When we set up Emergency-Services.News towards the end of the first quarter of this year (2018), we did so because we wanted to help to create a ‘voice’ for the emergency services / NHS.

From running our Facebook page, Emergency Services Humour, it soon became apparent that our 255,000 followers had loads of stories and blogs which they wanted to share with us.

Some of these stories are funny, some of them are serious and some of them are sad.

Whilst most sections of the mainstream media do a good job of reporting on emergency services / NHS related issues, many of them do not have anyone in their teams (as far as we are aware) who have actually served on the front line of the emergency services, whereas each member of our team of volunteers has.

This experience and insight just means that we can (hopefully) help to share the good stories which float around the emergency services & NHS, as well as being a platform for our former colleagues that is free from bureaucracy; Something that they never really had before the inception of Emergency-Services.News.

However, it does seem like most sections of the mainstream media have ignored our work, apart from the BBC….

Take, as an example, the story that we ‘broke’ about a Paramedic in Dorset who was given a parking ticket whilst she dealt with an emergency.

Now, I know that it’s not the biggest story to hit the UK this year, but we were trying to highlight a point in relation to something that we feel strongly about i.e. that NO emergency vehicles should get parking tickets and that no emergency services personnel should have to waste their time contesting them.

Anyway, we spoke to a few key people about the issue, including someone at Dorset Council and managed to get the ticket cancelled.

Good stuff.

However, when the Daily Mail (MailOnline) covered the story, we were given zero credit and our picture was cropped so that our URL was removed!

And yet, when the BBC covered the story, they gave us full credit for our ‘work’…

The Bournemouth Echo also gave us ‘credit’ as well when they covered the story

Many thanks to the @BBCNews | @BBCDorset for actually giving us credit for the work we did here!

Unlike the @MailOnline who used our photo and cropped it so as to cut out our URL from the image 🙄https://t.co/Gx3dcT74Hv

— Emergency_Services_Humour (@ES_Humour) November 2, 2018

In the grand scheme of things, its not a big deal and we won’t lose any sleep over the matter and we don’t need a hug or the usual ‘U ok Hun?’ messages of support.

However, I think that we can safely say that we will be more than willing in the future to share ‘important’ stories with the BBC rather than anyone else…for the moment at least!

But to everyone who has visited our site in the last 8 months, all 1 million of you, then we would like to say ‘thanks’ for checking out our stories and blogs. 

And thanks to everyone (both inside and outside of the emergency services) who has trusted our commitment to confidentiality and who has shared some very emotional and very touching stories with us. Please, keep them coming!

And we would also like to thank the BBC for not assuming that we are ‘just’ a bunch of gobby former emergency services personnel…

And remember, for all of the stories / content which we are not ‘allowed’ to share, then subscribe to our fortnightly eMagazine: ‘S__ts & Giggles’ (It only costs £1-per-month and your £1-per-month enables us to keep doing what we do).

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If you have a blog that you would like us to share with our readers and followers, then please feel free to contact our team of former emergency services personnel by using any of the details below. 

If you have an emergency services related story, video (that you have filmed) or opinion (whether its light-hearted or serious) that you want us to share with our readers, then you can reach our team using any of the details below. 

We treat all correspondence with anonymity! 

Email: emergency_services_humour@outlook.com | Follow & find us on Twitter @ES_Humour | Follow & find us on Facebook @EmergencyServicesHumour

Thanks to everyone who has helped us to get to 1 MILLION views in just over 7 months! @PFEW_Chair | @RhonddaBryant | @Peter_Kirkham | @grahamwettone | @PFEW_HQ | @BBCDorset | @googlenews | @facebook | @AppleNewsUK | @finnforchange 🙏🏻https://t.co/b6GBY9t4kq

— Emergency_Services_Humour (@ES_Humour) November 2, 2018