Transport Accessibility for Disabled People

Debate between Ruth Cadbury and Marsha De Cordova

Thursday 26th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of transport accessibility for disabled people; notes the recommendations of the Transport Committee in its First Report of Session 2024-25, Access denied: rights versus reality in disabled people’s access to transport, HC 770, and the Government’s response to that report, HC 931; and agrees with the Committee that there is an urgent need for review of the legislative framework and the enforcement regime to ensure that the gap between rights and obligations and the daily experience of disabled travellers is closed.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for scheduling today’s debate. The Transport Committee’s report, “Access denied: rights versus reality in disabled people’s access to transport”, was published a year ago. It was reported to the House on 10 June, and the Government response was published on 1 July. The timing of this debate enables me to provide a timely update on the work achieved by the Government and transport sectors over the past year, and to cover areas where more needs to be done. I am going to cover strategy, infrastructure and enforcement, and I will conclude with a few questions for the Minister.

Our report follows an in-depth inquiry that started in 2023 under the leadership of my predecessor as Chair, Iain Stewart. We travelled with people with disabilities to understand their experiences and the challenges they face, and we heard from a wide variety of people and organisations, whose knowledge was invaluable. The report has also informed much of the Committee’s other work over the last year or so, on buses, taxis and the street environment—areas where poor design and maintenance, and a lack of priority, continue to inhibit transport access unnecessarily.

In the year since the report was published, several important steps have been taken, and I thank the Government and others for these. The accessible railways road map was published alongside the Railways Bill in November last year and includes actions ahead of the formation of Great British Railways, such as a minor works budget and improved lift information. GBR will later set out its own plans through the long-term rail investment strategy. The Bus Services Act 2025 requires accessible network plans, streamlines disability awareness training and supports more accessible bus stop design. The aviation accessibility implementation group was established to deliver improvements in air travel for disabled passengers following the earlier task and finish group recommendations.

On railcards, eligibility has been extended to Blue Badge holders and will soon expand further to cover a wider range of visible and non-visible disabilities. On pavement parking, after five years of waiting—most of that was under the last Government—the Government have finally announced their next steps, and we await legislation. On taxi licensing standards, we welcome the amendments to the devolution Bill, including new national minimum standards that will include robust accessibility requirements. The Railways Bill introduces a duty on the Secretary of State and GBR to consider disabled passengers’ needs, and ensures that GBR is covered by the public sector equality duty. We welcome the publication of the equality impact assessment, and we will scrutinise it closely.

Let me now cover three strands that are essential if we are to embed and deliver lasting change. First, there needs to be a practical, ambitious and integrated transport strategy. The last Government’s 2018 inclusive transport strategy aimed for equal access for disabled people by 2030, but when we gathered evidence for our report, it was clear that that ambition was not being met. Much of the strategy focused on “considering”, “exploring” or “consulting”, rather than on delivering substantive change. Our report called for a new inclusive transport strategy; instead, the Department said that accessibility would be embedded as a “golden thread” in the forthcoming integrated national transport strategy.

That may be positive, but we still have not seen the strategy, which was originally expected by the end of 2025. We cannot judge whether accessibility will truly be prioritised until it is published. The Department says that the strategy will include clear actions and milestones for accessibility, so I hope that Ministers will ensure that those actions are ambitious, properly funded and capable of delivering inclusive transport—not just in principle, but in practice. After a decade of best-practice sharing and awareness raising, disabled people do not need warm words; they need a practical pathway to full accessibility.

On infrastructure, we need to avoid embedded barriers. When people think about accessibility, they usually picture lifts, ramps, level boarding, tactile surfaces, accessible bus stops, hearing loops, and reliable audible and visible announcements—and rightly so, as these are basic enablers. Inaccessible infrastructure is one of the most stubborn barriers to people with disabilities accessing our transport system. Transport assets are long-term investments, so mistakes become embedded for generations. The built environment can be enabling or deeply disabling. As many disabled people tell us, people are not disabled; too often it is the environment that disables them.

[Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on her opening speech. Does she agree that society’s disabling barriers prevent disabled people from being able to have accessible transport, and that the Government and others need to understand that we have to change the infrastructure? That is how we are going to create an inclusive and fully accessible transport network.

[Ruth Cadbury]

My hon. Friend is entirely right. She is a passionate advocate—not just in transport, but across the piece—on the needs and rights of disabled people. To a large extent, this issue in transport is a subset of the societal challenge that she rightly raises.

The barriers that I have described prevent access to employment, education and services, and prevent people from having social lives. Following long delays, eight Access for All station upgrades have been confirmed, with 23 more moving to detailed design, and another round may be funded in the next spending review. These upgrades are welcome, but they feel like a drop in the ocean. At current investment rates, the rail network will not be fully step-free for a century, according to the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee’s estimate in 2022. As Emma Vogelmann, formerly of Transport for All, has said:

“Accessibility must be delivered as standard across the whole network, not rationed station by station over generations.”

Judging by Transport questions this morning, as well as every previous one I have sat through, Members who have been waiting for station improvements in their constituencies clearly feel the same way.

We also await the Government’s new rolling stock strategy, which must set out a clear approach to level boarding. On holiday in France and Italy last summer, I saw clear ambition for that, as demonstrated by the lift access being built, if not already installed, across a number of rural stations. I hope GBR will inject that missing ambition into the UK rail system.

On electric vehicles, Transport Focus recently found that not a single charger on the strategic road network met voluntary accessibility standards, so we risk building new barriers into our future infrastructure, and those barriers will be expensive to fix later.

This is not just about hardware; we must embed accessibility into decision making. Witnesses to our recent inquiry into the Railways Bill expressed concern that, under the Bill, GBR must balance the interests of disabled people with cost. Of course, cost is always relevant, but we have repeatedly seen accessibility lose out. So we have recommended that GBR be required not just to consider but to deliver tangible improvements to accessibility.

On enforcement, we must ensure that rights are real. One of the most striking findings of our inquiry was that disabled people often have rights on paper that do not translate into real experiences. The reason is simple: enforcement is too weak.

Low Traffic Neighbourhoods

Debate between Ruth Cadbury and Marsha De Cordova

Monday 20th May 2024 Westminster Hall

[Marsha De Cordova]

I will make some progress.

Common complaints about LTNs have included the shifting of traffic to boundary or sacrificial roads, increased congestion, barriers for emergency services, worsening pollution and a negative knock-on effect on public transport. Many communities that have been impacted by traffic moving to densely populated areas are from poorer and black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds. One survey respondent described the impact, saying:

“The traffic was pushed out of [an] extremely wealthy [area] and onto the roads of the poor…The result was complete GRIDLOCK. The arterial roads remain highly congested to this day and it is horrible and stressful to be stuck in polluted traffic for hours on a journey that should take mere minutes.”

The introduction of LTNs has in some cases had a greater impact on disabled people, with 86% of those who responded to the survey saying that LTNs had a “negative” or “very negative” impact on them. Some of the concerns included the installation of bollards and planters, locked dropped kerbs, excessively longer journeys, which are not only inconvenient but lead to higher costs, and the failure to exempt blue badge holders from LTN schemes.

Increased travel times are not just mild inconveniences. Many disabled people often find commuting far more exhausting. In the most extreme cases, the added hassle caused by the longer journey time makes travel difficult, robbing them of the energy they need for when they arrive at their destination. Worryingly, travel times were also linked to the increased cost of petrol and taxi fares, adding to the financial burden borne by disabled people. That has the potential to prevent them from travelling or, worse, to keep them trapped in their homes. Someone living with multiple conditions said:

“The LTN has added to my journey times and costs and also my fatigue levels are increased due to the extra stress and travelling, added to this I suffer with anxiety as MS means I sometimes need access to a toilet quickly, with my journey time now increased threefold it makes it very difficult.”

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the excellent speech she is making. The LTN she describes sounds as if it has physical barriers. Does she agree that where an LTN is enforced through camera technology and residents can enter or leave their homes by the route that suits them best, they do not suffer from the problems she has described so well?

[Marsha De Cordova]

Making sure that routes are accessible is crucial, and using technology such as cameras can be a way forward. I will come to that shortly.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Sorry.

[Marsha De Cordova]

That’s fine—no need to apologise!

Moreover, not all LTNs have blue badge exemptions; that is the focus of one of the petitions we are debating. Although LTN schemes are different everywhere and councils have different policies for blue badge holders, disability is not a geographical issue. The lack of exemptions has led to there being a postcode lottery. One respondent to the Petitions Committee survey said:

“I cannot take my mother who has a blue badge to medical appointments as it would result in going through an LTN and getting a fine.”

Southwark Council in London recently had to scrap its plans for a low-traffic neighbourhood after a backlash from residents, including local disability groups, as blue badge holders and disabled motorists would not be exempt. Many of the benefits of LTNs do not help disabled people. For instance, active travel measures such as cycling infrastructure are not always accessibly designed. Narrow cycle lanes, designed with a standard two-wheel bike in mind, cannot be used by trikes or other non-standard vehicles. This really is about creating an inclusive public realm.

The accessibility issues around LTNs show that society is rarely designed with the needs and interests of disabled people in mind, and that often leads to their exclusion. In fact, many of the issues predate the introduction of the schemes and stem instead from the existing barriers. LTNs are inaccessible because street spaces themselves are not inclusive, so simply removing them is not a solution, as the status quo ante was not always inclusive and accessible.

A basic principle of the disability rights movement has always been, “Nothing about us without us”, which signals the importance of consultation and co-production in any policymaking that impacts our lives. Given the sometimes routine exclusion of disabled people from decision making, the existing approach to policy development has had and will have a wide impact. Poor consultation on low-traffic neighbourhoods and their imposition in a time of national crisis has allowed controversy to arise.

At first glance, the Department for Transport’s review in March this year shows support for LTNs, but the responses were based on a limited set of data. The surveys featured were limited to residents of only four geographical areas, and they had a low response rate. The review also failed to consult public health professionals, older and disabled people’s groups, and those representing black, Asian and ethnic minority communities.

The Government have issued guidance on the implementation and monitoring of LTNs, which could help to ensure that future schemes are more inclusive and have community buy-in and support, but given some of the concerns about the Government’s review, there is a case, outlined in petition 632748, for an independent review that has a specific focus on the impact on disabled people and consults all the relevant people and stakeholders. Will the Minister tell us whether the Government will agree to that? In the short term, LTNs must permit access to blue badge holders, as Mike Spenser called for in his petition.

A more sophisticated LTN design might include cameras, as my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) mentioned, to permit other vehicles and allow disabled people to access areas via any vehicle they choose, including taxis. Not all disabled people are blue badge holders, and many of them rely on public transport, including taxis.

Another recommendation could be for the temporary suspension of LTNs introduced during the pandemic until legal obligations are met and assessments and proper traffic baselines have been carried out. Although LTNs are the responsibility of local authorities, will the Government consider updating the guidance so that such an approach can be adopted? The current guidance is based on legislation that can lead to statutory requirements to consult, but if a traffic regulation order is made, key stakeholders such as the police and ambulance service must always be consulted.

There is also a requirement in the regulations to consult other organisations that represent people likely to be affected by the provisions of the order, as the local authorities see fit, but have the Government considered amending the legislation to put in place a mandatory requirement to consult other groups and stakeholders, such as those representing disabled people? LTNs can work in certain areas if they are supported by the community, which includes those who live on boundary and sacrificial roads. To enable that, will the Minister agree to develop a national framework for local authorities to use when planning new LTNs and monitoring existing and new schemes?

Successful and sustainable improvements to our transport system and public realm must always consider the interests of all who will be affected. Disabled people know this all too well; however, the interests of all communities everywhere can benefit from this simple lesson, and we can avoid the problems that we see today. I think all of us present can take that point. I am sure the House will agree that for a system or a scheme to work, it is important that we bring our communities together behind us so that all schemes can be successful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Cadbury]

The hon. Lady makes a good point. My experience is with Hounslow. I cannot say whether each local authority implemented change that was needed—or whether they plucked ideas out of thin air in 2020—but that is certainly the case in Hounslow.

The nightmare for residents who live on roads that are rat runs, particularly since the mass use of sat-navs, is that it varies; at some times of the day there is speeding, and at others there are continuous traffic jams, with vehicles spewing fumes and preventing residents from driving into or out of their own road. That environment takes away the freedom of children and older people to feel safe walking around their neighbourhood, particularly at junctions and crossroads. National figures show that more people cycle where they feel safe. Many of us own bikes but are not brave enough to cycle when roads are busy.

All the low-traffic neighbourhood measures that were implemented in Hounslow in 2020 were introduced in neighbourhoods or on roads where residents had long been angry about the impact of rat-running and had been calling on their councillors—I was one of them—for action for years. The measures introduced by the Government in 2020, during covid, which are probably the one thing I can compliment former Prime Minister Boris Johnson on, provided regulatory change and the funding to make implementation by local authorities happen quickly.

Local authorities, including Hounslow, used temporary measures to try out what worked. Some roads are now low-traffic neighbourhoods as a result of that work, including the whole south Chiswick area, which I will come to shortly; Green Dragon Lane, a road with almost all social rent housing where only a minority of people have use of a private vehicle; Occupation Lane in Brentford, at the top end of a council estate; and the Teesdales near West Middlesex University Hospital, where there were continuous battles between drivers trying to pass each other on a narrow road with resident parking.

Since they were implemented on those roads and others in Hounslow, the LTN measures have been achieving exactly what residents had asked of the council. They are stopping through traffic using the road as a shortcut while allowing residents to pass freely. Residents can drive into and out of their roads, and walk to and from their homes safely, especially when crossing and at corners. No longer are there long traffic jams with vehicles spewing out fumes and drivers getting angry when trying to pass.

Some of the schemes were revised. One was tried that removed through traffic from Turnham Green Terrace in Chiswick, a popular shopping street with very narrow pavements. The idea was to make it more business friendly, but local councillors asked for it to be removed, so it was. The schemes can be modified. Another popular shopping street, Devonshire Road, was closed completely. Concerns were expressed by the shop owners, but not by the restaurant and bar owners, so Devonshire Road is now open to through traffic during the day so that people can access the shops, but in the evening it reverts to a traffic-free road with tables and chairs outside on the carriageway, which benefits the restaurants and bars.

Physical barriers are not the only tool. In many cases there are often far better tools to create a low-traffic neighbourhood. Hounslow has made extensive use of camera technology and enforcement so that any vehicle can enter and leave a neighbourhood or road whichever way suits its driver, so long as it enters and leaves by the same way it came in, or arrives, stays and then leaves later.

I want briefly to address school streets, which are a subset of liveable neighbourhoods. There have been over 30 in Hounslow, and headteachers have told me of their benefits. They have cut out a lot of the conflict between the tiny minority of parents who insist on driving their children to school and the much larger number of parents who walk their children to school and get very angry at the behaviour of some selfish drivers. Those drivers are no longer able have close access to the school. One headteacher told me that an awful lot of families are now walking to and from school rather than making a trip of a couple of hundred yards in a vehicle every day.

Hounslow’s largest low-traffic neighbourhood started life before covid and was known as the south Chiswick liveable neighbourhood. Rat-running drivers seeking to avoid the Hogarth roundabout when travelling from the A3 or A316 to head west on the M4 or A4, or travelling either way between Chiswick bridge and Kew bridge parallel to the River Thames, had long been an issue. Thousands of vehicles a day were travelling straight through that neighbourhood without stopping, and most of them were long-distance; they were not local Chiswick vehicles.

In 2019, after full consultation, residents supported in principle the implementation of the liveable neighbourhood for south Chiswick. It was actually implemented in 2020 using the covid emergency measures, because funding had not been available prior to that. The impact has been significant: a 50% drop in through traffic, more people walking and cycling, and a drop in average vehicle speeds. On the boundary roads, there were not greater traffic jams and higher volumes, but a reduction in traffic of between 2.8% and 9.3%, despite the closure of Hammersmith bridge. That suggests that low-traffic neighbourhoods encourage a modal shift away from private vehicle use and towards public transport, walking and cycling.

The most remarkable impact we have seen in Chiswick is the loss of a council seat in the 2022 elections by the party that campaigned vigorously against the low-traffic neighbourhood that had been implemented two years earlier. For the first time in 48 years, a Labour councillor was elected to represent the Chiswick Riverside ward—hardly evidence that local people hate the LTN.

Following concerns raised locally, Hounslow has made improvements to the LTN scheme, and could perhaps make some more. I would like to see improved signage warning drivers that they are entering an LTN. Another suggestion is the use of a “one strike and then you’re fined” rule to warn people not to drive through the area again. I have been fined for not being able to see a sign in an area I did not know very well. I was a bit annoyed with myself. It was a school street and I was driving through at the very end of the school street restrictions. That annoys people, and does not help their ability to support what I believe overall are very good policies.

There is no doubt that restricting through traffic in an area achieves its purpose if it is done well and there is a need, with less pollution directly outside people’s homes, safer roads and easy access for residents. There is national evidence that there is more walking and cycling in quiet areas, and that more walking and cycling in retail areas—Walthamstow town in Waltham Forest being the best example—has strong economic benefits for local businesses and high streets. We know the benefits to tourism areas of easy, safe, segregated cycling infrastructure or quiet areas to cycle. I do not know how many other people look for cycling opportunities when they are going on holiday, but good cycling measures are a draw to tourists.

Low-traffic neighbourhoods, if they are implemented where they are needed, are properly consulted on and use clear signage and appropriate technology—camera enforcement or bollards and planters, as appropriate—can work.

[Marsha De Cordova]

I thank my hon. Friend for her speech. As she is drawing it to a close, and as she has said that low-traffic neighbourhoods can work, I want to pick up again on the barriers that disabled people face. Does she agree that it is important to co-produce the design of any low-traffic neighbourhood with disabled people and their organisations to ensure that they are inclusive? Does she also agree that those who have a blue badge should be exempt from such schemes?

[Ruth Cadbury]

As Front Bencher myself, I will defer to my colleague on the Front Bench today, although it seems to me that exemptions for blue badge holders would make sense, for the reasons that my hon. Friend gave in her speech.

Let us remember that disability is not one thing. Some disabled people rely on a private vehicle to get about. Many disabled people cannot drive, for all sorts of reasons. Many, particularly frail elderly people, can walk short distances, but need to feel safe. They want to know that they can be seen at the corners of roads when trying to cross, so pedestrian build-outs and clear crossings, and so on, are essential. Good design is important, as is segregation between pedestrians and cyclists, where appropriate, so that no one fears being mown down by somebody cycling too fast in an area that should be for pedestrians. That is particularly true of one form of low-traffic neighbourhood: pedestrianised retail areas or town centres—although I am not sure whether we are talking about those in this context.

Nobody likes getting a fine for driving a route that they have always driven, but there is no reason why councils cannot use a first strike and then a fine the second time for those who did not notice the changed signage. I agree that we should consider exempting blue badge holders, particularly for a barrier-based LTN where the alternative journey is a long way round. However, if the proposals are not working and not delivering the improved environment that residents said they wanted, they can be reversed and something else can be tried.

The majority of my constituents do not have sole use of a private car and, being in London, do have alternative travel choices. Those who live on roads in LTNs should have the choice, so that, should they want to restrict their road, they can. They should not have the choice to use their road as a shortcut imposed on them by other drivers, particularly those who are not even local, such as—in our case—those driving between Surrey and Heathrow airport. Why should our residents have to put up with those drivers using their small residential roads as a shortcut?