Disability Rights Commission’s (DRC’s) Chairman Bert Massie was left stranded at Euston Station this month (January) because staff were "too busy" to provide the wheelchair assistance he had pre-booked.
Mr Massie was unable to get assistance from Euston’s taxi rank to the platform and onto a Liverpool train and was forced to wait an hour for the next service.
Mr Massie is writing to Network Rail to complain about the service he received.
The incident comes on the eve of a major speech Mr Massie was to deliver at the end of the month to mark the launch of an advertising campaign to highlight the daily diet of discrimination and indignity that disabled people in Britain face.
When Mr Massie arrived at Euston he approached a Network Rail worker for help at the underground taxi-rank but was told ‘You will have to phone the office. I'm too busy’.
Mr Massie called the number but says he was confronted with another unhelpful member of staff.
The DRC’s Chairman said: "I arrived twenty minutes early at the station as usual. There is usually someone waiting for me when I pre-book but on this occasion there was only a young man carrying luggage at a taxi rank who told me to phone the office.
"I couldn't believe it when the person who took my call said, 'It's just one of those things. If you miss the train, you miss the train’. He didn’t seem to understand that there are only three seats on every train that a wheelchair user can use. If they are pre-booked we have to wait for a train that does have space.
"His attitude was particularly unhelpful and dismissive and he didn’t appear to understand customer service. I travel a lot by public transport and generally receive a decent service but when they get it wrong the consequences for disabled people can be dire."
Though Mr Massie was unhappy at the attitude of the staff, he blames Network Rail management for understaffing the station and using untrained security staff to assist disabled people. Usually he receives a good service from Network Rail staff at Euston.
During the last thirty years Bert Massie has served on a number of government advisory committees concerned with transport and disability including the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee.
- In December 2006 new rules for public transport providers will be introduced under the Disability Discrimination Act which mean that disabled people have a right to be treated fairly on transport vehicles. At present, disabled people only have the right to be treated fairly when using services at the bus or rail station.
- The Government’s end date by which all rail vehicles will have to meet the Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 1998 (RVAR) is 2020. Draft regulations covering these proposals will be the subject of a public consultation process.
- Sixty per cent of the rail network is inaccessible to disabled people according to the Strategic Rail Authority.
- The DRC is an independent statutory body responsible for tackling disability discrimination. We aim to bring about equality of opportunity and increased participation for the 10 million people in Britain who have rights under the Disability Discrimination Act.
You can contact the DRC on - Telephone: 08457 622 633 or Textphone: 08457 622 644. The website is www.drc-gb.org