Dedicated volunteers are always there to help in an emergency

TWO residents in the Gosnells area will receive Meritorious Awards as part of the Australia Day honours today.

Simon Warwick Hughes, Kenwick Ambulance Service Medal (ASM) SIMON Hughes will be awarded an Ambulance Service Medal for 20 years of service at St John Ambulance in the Volunteer First Aid Service before beginning his career as a paid paramedic in 2002. Mr Hughes quickly rose up the ranks and is now serving as the manager of metropolitan operations. Leadership, an ability to find ways to improve the organisation, passion and professionalism are just some of the traits for which he is being recognised. Last year, he was given the responsibility to lead a St John Ambulance delegation to Malaysia where he assisted the St John Ambulance establishment there by examining 11 recommendations for improvement to assist operations in Malaysia. Robert William Crawford, Thornlie Emergency Services Medal (ESM) ROBERT Crawford joined the WA State Emergency Service when he was 16 and has worked in a range of roles, including as logistics manager, unit training manager and unit operations. Mr Crawford will receive the Emergency Services Medal for his work in developing and rolling out radio equipment with the emergency service. He was instrumental in the rollout, training and development of the new Western Australian Emergency Radio Network. Not only did he help develop a training program for the network for firefighters and the SES, he also has been a key developer in the new handheld devices used by the Department of Fire and Emergency Services and volunteers. From very early on in his service, he has devoted an enormous amount of his own time to developing and managing the radio communications training delivered to SES volunteers over the past two decades, often leaving his business for days at a time to conduct either a voice procedures course or communications field equipment course throughout WA.