Disability Access Disgrace

Kaitlin Dryburgh

The Paralympics are in full swing, and Team GB are so far doing great. Some amazing sporting moments, second in the medal table (as I write this), and some new sporting legends will be made over the course of several weeks in Paris. Turn on the TV, look at the news or social media and there’s a positive story surrounding disability, pride and perhaps even a rhetoric that as a society we’ve come so far. But that unfortunately is naïve.

In sparse contrast to these good-news stories is the quite frankly shocking story that 11-time Paralympic gold medallist Tanni Grey-Thompson was forced to crawl off of a train in London’s King Cross when no one arrived to provide her assistance.

It’s utterly disgraceful that she was put in that situation. In a country as rich and advanced (apparently) as the UK why are disabled people sometimes treated like second-class citizens? It’s ridiculous that something as simple as getting off a train is not afforded to everyone. The painfully ironic aspect of this story is Tanni was starting her journey to Paris for the Paralympics when this occurred.

As a non-disabled person I couldn’t even contemplate having to do this, it’s not a situation that I would ever expect to encounter. I know that many non-disabled people would also not ever imagine their commute to work ending like this but for many disabled people this is not an uncommon experience.

Having to crawl off of a train, Paralympic champion or not, is a dehumanising experience but after Tanni quite rightfully shown a light on the incident she began to get some really nasty and ignorant abuse thrown her way. “You shouldn’t have travelled alone”, “you shouldn’t have missed your train”, “you shouldn’t travel on a bank holiday”. Outright ridiculous comments. Tanni did miss her original train- who the hell hasn’t done that- so does that mean her punishment is to crawl off of it? She even notified the train operator that she had missed her original train- not many people have to go to that effort if they miss a train. Do we seriously expect disabled people to only travel accompanied and on working days? Trolls and abuse should rarely be taken notice of but if that’s some of the common thinking going around we seriously need to wake-up. A train journey shouldn’t be considered a luxury to anyone.

We’ve needed a wake-up call for some time. Tanni’s story is common among disabled people, especially wheelchair users. Her story is even common among notable disabled people as other Paralympians have also brought media attention to very similar situations. Of course they get official apologies and statements, people not in the public eye are not so lucky. But as Tanni rightfully points out what’s the point in apologies if nothing changes.

Every time a disabled person embarks on public transport there is that added stress of wondering if the process will be smooth on the other end of the journey. Something as mundane as a broken lift can completely throw off plans.

Countless stories paint a dim picture that rarely gets attention. A short video from a popular influencer Eliza Rain who is a wheelchair user, shows the effort that some have to go through. She arrived at her usual London tube station to find that the lift was broken, meaning the platform she needs is completely inaccessible. She acknowledges that she should have checked that the lift was broken before she arrived, which just demonstrates the unacceptable amount of planning and stress that wheelchair users and other disabled people are having to experience.

Transport for London will offer a disabled person who needs step-free access a paid taxi if a fault on their part means they can’t complete their journey, unless there is another route. Eliza was refused the taxi because there was another route. However, it was 20 minutes longer and included a change to another line. Not only would this option make her late for work, but due to her health conditions it would have been too tiring and painful. So she paid for a taxi herself. As she remarks there seems to be this notion that disabled people always have extra time and in this case extra money to spend on travel.

That’s just one experience but this is happening on the daily.

So just looking at trains, it was estimated in 2022 that it would take 100 years to make all train stations in the UK step-free if we keep going at the current rate. That means that if we don’t start adopting meaningful legislation, upping our investment and changing building regulations it’ll be 100 years before someone like Tanni Grey-Thompson can get on a train without having to worry about how she’ll get off. Even changing booking systems and changing the way incidents like these are reported would make a difference. As of right now it’s a flawed system that places too much responsibility on the disabled user and not enough on the providers.

Although the rail system is an important feature of disability legislation that’s just one aspect of society. What about the rest of society?

Well Glasgow city centre came under fire in 2022 when their updated bike and footpaths on Sauchiehall Street didn’t consider visually impaired users. The distinction between both paths was not profound enough for visually impaired persons to detect where they were walking, rendering the whole design potentially very dangerous. Without the use of tactile paving and other measures routes to work or to the local shop can be made significantly harder to navigate for disabled people.

Not to mention earlier on this year the then Prime Minister Rishi Sunk pretty much launched an attack on disabled people by threatening to remove a cash benefit from those with mental health conditions. While using phrases such as “sick note culture” he demonstrated some of the ignorance surrounding mental health problems and their debilitating effect. He obviously thought this was a laziness problem spurred on by the COVID pandemic.

There is still a clear lack of consideration for disabled people in almost every aspect of society. And even though watching the Paralympics, seeing stadiums full, and elevated media attention is a good thing it still doesn’t make-up for the fact that being a disabled person in this country isn’t as easy as we would like to make out. Yes the Paralympics may showcase and open up the possibility of people enjoying disability sport, but the 2012 Paralympics Games- although the biggest games up until that point- proved that for ordinary disabled people there wasn’t much change. Research the following year found that attitudes towards disabled people didn’t change at all that much after the Paralympic success story, in fact some believe things had actually got worse.

Without a doubt as a nation we could be doing more to consider the disabled population, a lot more.