. This item is now listed as “Closed”. However, if further issues occur we will raise this again at a future JCC.

Ready Now Jobs at Hospitals
This item has been closed from the last JCC. St John had advised all officers that if they arrive to pick up the patient and after 15-minutes they are still not ready a call to PTS comms should occur to advise. Depending on workload you will either remain there a little longer until the patient is ready, or the job will need to be rebooked and you will be sent another call.

The AEAWA stated St John need a ‘checklist’ for ready now calls. Someone should be calling and finding out; is the cannula out, is the paperwork done, have all interventions ceased with the patient, before we attend. This will prevent crews hanging around at hospitals. With the current state of the health system, we do enough of this already.

A further discussion occurred around ‘wait and return’ calls. Some officers have been forced to wait excessively long at scenes whilst other calls move more smoothly. As always wait and returns will be arranged on a case-by-case basis. Some scenes it may not be appropriate to leave the patient, whilst other times it will be OK.

It is also dependent on the procedure that patient is going for, as this will determine the time the crew is required to wait. All such calls will be advised by PTS comms.

Forced Overtime
The procedure requested by St John for officers to call PTS comms is clearly becoming an issue for many members. Officers are calling three to four times to advise they can not do overtime are not getting through to anyone on the phone, as those staff are busy and on calls themselves.

The AEAWA advised that this was brought up in the Paramedic JCC and the Association requested an AmbiCad message which pops up and asks on shift crews if they would like a shift extension, crews can simply hit a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ button.

With an excessive number of calls going into our communication centres each day, and employees constantly under the pump, why create a system where extra call volumes come in?

St John seemed happy to review this, and they will provide an answer shortly. It was also advised that with the extra new staff that have hit the road and Transport ‘book off’ rates improving, this may not be such an issue in the future.

New Agenda Items

Vehicle Maintenance Requests
This is now a closed. The Ambulance Transport Officer Newsletter has provided all information on this issue to the workforce. If any issues are still occurring, Ambulance Transport Officers and Medics are advised to contact the AEAWA, and we can relist the problem on the JCC agenda.

Cert III for Non-Emergency Transport
This item has been raised numerous times; St John have tried to get this to work. An expression of interest has now gone out to see who would be interested in this in the newsletter. The aim was to get officers who wish to get the certification to complete the certificate. St Johno were also looking to sort the retrospective requirements for officers interested in the course. This process may take about six months; however, St John would like to get this through.

St John need to investigate officer training to see if the standards will be accepted for officers to gain the certification. This will require external discussions. St John will also require someone who is experienced in clinical education to assist in running the course or with course development. Currently, the plan is to look into a small number of people for the first group, to test the process.

Stryker Rollout
Members would like to know what is happening with the rollout, when can members expect them to be in the vehicles. St John stated the Medics were the primary focus as they were assigned the new vehicles.

There has also been a supply issue, which has delayed this process. Normal fleet replacements are still occurring, and the current Stryker retro fit is doing approximate two vehicles per week. St John also advised that no new vehicles will be fitted with the Ferno, they will all be Stryker fitted vehicles.

It is a long task, but the process should be completed over the next year or two. The CEO is focused on this and wants it completed as soon as possible.

Roster System
Members are a little concerned at the length delays of this upcoming roster system. St John advised that there is now a Team purely focussed on this. St John are still reviewing all the potential systems and data capturing processes and some head way is expected in the next calendar year. St Johns will keep members informed through the AEAWA and the Ambulance Transport Newsletter.

Closed Vans
The question was asked about the data capturing of closed vehicles. The AEAWA would like to see how many shifts/vehicles are closed daily (inclusive of Medic and Transport Officer vehicles). St John did not have that data with them but provided some data from today (13/09/2023). Out of the 37 rostered vehicles today they were 5 down.

There were no specifics of Medic/Transport configurations. St John would be happy to inform the AEAWA on future closures of vehicles.

Transferring Infants/Babies
Discussions occurred around transferring new borns. In some cases, crews are saying its unsafe to have mum on one stretcher and the baby on the other. As they can not see the child and its very hard to assess them properly on route.

The AEAWA intervened and asked the question ‘have the new baby blankets been provided to the Transport fleet yet? St Johns stated ‘No’. This is a simple fix. Again the AEAWA would like to remind all officers YOU SHOULD NOT USE THE BABY BLANKET UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES! The manufacturer states it can only be used in ‘EMERGENCY SITUATIONS’. If an issue occurs and you are Transporting a newborn under non-emergency circumstances, any fallout will land WITH THE DRIVER!!! As you have deemed the manufacturers warning to be unimportant and you have chosen to ignore the warning! The risk is yours to take.

The AEAWAs advice is to politely decline the job as it is unsafe, if you feel you are pressured into doing the call contact the AEAWA immediately. A St John lawful directive under workplace law is not lawful if the direction has the potential to cause harm or if the request is illegal. Thankfully you will be covered for both!

Process for Increasing Clinical Scope SOP
As there were no representatives from the Country at today’s meeting, this item will be held over until the next JCC.

Uniform Orders
The AEAWA wanted to inquire what has evolved since the last JCC. At the last JCC St John agreed that the process in ordering uniforms is cumbersome, and that numerous employees are not receiving their full uniform order. Today St John stated the Uniform Committee will be reviewing all items related to the uniform.

There are some uniforms which will be trialed in December. A discussion took place on the quality of the uniform. The AEAWA stated that volunteers from the SES and DEFES have full dress uniforms, and here are St John employees with an embarrassing mismatch of green.

Regarding the number of uniforms full time Ambulance Transport Officers can order, it shouldn’t be too hard to change a 4 to a 5 on the drop-down menu so they have a clean uniform for very shift. Again, this will be reviewed by members on the Uniform Committee.

Crews Working the 12-Hour Roster
St John really dropped the ball with this one. With the introduction of the 12-hour shifts a number of employees were under the impression, and in some cases led to believe that as they have moved from an 8.5-hour day roster to a 12-hour a day roster they would be receiving 3.5-hours of overtime per shift.

THIS IS NOT THE CASE – You will be paid a 12-hour rate for the days you work, not the overtime. Unfortunately, no one is advised of this, and it is not until the employee see’s their first pay that they realise their pay doesn’t add up.

Officers are then contacting St John, who then inform the employee they do not get paid the overtime.

All officers should note that those who work these rosters often receive contracts that state your pay is referenced to Appendix 2 in the Ambulance Transport Officers Certified Agreement (as all Ambulance Transport rates are). Unfortunately, St John never realised that there are NO 12-HOUR SHIFTS IN APPENDIX 2. So, your rate will be calculated differently. Unfortunately, it appears there are various Ambulance Transport Officers working these 12-hour rosters on a multitude of pay rates. St John are in the process of reviewing this.

Medic/LAR Crews
The AEAWA asked about placing these resources in the Southern metropolitan corridor. Some of these crews log on in Belmont and Wangara and are then continually deployed to the Mandurah and Rockingham areas, as there are no resources there.

This leads to extensive shift extensions, as crews are driving 50+ minutes to get back to their starting locations to then knock off. Some officers are driving from their homes in these areas to Wangara to then drive back again.

St Johns appeared receptive on this matter and would like to see more resources placed in this area. Further discussions and information will occur soon on permanent placements of these vehicles.

Ipads for Casuals
Again, this was brought up as casuals do not have iPads to use. Many of the iPads at the depots are not even charged or have not been updated in some time. Often the passwords do not work. St John put in a case to IT for more iPads and the answer came back ‘NO’.

The AEAWA then had an epiphany….. Maybe the managers at the depots…. Wait for it……. Could plug them in, and squeeze in an update every 30 days. St John will review this and get back to us.

Country Transfers
Members approached the AEAWA regarding the allocation of crews to do country transfers. Some officers appear to get 2-3 a week whilst others never get allocated one. Members would like to know what the process is.

The AEAWA suggested an EOI go out to all officers, get a list of those keen to do them, and were possible divide the transfers as best as you can. Its not a hard thing to do. St John appeared to like this idea, and they will return to the table at the next JCC to discuss options.

Currently, these calls are mainly given to Casuals over full time officers, which is strange as casuals cost more.

Extra Discussions

Transfers from Perth to Country Regions
A discussion occurred around the use of the Multi Patient Transport Vehicle. Yesterday three Transport crews brought down three patients from Perth to Albany Hospital. The question was asked why the MPTV wasn’t used. St Johns stated that sometimes its more expensive to run this vehicle over three separate crews.

They realise that three crews are taken out of the metropolitan circulation, however, it is cheaper for the organisation to do this over the deployment of the MPTV.

Van overstocking
St John asked the question ‘has the practice of overstocking the PTVs with equipment still occurring?’. The delegates stated the issue is better, as previously crews were spending 10-15 minutes of the start of the shift removing piles of stock. But since COVID ceased, the practice of over overstocking has greatly reduced. This has also been addressed in the newsletter and crews are asked to speak to the Transport Managers if this continues.

Will We See 224 LAR/Transport Crews?
St John stated perhaps, originally, we were told there is not enough depth in resources to run 224 vehicles, however this has recently changed. Next month there may be the possibility to add further 224 vehicles to support the RFDS crews. Early in the morning and late evening jobs cannot be done currently, as there are now crews to do them, this means the Paramedics crews are assigned.

The AEAWA discussed the current new officers, some have a weekday contract, and some have weekend contracts. Some weekenders are racing through their mentor shifts by doing extra weekdays, whilst other weekenders are told they can not work weekdays as they are on weekend contracts.

Once again, we seem to have hit the old St John bottle neck when only the chosen few get passed. St John will review this and get back to the AEAWA on why this is occurring.

St John to Return to the Next JCC With
Heatmap of the work distribution from the northern corridor to Jurien Bay.

Meeting Closed
11:05

Next Meeting
TBA

Meeting Chaired By
Lee Waller

Meeting Conducted
08:30 – 10:30.

Committee Attendees
Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Jesse George, Callan McClure, Kirsty Roberts, Tim Dunlop, Phil Stanatis, Justin Ingrey and Andrew Kerfoot.

Committee Apologies
John Thomas, Jon Flocton and Dale Reid

Previous Minutes Accepted By
Mike Hardwick and Lee Waller

Meeting Agenda
This is the monthly scheduled AEAWA meeting for all the Association Committees (Executive, Paramedic, Communications, Medic, and Transport). Association correspondence and issues from the membership will be discussed here.

New AEAWA members
There has been a total of 143 new members signed with the AEAWA since January 1st, 2023. The Executive have been running a recruitment campaign which has involved general emails, crew discussions and talks with the new Operational Support Officers, Communications Officers, Direct Entrants, Medics and students within the college.

SOC EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Communications Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the SOC EBA drop down menu on the website). The Communications Officer’s offer was less than favorable and the AEAWA wrote to St Johns advising them of the disappointing offer. To date no reply has been sent by the organisation, but we will keep the membership up to date when we receive it.

The correspondence sent can be found on the website under the information and Correspondence drop down menu.

Transport EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Ambulance Transport Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the Transport EBA drop down menu on the website). As the Communications Officers and Ambulance Transport Officers EBA negotiations both paused for St John to do their costings. The AEAWA have still not received an offer from St John for the Ambulance Transport offer. When we receive this it will go out to all Ambulance Transport members.

The AEAWA Treasurer Report
The AEAWA report from the Treasurer was tabled. The financials of the Association were discussed and all recent debit and credits were provided to the Executive. The Executive Committee both reviewed and accepted the report and any financial member of the Association can request a copy through [email protected].

Agenda Items

Workers Compensation Issues
Members have contacted the AEAWA as they have been off work for some time awaiting Allianz the insurer to accept their workers compensation claim. Some officers have been off for over 5-months with no contact from Allianz. Members are not even being contacted by St John to advise of the status of their claim.

This is causing significant stress for those who are off work and awaiting claim acceptance. Can the AEAWA do something to assist these members?

The AEAWA has agreed to formally write to St John in an effort to improve the lines of communication to those off work. As some of these issues may be of a confidential matter, it would be difficult for the AEAWA to act on behalf of some of the members off work, but as an Association we can be an advocate for them.

Any member off work and has not heard about the status of their claim should email [email protected] with how long you have been off work, and when was the last time you heard from St John or Allianz.

Kellerberrin Incident
Members have raised concerns over this recent unfortunate event, as it highlights significant issues within the country regions. For career staff they must undergo a series of psychometric testings before you work along side volunteers. However, this is not the case for the volunteer working alongside career staff.

There is absolutely no mental health testing of any kind for those contained within the volunteer model. Members have approached the AEAWA and are clear in what they are asking.

Any individual that ‘volunteers’ alongside a career employee (be that a Paramedic, Ambulance Officer, Medic or Ambulance Transport Officer etc) must have completed, been assessed and passed the same psychometric testing.

This will also have to be sorted for Community Paramedics, and those students who are being placed into surge programs by St John will also have to undergo this assessment if they work along side any paid St John employee. The AEAWA will formally write to St John and advise the membership of the response.

AP1s in country
Members contacted multiple delegates recently over AP1 advertisements for country. There have been some questions over the country spots being advertised for AP1s and above. There are rumors that AP1s are getting some positions over the AP2s as they have a lower country relief score.

The AEAWA will contact St John to see if this is the case and are advising any AP2 or AP3 that has been turned down for a country relief spot over an AP1 for relief scores need to contact the AEAWA immediately.

Further discussions occurred on the fact of having AP1s in the country at all, we have a Certified Agreement that defines who can work in the country, we should be holding St John to account over this and stop the practice.

LAR Model Email to Employees
A recent email sent by a St John Manager related to the LAR Model being staffed by an Ambulance Transport Officer and a Medic to respond to community P3 calls. It stated the roster will be four on four off working two early shifts (08:00-20:00) and two late shifts (10:00-22:00).

Members contacted the AEAWA wanting to know why these services aren’t 24/7? There is a long history with St John only thinking you need resources up until 10pm and after that we have a dangerous level of 224 vehicles on for the rest of the night.

Discussions also occurred around the ten Medic crews per shift that were promised during the last EBA negotiations, an item St John still haven’t fixed. The AEAWA realise that often St John moves as fast as a snail with Asthma, but we believe its time to get these resources up and running throughout the State.

Questions were asked does this have to do with the Medics not having the backing of STT (as this is another resource St John put on without working through the night). The AEAWA have heard this before, apparently when STT goes 24/7 so will the Medic crews.

Seems strange they need STT to back them for calls ProQA has deemed non-emergency but in the country, anyone can attend Priority 0s with just a driving qualification. This is an item to be raised at the next Transport JCC. The AEAWA will advise of the answer.

The Protective Equipment Trial
Members have contacted the AEAWA not happy about St John entering the Body Cam Trial, considering that was never even discussed during the initial safety meeting. Many members believe this will be used by ER to punish officers for wrong doings rather than to limit the rates of occupational violence.

Both studies published in this area and CCTV footage that show acts of violence towards emergency personnel rarely punish those accused and often bare no relevance in sentencing.

With trust of St John at an all-time low there is no faith in an organisation to protect their staff. The AEAWA will not advocate the use of Body Cams in either a trial or on a ‘roll out’ basis, and will write to St John stating this fact.

The New Warning Stickers in the Ambulances
Members contacted the AEAWA over new warning stickers in some of the vehicles, these stickers have been placed in the area behind the driver’s seat. These stickers cannot be seen by patients in the vehicle. The warning states “Certain devices in this vehicle are capable of audio recording”.

The question is, are there multiple recording devices in the vehicles? Why were these warnings placed in the vehicles and who are they for? This was raised this at the last JCC. The AEAWA will write to St John to get a definitive answer on this and will provide that feedback shortly.

The Dangerous Levels of Staffing Within the Service
Members have stated enough is enough. When will St John short their staffing levels out. Night shifts have become a joke and downright dangerous for the WA community. Its clear there is no mass recruitment campaign in sight. Can the AEAWA speak to the Government over this?

Much of the data on response times, depot closures etc are held at St John and are not disclosed or able to be accessed by the AEAWA. However, the AEAWA have placed a ‘Report’ section on their website (top menu bar) and would like all members to familiarise themselves with it. Alert the AEAWA to depot closures, poor response times, equipment failures and other issues. This evidence can be used to keep St John honest in how they run the service and improve all of our working conditions.

Triple Time
Will St John consider the triple time increase for OT shifts during winter surge? They seem to be worried about staffing levels and the service entering winter, with COVID still about.

The AEAWA will approach St John with this at the next paramedic JCC (November 1st, 2023) and the
Next Winter Surge meeting. There needs to be an incentive for weekends and night shifts. SJA have not supported the 224 for many years. They need to start.

Paramedics EBA
Members have asked when the Paramedic EBA negotiations will commence, and will the AEAWA contact the membership to get ideas for the Log of Claims? Yes, the AEAWA will contact members soon for the log of claims items. This will be in the next month or so, and negotiations look like commencing over the February/March period 2024.

NETS Transfer Vehicle Potentially Being Overweight
Apparently there has been some discussions around transferring a whole NETS team, plus crew and stretcher. Many believe this places the Ambulance over the legal tare weight. Members would like to know if there is a policy about this, as the ownership is on the driver if anything goes wrong.

The AEAWA have been made aware that the ambulances have been taken over certified weigh bridges and the weight calculation plus numerous extra equipment and staff in the vehicle surely exceeds the safety limits.

The idea of leaving an Ambulance parked at RFDS for their staff to use has been floated. The AEAWA will investigate this. If the vehicles are over the legal weight limit, then the jobs can not be done. It’s that simple. An organisational ‘lawful’ direction is not lawful if its not safe and/or illegal to follow that order.

Lack of Reserve Coverage in the Southwest
BCP3 appears a reactive measure, no initiative shown by St John about putting on extra crews or using the multi-patient transfer vehicle for transfers. This is causing an issue within the region. It is the largest population outside of the Perth metropolitan area and it has very few crews, and little capacity to handle staff book offs. There are always depot closures, especially at East Bunbury.

Over the last 34 days EBU has only had 4 shifts that are properly staffed, all shifts are generally covered with overtime. The depot has been closed numerous times; it is obvious more staff are required in this region. The AEAWA will write to St John to see what they have plans to respond to the community within this region.

General Business

Diesel Particulate Testing for East Bunbury Depot
Members still want to see the report that was provided to St John for EBU. Two lots of testing has been performed at the depot and St John have still not provided the report. No follow-up from St John and emails to Regional Office are not being responded too. Our members believe that St John need to provide this information to employees. If there were no issues members would have had this report months ago. There is clearly an issue there. This was an Agenda item at the last JCC that was not raised at the meeting due to time constraints.

The AEAWA will write to St John and see if we can gain access to this report.

AEAWA Letters
Members have asked all relevant correspondence to and from St John to be placed on the website so they can review and see what the AEAWA has been achieving. The AEAWA stated yes, certain letters can be placed on the website, whilst other content is a little trickier in loading it for all to see.

Local Member of Parliament Meetings
Members have asked if the AEAWA would support them in talking to their various members of Parliament about the poor staffing across the state. Numerous individuals have approached local staff asking them why staffing levels are so low, after receiving responses from local communities.

Members would like to pass on these details to the AEAWA to arrange meetings, as they believe these local members should be made aware of how bad things have become.

Swapping Permanent Positions in the Depot
Members would like to know why they can not swap shifts or vehicles within the depot. They have approached rosters, who have stated no, as this will affect the list system. Two officers are on different vehicles at the same depot on the same shift, both officers have no partner, no one on the list wants the positions so why can’t these officers work together permanently.

This has been raised at numerous JCCs and meetings with St John. Its time this was raised again. The AEAWA will list this as a Paramedic JCC agenda item as the list system (apart from day vans) only requires officers to list the location and shift colour, not the vehicle.

List System for the Country
After the recent country appointments members have contacted the AEAWA over bringing back the country list system. The new process is again unfair, and as always goes back to a popularity contest in the interview. The list system was the only fair and transparent process we had, and members would like this to return in the next EBA negotiations.

The AEAWA will list this in the upcoming paramedic/Ambulance Officers EBA negotiations.

Next Meeting
Wednesday 11th October, 2023 from 08:30 – 10:30.

Meeting Concluded
10:30.

Meeting Chaired By
John Thomas.

Meeting Conducted
08:30 – 09:30.

Committee Attendees
Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Aaaron Pittaway, Rick Candy, Andrew Kerfoot, Chris Smith, Jesse George, Jon Flockton, Phil Stanatis, Justin Ingrey, Tim Dunlop, Dave Bryant, Amanda Howell and Todd Jones

Committee Apologies
Karen Vance, Kirsty Roberts and Damian Condo.

Previous Minutes Accepted By
Mike Hardwick and Justin Ingrey.

Meeting Agenda
This is the monthly scheduled AEAWA meeting for all the Association Committees (Executive, Paramedic, Communications, Medic, and Transport). Association correspondence and issues from the membership will be discussed here.

New AEAWA members
There has been a total of 56 new members signed with the AEAWA since January 1st. The Executive have been running a recruitment campaign which has involved general emails, crew discussions and talks with the new Operational Support Officers, Communications Officers, Direct Entrants and Ambulance Transport Officers students within the college.

SOC EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Communications Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the SOC EBA drop down menu on the website).

Transport EBA Update
The Log of Claims for the 2023-2026 Ambulance Transport Officers Certified Agreement was discussed (located in the Transport EBA drop down menu on the website).

Meeting with the CEO
The AEAWA President, Vice President and Secretary met with the new CEO for a meeting about the service. The AEAWA highlighted many current issues within metro, country and the communications centre, that we believe could be fixed relatively easily. The emphasis of consultation was discussed and history between the AEAWA and St John was also highlighted.

The AEAWA at this stage believe that a good relationship and avenue for change could be a potentiality here. Further updates and discussion points will be provided shortly.

Paramedics into Country Locations
There was a brief discussion on where the 31 new paramedic positions within the country are going. So far, the AEAWA are aware of the following locations.
– Busselton
– Newman
– Geraldton
– Margaret river
– Esperance
– Narrogin

Correspondence In
Members who contact the AEAWA for items to be raised at the meeting are listed here.

Secondary Triage going 24/7
Many members contacted the AEAWA asking when the STT are going 24/7. We were told this would happen, however, to date this has not been rolled out. Many members are frustrated that low priority callers occur 24/7 so when STT finish, these calls continue. This causes further ramping. Many alternative pathway providers start 3 hours before STT do, so there are lots of ‘missed opportunities’ to reduce ramping and improve community emergency response.

The AEAWA will write to St John to ascertain what the roll out plan for this will occur.

Paramedics working with EMR’s
Our members in the country have discussed with the AEAWA Executive their frustrations of working with Emergency Medical Responders at scenes (traumatic scenes etc). There have been a number of calls where Paramedics have found that the level of training EMR’s receive are of little use on ‘big jobs’.

Of late the AEAWA have been in discussions with St John over the Medic dispute (currently being negotiated through the Fair Work Commission), and we believe that Medics may be able to be used as a stop gap until further resourcing occurs in the country. Medics WILL NOT be placed in Bunbury as this is a protected location under the Certified Agreement and will be lodged as a breach if this occurs.

The AEAWA are looking at a two-year only deal to sort some of these country issues out (basically sorting a problem out in a few weeks that St Johns have sat on for years). Further information regarding the dispute and possible outcomes will be discussed shortly.

Increase in the Numbers of Officers Failing Transition
It has become blatantly obvious on how bad things are getting in the metropolitan area. Officers in their training are spending most of their careers being ramped, and there has been an increase in Ambulance Officer/Ambulance Officer crewing. This has caused issues when members reach the transition school, they have had reduced exposure and reduced experiences and are finding the process harder to get through. There has even been talk that St John want to reduce the ‘training’ time by a year, this we believe will cause even more problems during transition.

The AEAWA are still in dispute with over this, but we are getting closer to what we believe is the best option, and when the decision is made by the Commissioner it will be disseminated to the membership.

Ambulances Deep Cleaned
Due to increased workload and decreased down time the condition of our Ambulances are questionable. Many members would like to see the Ambulances deep cleaned on a regular basis. Many services have this ability, and as there is no time to check a vehicle most of the time, never mind deep cleaning one, members believe St John should be doing this so that those in the community are not put ask risk, and employees are working in a cleaner environment.

The AEAWA will write to St John and will advise the membership of the response.

Better Workplaces
Some depots such as Warwick and Riverton are in need of urgent renovation or relocation. Some of the members working in these locations have asked when will these depots be reviewed to be changed.

The AEAWA Executive discussed this with St John a while ago, and currently four locations within the metropolitan area have been reviewed, and fixes are to be in place within the next 12-months.

FIT Testing on Shift
A member contacted the AEAWA after they were told they would not get a P8 Card to do a Fit Test, they were told to do this on overtime. The reason being, there are no crews, so P8 Cards for Fit Testing will not be authorised.

The AEAWA will write to St John over this, as we believe this is forced overtime, and P8 Cards should still be authorised.

CEP Email
Many members have stated the email about failing CEP and the threat to report to AHPRA is heavy handed. No other profession (doctors, nurses) have this policy, so why are we?

The AEAWA are in discussions with St John over this email and its intent and will provide feedback shortly.

Removal of Officers from WhatsApp in the Southwest
The AEAWA have been advised of fulltime and parttime officers being moved from the WhatsApp ‘call in’ page in this region. Many of the casuals are not doing the shifts, and the officers who have been removed have no ability to come in for shifts on their days off, which leads to further under resourcing.

The AEAWA will investigate this further and will also write to St John to ascertain if this had occurred, and the reason behind why it occurred.

Recent OSH Election
There was a point brought to the committees attention of the recent Safety Representative election in the Southwest. Many officers were not given the opportunity to vote, some members found the link for the vote would not work, and other members who work in the region were not even listed on the country list to get a vote. There was also discussion on the fact that officers who have worked in the country for twoyears (but not permanent) are ineligible to vote, but a volunteer who is transitory, working in the area for two-weeks are eligible.

The election was run by Elections Australia, so the voting result is likely unable to be changed, but the process of how potential voters are selected in the future can be. The AEAWA will write to St John to discuss this and will provide further information soon.

Being Pressured to Work with Students
Members have contacted the AEAWA over being pressured to work with a student even though they are not tutors. This is a regular occurrence due to the failure to staff the ambulance service adequately.

The AEAWA are in current discussions with St John over this and it is also being raised in the upcoming Paramedic JCC.

Correspondence Out
There was no correspondence out to discuss,

General Business

Cath Lab Closure in the SW
The only Cath Lab in the Southwest is being closed for a scheduled upgrade, this closure has been advised to be 6-weeks. Members within this region have contacted the AEAWA as on average 2 patients a day are transferred to this Cath Lab, so this means those two patients will need to be transferred to Perth. This will create further pressures in responding to the community.

The AEAWA will write to senior country management and ask them what the plan is and provide solutions on how we can manage this period of closure and limit its impact.

Metro OT knockbacks
Members have advised that they have been knocked back for overtime, even though depots have been closed. One members stated the response was that once a crew has been closed on CAD it can not be reopened. In short this is technically correct, however if Riverton 21 is closed, and two officers are able to work there it can be rostered on as a Riverton 27.

The AEAWA have asked the membership previously, that if they are advised that there is no overtime available, and you find out later there are closed stations, please email [email protected] with who declined the overtime and the time of your call and we will chase this up.

The AEAWA also discussed with St John the possibility of having a WhatsApp for overtime, especially when roster knock off. As always, the response was ‘we will trial that’. The AEAWA are in further discussions with St John over this, but there does not appear to be an appetite to do anything about depot closures.

Meeting Closed
The meeting was closed at 09:30

Next Committee Meeting
TBA

Meeting Chaired By
John Thomas.

Meeting Conducted
09:30 – 10:50.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Bronwyn  Herne, Chris Smith, Justin Ingrey, Aaaron Pittaway, Bronwyn Herne. Paul Davies, Phil Stanatis, Fernando Colella, Todd Jones and Dave Bryant.

Committee Apologies
Karen Vance, Kirsty Roberts, Jesse George and Damian Condo.

Previous Minutes Accepted By
Mike Hardwick and Justin Ingrey.

Meeting Agenda
This is the monthly scheduled AEAWA meeting for all the Association Committees (Executive, Paramedic, Communications, Medic, and Transport). Association correspondence and issues from the membership will be discussed here.

New Committee Member
The AEAWA would like to welcome Bronwyn Herne to the Committee. Bronwyn has been around a while and will be representing the Community Paramedics across the State contact (and will on be on the website).

Correspondence In
Issues raised by members with delegates or emailed directly to the AEAWA are recorded here.

The Proposed ‘31’ Paramedics Scheduled for the Country Regions
The question was asked are the increased staffing levels assigned to Geraldton and Kalgoorlie being deducted from the ‘31’ assigned to country? In short, yes. However, we are trying to ascertain from SJA the classification of the officers that will fill the positions. We believe that SJA will try to fill these spots with Ambulance Officers and Paramedic Interns, or even Medics.

There is also been some discussion that the number is actually ‘30’ and not the ’31’ positions previously reported. The AEAWA are also seeking clarification on this. The AEAWA’s position is that these positions need to be offered to Paramedics first. The AEAWA have also been in discussions with senior SJA management regarding the service of delivery across the State and have already submitted a proposed plan around the roll out of country positions.

Further details will be provided shortly. The newly proposed positions will most likely see upwards of 50% of those officers going to  Geraldton and Kalgoorlie. However, with the volunteer model declining dramatically coupled  with increased workloads we now see locations like Albany coming under increased scrutiny.  The Southwest is also another issue for community response, and the AEAWA are also in  discussions with SJA ion how to increase numbers within this location.

The Parliamentary Inquiry
As you would all know, SJA have five years to fix this shambles, and although a year has past (with not much being done) they still have four years to change the service. We may see another year or two of this procrastination. The Committee are using this time to propose, table and discuss multiple options to better the service, and create more positions for on-road officers.

Paramedics/Communications Officers and Transport Officers in the Same Agreement
The question was asked, would all ambulance classifications benefit from being in the same Certified Agreement. There are pros and cons to this, and many States and Territories do things differently. Ambulance Victoria have an ‘all in’ Agreement, that sections off numerous roles into specific sections, with specific roles being separated (SOC, Transport, Paramedics etc) and same for same areas (such as sick leave and annual leave) being recorded in the same area, as all officers align with this section.

This does and benefits with negotiations (as we are together in negotiations), but can also be frustrating for officers, that is Transport and Communications Officers may have to wait for agreed items in their EBA which may have been signed off, due to a dispute held in a Paramedic section. For now, the consensus is to stay with the three Agreements.

Transport Officers Scheduled to Work in Bunbury Depot
This is occurring more often, and places pressures to respond to emergency calls for our members in the SOC and those within the Southwest. Members within the region would like to know what they should do if they attend the station and are provided another role to work with for the shift. The AEAWA are in current discussions regarding this and will supply those officers affected with a process to follow soon.

Current Disputes
It appears as there are so many miscommunications and blatant disregard of our Certified Agreements, a new disputes section is now required within our minutes.

The Medic Trial Dispute
The AEAWA met with senior SJA management over the proposed Medic Trial. Your committee stated to SJA that WE DO NOT AGREE to a trial, WE DO NOT AGREE to a mentoring time period over and above to what has been agreed to. WE DO NOT AGREE to yet another paramedic being seconded off road and into a position to further decrease responding resources.

As SJA have fell asleep at the wheel regarding recruitment, they are now clutching at straws to split our crew formation (another breech of the Agreement) by introducing a stealth permanent Medic/Paramedic role into the service. The Senior SJA Executive Team have been advised that any deviation from the above (already negotiated items) will be viewed by the AEAWA as a breach of both the Ambulance Officers/Paramedics Agreement and the Ambulance Transport Officers Agreement.

The AEAWA Treasurer Report
The AEAWA report from the Treasurer was tabled. The financials of the Association were discussed and all recent debit and credits were provided to the Executive. The Executive Committee both reviewed and accepted the report and any financial member of the Association can request a copy through [email protected].

AEAWA Business

New members
The AEAWA have welcomes a total of 36 members who joined last month.

AEAWA Uniform and Merchandise
Mike Hardwick and Callan McClure are currently an AEAWA formal uniform for committee members to wear during representations and official AEAWA business. A company has been sourced and the designs of the official shirts have been put together. Samples will be provided shortly for the committee to review.

AEAWA Union Update
There is a meeting to be held Tuesday 31st January, 2023 around the AEAWA’s Rules and Constitution. This is a normal process that requires numerous discussions between the Executive Committee, FairWork and the AEAWA’ Lawyers. The results of these will be discussed with the membership as soon as we get them.

AEAWA New Website Format
The new website is to accommodate the various documents and member access we require under the new draft rules of the AEAWA. It will also house a report button so that members can streamline incidents back to the Association for us to work through.

JCC Meetings
The date and time for the next Paramedic, Transport and Communications Joint Consultative Meetings have not been set as yet. The AEAWA will require delegates from each role to attend these meetings, along with members of the Executive.

CPHC Student Talks
Two college talks have been scheduled for March, and delegates will be required to come along to Belmont to give the AEAWA talk to our new colleagues. Those details are.
1. The casual ATO employee talk is scheduled for Thursday 2nd March 2023 (15:15- 16:00) in Training Room 8. There will be approximately 6 students.
2. The SAOs will have theirs Monday 27th March 2023 (11:45-12:30) in Training Room 4 and 5. There will be approximately 35 students.

CPAT Working Group
The AEAWA’s representative for the new CPAT Working Group is Callan McClure. Callan will represent the AEAWA and the membership regarding the vehicle. Any suggestions or questions regarding the CPAT should be directed to [email protected].

Membership Details
The below message has been sent to all members with incomplete details in our database. The AEAWA are writing to members who have incomplete information held within our database. For the AEAWA to comply with the Associations Regulations we require your postal address and mobile phone number for future ballots and dispersal of AEAWA information to the membership. Recent amendments have made a compulsory change in which all members details need to be held by any Association that support employees within the workplace. If possible, could you please email [email protected] or [email protected] with the required information listed above.

The AEAWA appreciate you doing this as it assists us greatly in complying with any current and future regulations, which often change through the various Acts we as an Association are governed by. If you have received this email message or text message, please email your details back to the AEAWA.

Geraldton Plan Distribution
The AEAWA will distribute this current plan to the Committee shortly for their input before it is discussed with SJA management. This plan is not for circulation and will be emailed out soon for the AEAWA to comment on.

Correspondence Out
There was no correspondence out to discuss.

General Business

Night Shift ICBs and the Proposed WhatsApp Implementation
As usual there is a division between what members are saying compared to the response from SJA. There has been lots of discussions regarding crews who book off are not being replaced. We are being told that the organisation are contacting officers to perform OT but are getting less responses that what’s required to fill the shift.

Depots are being closed with many members contacting rosters and being declined the shift. Many officers are advising us that they are not even being contacted for OT and have been available to do the shift. Because of this difference of fact from both camps, the AEAWA proposed a Whats App so the process of OT can be tracked, and it is more transparent. This will identify the issue of depot closures versus officers willing to do OT.

The Requested Heat Map from SJA
Some weeks back the AEAWA requested a heat map from SJA to show the call distribution across the metropolitan area. This was to identify areas of concern across the metropolitan area, and assist in the further crew placements in the near future. To date that information has not been provided by SJA. The AEAWA will follow this up as a matter or urgency so that further discussions can occur.

SJA and Speeding Fines
There have been a few instances of late were crews have greatly exceeded the speed limit when responding to ‘proper’ emergency calls, i.e. infant cardiac arrests etc. WAPOL have contacted these crews asking them to justify their reasonings for excessive speed. In most cases the significance of the events they are traveling too have been taken into account and those cases have been dropped by WAPOL who have cited a sound and reasonable response for the speed infringement.

Then the other Police Department (SJA) are running their own investigations stating that it is against the policy. The AEAWA are in the strong belief that if WAPOL have investigated the infringement and have determined the driver has not broken the law and no further investigation is necessary, then SJA should not be looking to punish the officer who was driving.

The AEAWA will write to SJA for further information regarding this and will provide the membership with a response shortly. This will also be raised as an item in the upcoming Paramedic JCC.

There being no further business the meeting was closed at 10:50

Next Committee Meeting Wednesday February 15th (tentative) at 09:30 via Microsoft Teams