Welsh lead welcomes the Senedd’s debate on officer vaccine priority

1 March 2021

The Police Federation’s Welsh lead Mark Bleasdale is urging politicians to give officers priority in the Covid vaccine roll-out as the Senedd prepares to debate the issue.

Triggered after a petition calling for frontline officers and staff to be prioritised received 10,000 signatures, the debate will be taking place on Wednesday (3 March).

Mark welcomes the debate, having previously argued that if officers could not be given priority, then at the very least they should be among those on a daily reserve list for any spare vaccines.

“Federations across Wales and England have been calling for change for months now so I’m pleased to hear that our pleas have not been in vain,” said Mark, who has previously urged the Joint Committee for Vaccinations and Immunisation to reconsider the order in which people will receive the jab.

He added: “While we all understand that the most vulnerable in our communities, as well as frontline health staff and those working in care homes should be given absolute priority, it is vital that our police officers are protected too.

“Our frontline staff find themselves putting their health at risk on a daily basis, simply by doing their job. Not only that, but they are potentially taking the virus into their homes too.”

The petition was created by Graham Bishop, the father of a police officer who contracted coronavirus before passing it onto his heavily pregnant wife.

Graham’s twin grandchildren were born via emergency c-section a month early, after their mum contracted coronavirus from his police officer son.

“Police officers are often sent into homes or put in situations where Covid-19 is present, which means they are putting their own health and that of loved ones on the line, in order to continue protecting the public,” added Mark.

Over the past 12 months, the Force have seen a number of officers calling in sick due to having the virus or are isolating having been in contact with it.

“Changes need to be made, not just for the sake of our frontline officers but for all of our colleagues across all Federations,” said Mark.

On Friday, the JCVI confirmed it would not be prioritising any group of workers in the second phase of the vaccine roll-out programme and instead, after the over 50s have been vaccinated, would move to the 40 to 49 age group, then 30 - 39 and 18 to 29s.

“The number of officers protecting the public on the frontline who, in reality, should get vaccine priority is relatively small compared to the two million people in the other nine categories,” said Mark, who disagrees with the decision made by the Government.”

A number of Welsh politicians have already pledged to support the Federation’s campaign for police officer vaccine priority.

Their support came after the four Welsh Police Federations joined forces to send an open letter to the First Minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford, accusing him of reneging on his commitment to protect officers during the pandemic. They claimed he had treated them with contempt by refusing to raise them a priority group.

This was followed just days later by all 43 Federation branches across England and Wales sending another letter to the Governments in Cardiff and Westminster, condemning them for not protecting frontline police officers and staff.