THE AMBULANCE service is “on a knife-edge and may well collapse”, a union has said, over fears that untrained military personnel drafted in to ease pressures has actually made staff feel unsafe.

The GMB Union is calling on the Welsh Ambulance Service to “take their grievance seriously and come back to the table” after releasing “damning” figures showing staff morale “close to collapse.”

A union survey showed that 88 per cent of staff admitted to fearing for their safety whilst in work with unqualified staff

The union said it is still waiting for a meeting to discuss the formal grievance launched November last year following clinical staff raising concerns surrounding the scale of military involvement in emergency call outs.

The union formally lodged the dispute with the trust and written to the Welsh Government minister to raise its concerns about the extent of the Military involvement.

It is also renewing calls for unqualified workers to receive proper training before being sent out on calls to prevent possible safeguarding issues, and demanded an “immediate meeting” with the service management.

Nathan Holman, GMB Organiser, said: “The service is on a knife edge, if nine tenths of staff not feeling safe in their job isn’t a crisis then I don’t know what is. “The service needs to start taking this grievance seriously and come back to the table with us right now.

“If they don’t the whole service could collapse.

“They need to immediately roll out training to service personnel providing support to the Welsh Ambulance - it’s not fair that our military are treated so poorly.

“We do not object to the military assisting in low acuity, non-emergency calls, but we cannot turn a blind eye, unqualified personnel assisting in emergency situations.

“You cannot use underqualified staff to plug the holes in the service.”

Jason Killens, Chief Executive of the Welsh Ambulance Service, said: “To suggest that nine out of ten staff feel unsafe working with the military is misleading when only 201 from a total 1,700 colleagues in our Emergency Medical Service responded to GMB’s survey, and undermining confidence in our ambulance service by using inflammatory language like this is in no way constructive or helpful.

“We’re proud and grateful for military support through one of the toughest chapters in our history, and have actually had lots of positive feedback about our partnership, including from staff, patients and military personnel alike.

“While re-enlisting the military for the third time is less than ideal, on balance we believe it is better for patient experience, as well as safe for our clinicians, as demonstrated by the fact there has been no change in the rates of adverse incidents between double paramedic crews and those paired with defence colleagues.

“Ultimately, we can’t sit idly by and allow patients to suffer as a result of long waits in the community because of staff absence exacerbated by Covid-19, compounded by extensive handover delays at hospitals.

“We reviewed the training for military colleagues as recently as last month and are satisfied that it is appropriate for the role they are undertaking; GMB did not attend this meeting, despite our invitation.

“In addition, we have invested a considerable amount of senior leadership time with trade union colleagues, including GMB, understanding what they are telling us are their members’ concerns and doing our best to address them, while balancing the safety of patients.

“GMB’s collective grievance will be heard as soon as a suitably impartial and senior individual can be found to hear it. “In the meantime, we continue to do all we can to provide a safe service to the people of Wales.”