UKPC Parked in Disabled Persons Space

Coupon-mad

Scrootum wrote: »

To be honest, I have given up complaining.
Nobody seems to care.
Got threatened with violence on Xmas eve for asking someone to free up a disabled bay.

I care deeply about this issue and have posted about it loads of times, long before you arrived here on this forum.

- People are selfish who use disabled bays when not disabled. It annoys me no end. I hate the excuse 'it was raining'. But I will still help this poster.

- But they should not pay a random third party shark firm £100 for it.

- And you should leave people alone who park there because HOW CAN YOU KNOW they are not picking up a disabled person or have an invisible disability? You cannot know and by challenging people you are actually making things worse and perpetuating the myth that Blue Badges are the be-all and end-all. On private land they mean nothing, as you do already know but don't like.

How would you react if some elderly flat-cap 'look I have a Blue badge so I own the World' idiot in his unnecessarily massive car asked you to 'free up' your disabled bay because he was judging you, because he couldn't see your Blue Badge? What if one day YOU get a fake PCN as your Badge-of-Honour slips behind your tax disc?

Scrootum wrote: »

I think the point is that an able bodied motorist would have no problem parking a few hundred yards down the road and walking to the shop, whereas someone with a mobility problem maybe does not have that option.

I think your post demonstrates the fact that most able bodied drivers just "do not get it".

You are the one who 'doesn't get it' as regards, for example, non-mobility disabilities like these which MAY mean parking close to a store:

- mental health issues (passenger) which could require a space safely near the store
- learning difficulties (passenger) which could require a space safely near the store
- sensory impairments (passenger) which could require a space safely near the store
- epilepsy (passenger) which could require a space safely near the store
- autism/aspergers/severe OCD/symtomatic phobic conditions, all of which which could require a space safely near the store
- cancer
- eating disorders affecting strength & stamina
- ME or similar
- circulatory or nervous system conditions
- heart condition
- other organ conditions, e.g. bowel disease, lung disease, stuff that may mean the person 'looks healthy' when walking the first few hundred yards but tires easily or needs to reach the car quicker if forced to leave by symptoms of their medical condition
- people with longterm mobility issues but no Blue Badge, e.g. arthritis, joint conditions, trapped nerve or similar chronic spinal/back pain, just had surgery, etc.
- people collecting any disabled person


There are loads of others I could think of, all of whom can use those bays under the Equality Act 2010. It is about whether the person has a condition which causes the need for the disabled (close by) space. Not whether they have a particular Badge of Honour to prove it, sorry.

It is up to the person whether they have a NEED for a disability provision under the Act, not up to others to argue the toss unless they are 100% certain of the person's/passenger's situation. You wouldn't stick your nose in and whip a wheelchair away from someone in-store because they 'looked healthy' so what is the difference?!

Redx

this is very true, my sister got berated at by some do-gooder when she parked in the "disabled" space on the main road outside my doctors

she was in fact going into the doctors to pick up my mum and she had my mums badge so was doing exactly what she should have been doing (my brother had dropped her off earlier and my sister was scheduled to pick her up again), but she had to go into the doctors to retrieve the BB in order to come back out and place it on the dashboard , so it looked "iffy" to the uninformed "thought police"

too many people (even BB holders) seem to forget or ignore the fact that the badges can be and are used by the able bodied even if the owner does not own a car or drive (like mum never did) , on behalf of the BB owner , helping them, not themselves

there is a lot of abuse , I agree there is, and it reflects badly on the genuine owners, but as mentioned above the spaces may be being used for their correct purpose and sometimes we should all keep our noses out unless it is obvious that the system is being abused

the chances are that anyone interfering will have picked the wrong person and wrong time , ie:- a genuine use of the space and badge

and that anecdote was purely about the BB, not any other similar EQUALITY ACT 2010 issues for the disabled or sick people

Coupon-mad

Uninformed "thought police" = indeed they are, and are nearly as bad as PPCs. I used to get black looks all the time at Tesco when I used to collect my late Mum each week after her shop...in her wheelchair. It made me laugh though at such uninformed idiots.

The main abuse is in fact people WITH a Blue badge, misusing it (e.g. using granny's badge to nip to the chippy). The complete opposite of the way the papers portray it sometimes, but that's the BB abuse that needs to be dealt with.

Sounds like Scrootum looks along the row of cars, immediately judges with a typical knee-jerk reaction, those with no Blue badge showing - and yet smiles benevolently at those showing a Blue Badge - assuming they are all belonging to a person who was in the car. How can he/she know? It's impossible to tell and a PPC has no right to check a Blue Badge nor make such a judgement any more than Scrootum does.

Having said that, the OP was wrong and I'm sure accepts it and won't repeat it now, but should appeal immediately as registered keeper (not even talking about 'what happened' nor who was driving). As per the 'Newbies' thread examples of first appeals.

Stroma

Coupon-mad wrote: »

Sounds like Scrootum looks along the row of cars, immediately judges with a typical knee-jerk reaction to those with no Blue badge showing - and yet smiles benevolently at those showing a Blue Badge - assuming they are all belonging to a person who was in the car. How can he know?

Exactly, people should be making their own decisions on whether they need a disabled bay or not. I could for example park my works decaled van in a disabled bay as I fall under the definition of disabled under the Equality Act, how many complaints do you think my works will get if I do this?

The point is that I am allowed to do this, but I don't as I feel that I am not disabled enough to take advantage of the reasonable adjustment under the Act. And as I am not qualified to judge people, I don't really as in post #2 on this thread.

martmonk

nigelbb wrote: »

Does anyone have any idea how many Blue Badge holders there are?

There are 9,000 in the catchment area for Northumbria NHS which is North Tyneside and Northumberland.

Sure someone cleverer than me could make some extrapolation assumptions for the rest of the country.

4consumerrights

Scrootum wrote: »

To be honest, I have given up complaining.
Nobody seems to care.
Got threatened with violence on Xmas eve for asking someone to free up a disabled bay.

As Coupon-Mad states in two posts above - disability cannot always be seen, you may be covered by collecting a disabled person, and the blue badge scheme is not relevant on private land. Even police officers and council officials (civil enforcement officers - formerly known as traffic wardens) have no legal rights to inspect the validity of blue badges on private land as the current legislation stands - and they are the only personnel able to inspect them on public land.

Notwithstanding the above, there is still the legal requirement of service providers to make reasonable adjustments for users of their facilities - which includes the provision of such parking bays.

Scootum - from your numerous posts on this forum about blue badges and their "misuse" it is clearly evident that you have a blue badge and meet the requirements for reasonable adjustments and to be able to park in disabled bays.

Question to you is this (without knowing what your disability is) - if you forgot to put out your blue badge and someone came up to you and challenged your right to park there - how would you react?

You have no right to judge other people and even though blue badge misuse does occur - it is not as frequent as some reports make out.

A pensioner in Biggleswade was attacked and killed by another motorist in an argument over parking in a disabled bay - and he was entitled to do so as his wife was covered and shopping in Asda. The man was found guilty at court to manslaugher report here:

http://www.biggleswadetoday.co.uk/news/local-news/guilty-of-biggleswade-asda-car-park-killing-1-5746475

nigelbb

martmonk wrote: »

There are 9,000 in the catchment area for Northumbria NHS which is North Tyneside and Northumberland.

Sure someone cleverer than me could make some extrapolation assumptions for the rest of the country.

North Tyneside and Northumberland has a population of over 500K so the number of BB holders is less than 2% of the population.

Coupon-mad

And the number of people who would meet the 'definition of disability' would be much, much higher, around a quarter of the UK population perhaps (and a figure somewhere in between the two percentages, would be those people who would actually 'need' a disabled bay, Blue Badge or not). In 2011 this was published:

http://www.papworth.org.uk/downloads/factsandfigures_disabilityintheuk_july2011_110721132605.pdf


[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]''There are over 10 million (10.4m) disabled adults (age 16+) in the UK, which includes limiting long standing illnesses. This is equivalent to 24% of the adult population. [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]There are 770,000 disabled children under the age of 16 in the UK. This equates to 1 in 20 children. [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]The majority of impairments are not visible; Less than 8% of disabled people use wheelchairs - there are only 750,000 or so wheelchair users in the UK.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]The six most common buildings where difficulty with access is experienced by adults with impairments are: [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]Shops - 54%; Hospitals - 33%; Pubs/bars/restaurants-23%; GP surgery-21%; Other people’s homes-20%; Theatre/ Cinemas-17%.[/FONT]

[FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]The most common barriers to accessing buildings among adults with impairments* are: [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Courier New,Courier New][FONT=Courier New,Courier New]
[/FONT][/FONT] [FONT=Courier New,Courier New][FONT=Courier New,Courier New]o [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]moving around the building – for reasons related to stairs, doors or narrow corridors – 42% [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Courier New,Courier New][FONT=Courier New,Courier New]o [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]inadequate lifts or escalators - 23% [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Courier New,Courier New][FONT=Courier New,Courier New]
[/FONT][/FONT] [FONT=Courier New,Courier New][FONT=Courier New,Courier New]o [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Calibri,Calibri][FONT=Calibri,Calibri]parking problems - 22% [/FONT][/FONT]
[/FONT]






* please note, Scrootum, they didn't just survey 'adults with a Blue Badge' because of course, as we all know except you, that would have been...discriminatory...and not a true survey of need.


Yawn. Can we get back to helping the OP to win at POPLA now?