Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006

Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006^[1]

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Long title	An Act to make it an offence to obstruct or hinder persons who provide emergency services; and for connected purposes.
Citation	2006 c 39
Territorial extent	England and Wales and Northern Ireland.[2]
Dates
Royal assent	8 November 2006
History of passage through Parliament
Text of statute as originally enacted
Revised text of statute as amended

The Emergency Services (Obstruction) Act 2006 (c 39) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is intended to reduce the instances of obstruction of, or assaults on, emergency service personnel.

Sections 1 to 6 came into force on 20 February 2007.^[3]

Scope[]

The Act defines emergency service personnel to cover firefighters, paramedics or other persons responding on behalf of the statutory ambulance service, members of HM Coastguard, and crew of a vessel of the RNLI or any other lifeboat.

Offences and penalties[]

The Act makes it an offence to obstruct any emergency service crew while responding to an emergency, whether physically or not, punishable by a fine of up to level 5 on the standard scale.

See R v McMenemy [2009] EWCA Crim 42, [2009] 2 Cr App R (S).

Section 6 - Repeals[]

This section repealed sections 44(3) and (4) of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004.

Section 7 - Short title, commencement and extent[]

This section came into force on 8 November 2006.^[4]

The Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006 (Commencement) Order 2007 (S.I. 2007/153 (C.7)) was made under section 7(2).

References[]

• Halsbury's Statutes,
• Ormerod (ed). Smith and Hogan's Criminal Law. 13th ed. OUP. 2011. p 673.

External links[]

• Text of the Emergency Workers (Obstruction) Act 2006 as in force today (including any amendments) within the United Kingdom, from legislation.gov.uk.