NSW Ambulance to honour Steven Tougher with new paramedic award

Steven Tougher’s family want the slain paramedic to be remembered for who he was - a kind, empathetic man - not what happened to him.

When Madison Tougher talks to her daughter about the little girl’s father Steven, she explains his “kind, empathetic” nature, and the way his face lit up when he talked about his job as a paramedic.

Lily-Mae Stevie Tougher was born just weeks after Steven was killed while on duty with NSW Ambulance, when a mentally unwell man set upon him in a stabbing frenzy in a Campbelltown carpark.

And while Lily never met her dad – arriving into the world a month after his death – she already knows all the best parts about him.

“Lily is at the age now where she points out the ambulances when she sees them, and she’s got a book that’s called My Daddy is a Paramedic that she just loves,” Madison told the Telegraph.

“She’s starting to get to an age where I can tell her stories and share memories about her dad which is a really beautiful thing.”

NSW Ambulance officer Steve Tougher and his wife Madison Tougher. Picture: supplied

Madison’s life was thrown upside down in April 2023, when her husband was killed just seven weeks after they were married.

While the weeks and months that followed were filled with sadness, and facing the horrific details of what happened – when Steven’s name is brought up now, the conversation revolves around “who he was, not what happened to him”.

“He was a person that wanted to help anyone he could. When he spoke about the jobs that he would go to, you could just see the passion on his face,” Madison said.

“When he’d come home and tell me how he had helped someone that day, the smile on his face and the proudness was just incredible.”

And remembering him this way has also been a key focus for the NSW Ambulance organisation, who will next week present the inaugural Steven Tougher Award for Personal and Professional Development.

The award will on Tuesday be presented to a paramedic in their graduating year who demonstrates the same kind, caring qualities as Steven as they start out in the profession he loved.

And Madison will be there to present it, along with Steven’s parents Jeff, Jill and sister Jess.

“Every day of my life is about missing Steven, but I think slowly, people stopped talking about him as much,” Madison said.

NSW Ambulance officer Steven Tougher was a person “who would help anyone”.

Steven Tougher and his wife Madison Tougher on their wedding day.

“So to be able to talk about him and his legacy means everything to me, he had such a big impact on our world, so it’s just nice to be able to acknowledge that.”

NSW Ambulance commissioner Dominic Morgan said he was “in awe” of the Tougher family in the wake of the tragedy, and was honoured to introduce the new award.

“I’ve been doing this job for a very long time and rarely have I seen a family with such grace,” he told the Telegraph.

“What happened to Steven is just beyond genuine belief, and yet all of them have approached this tragedy with the perspective of trying to be as positive as possible in his legacy.

“Personally I am in awe of them.”

From a young age, Steven had always wanted to be a paramedic, playing with bandages bandaids, and it took first becoming a nurse, and then a conversion course to finally get there in his late 20s.

“It wasn’t all easy things to get there, and it didn’t come easily,” Commissioner Morgan said.

“He paved his own way, he struggled, but he got there and was cut down in the prime of his life.

“And for that reason, having an award that celebrates him and his hard work is really special.”