Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Baroness Grey-Thompson Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilkins]

I have my name to these amendments and I regret that, due to illness, I was unable to speak in Committee in support of the retention of DPTAC.

DPTAC has been held in huge respect for very good reason over the past 20 years. It has brought together all those who need to be involved in order to make sure that the needs of disabled people are met by the transport sector. The committee includes not only disabled people covering the wide range of impairment types but, most importantly, experts covering the transport field—for example, people who are expert in the bus industry, trains and so on—people who the industry will listen to in finding solutions to access problems. As a result, DPTAC has worked co-operatively with the industry to sort out how to make the access policy work. It is hard to see how a replacement body would be able to achieve better results.

DPTAC has performed an indispensible role in drawing attention to the transport needs of disabled people and in ensuring that our profile is raised both externally with the transport industries and internally with the Department for Transport. Without it, it would have been all too easy for these issues to go by the board. Indeed, with the closure of the mobility unit within the department, there is evidence that the department has lost its focus on disability issues. Without DPTAC there will be no one to fight for disabled people, whose interests are all too tempting to overlook when budgets are tight and there is no one to fight our corner.

In his reply in Committee, the Minister sounded somewhat complacent about the transport sector incorporating the needs of disabled people into the mainstream of transport planning and delivery. I agree that all modes of transport have been transformed in the past two and a half decades, but a great deal still remains to be done. There are very few accessible buses in many parts of the country, disabled people still cannot use half the tubes in London, timetables are still inaccessible to people with learning disabilities, and the taxi situation desperately needs sorting out. There is still an essential need for DPTAC’s focus and technical expertise. Moreover, the provision now made by mainstream providers must be monitored to ensure that they provide the access that they claim exists.

The Minister argued that DPTAC needed to be replaced,

“to increase flexibility and accountability to the taxpayer”.—[Official Report, 11/1/11; col. 1320.]

It seems strange that an expert committee, which gave its advice for free for over 20 years, might not be seen as very good value to the taxpayer. However, that aside, I agree that there might now be an argument that DPTAC’s technical expertise could be augmented by more of a focus on the behavioural side of transport issues—for example, the problems with unco-operative bus drivers; the behaviour of other passengers, especially those who refuse to remove their buggies from the wheelchair space; and especially the need to give disabled people the confidence that it is safe to use public transport and that they will be able to reach their destination—so that we use the accessible transport that has been provided.

While DPTAC might have lacked visionary strategic leadership in the recent past, candidates are available to take the chair who would give the committee the vibrant leadership required to meet all the Government’s aspirations for greater flexibility. DPTAC has been a model of good practice. It is a model that should be extended across the public service, not abolished. If the Minister is intent on doing so, finding an alternative arrangement that will better it will be a very tall order indeed.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson]

My Lords, I also have my name to this amendment, and I endorse the words of the noble Lord, Lord Low, and the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins. Disabled people as yet do not have equal opportunities to use transport. It is a complex issue. For disabled people it is incredibly hard to be spontaneous. If you wish to travel by train, you have to book 24 or 48 hours in advance. You have to check that the toilets on the trains are accessible. I know too many people who, like me, find it incredibly difficult to navigate around the UK. Travelling from London to the north-east of England, you sometimes have to be put off at York to use facilities. It is incredibly difficult for disabled people to do many things that many non-disabled people take for granted.

It is important to have an organisation such as DPTAC because in 492 days and 525 days—just 70 and 75 Wednesdays—we will have the Olympics and Paralympic Games in the UK. There is no doubt that the Games will be wonderful but, as a country, we will be assessed on so much more than the athletics achievements at Games times; we will be assessed on how we move people around the city. I declare an interest in that I sit on a number of LOCOG committees looking at athlete engagement and diversity. I am also a board member of Transport for London. During Games time we will have more disabled people in London than ever before at any one time. There will be significant numbers of disabled tourists and large numbers of disabled volunteers, who have been actively encouraged by LOCOG.

In addition, we will have 4,500 disabled athletes for the Paralympic Games who, I accept, will be using dedicated Games transport much of the time. That in itself will require considerable stakeholder consultation and work. However, those athletes will be using other modes both inside and outside London around Games time to get to pre-Games training camps and to return later. The expectation in the UK is that we will have an incredibly accessible country. For me, it is essential that we have a body such as DPTAC that can influence pre-Games. We can also learn from the experience of moving significant numbers of disabled people around so that after the Games we have a truly meaningful legacy for disabled people for transport.

[Lord Newton of Braintree]

My Lords, my name is not on this amendment. I might have kept my head down had the noble Lord, Lord Low, not blown my cover by indicating that I had been conspiring with him over this matter in the period since we last discussed it. I ought to declare an interest in that I have my own problems these days. However, what is prompting me to intervene is that I have had a long experience of these difficulties through connections with many voluntary organisations for disabled people, and not least as Minister for disabled people, albeit a long while ago, between about 1982 and 1986. That kind of experience leaves you with an abiding sense of the range of difficulties and—although we have made huge progress—the extent to which things still need to be done.

I do not have quite the same problems as the noble Baronesses, Lady Wilkins and Lady Grey-Thompson, because I am still able to get about to a significant extent. As far as the railways are concerned, I pay tribute to the almost unfailing courtesy of the staff at railway stations, who in many cases do not wait to be asked but come and say, “Do you need some help?”. However, if you want to know where the limitations still are, let me tell you that Ipswich station in Suffolk, where I have been twice today—the county town of a sizeable though not macro county—has no means of getting someone like me or the two noble Baronesses from one platform to the other, except what you might call a man with the red flag to see you across the line when there are no trains about. I have missed connections as a result. It is true that they are building lifts at the moment, but they are two months late.

What should have been available today is not going to be available for another couple of months. That is a two-month delay in six. Network Rail does not appear to think that this is a matter of any great consequence, from what they are reported to have said to one of the Suffolk MPs. There are plenty of problems that need to be tackled, and I have some experience and knowledge of them. I certainly do not think that they can be dismissed, and they vary enormously from one form of disability to another. That is the other key point with which I think the noble Lord, Lord Low, would agree. The sorts of things that someone like me requires are one thing, but if you are wheelchair-bound it is another thing. If you are deaf, blind or suffering from one of a variety of other conditions, another set of things are required. It is crucial that whatever arrangements are put in place should reflect and represent that diversity with real knowledge of the differences between various forms of disability. That is one of the key things here. I hope my noble friend will be able to respond constructively once again so that I can applaud him and stop being a nuisance.