Concerns disabled people in Scarborough excluded from council decision-making processes
Scarborough Disability Action Group is calling for the Borough Council to make improvements
A local disability charity has called on the borough council to improve the representation of disabled people in decision-making processes following concerns about their exclusion.
The Scarborough Disability Action Group, a local charity that supports disabled people in the borough, has said that disabled people have “become increasingly excluded from local decision-making processes” though the council has said it is “committed to reducing inequalities in the borough”.
Concerns have also been raised by members of the public about the number of accessible venues, toilets, and businesses that are available in the area.
Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, Mr Tim Vasey, manager of the Disability Action Group (DAG), said that disability groups such as his are no longer being consulted when it comes to local decision-making.
He said: “The council used to have its own access officer and they used to consult with us quite regularly” on issues such as planning decisions.
But Mr Vasey said that once the borough council’s access officer position ceased to exist, the council did not continue its dialogue with DAG and was no longer in contact with the group “at all”.
Scarborough Council has said it is “committed to reducing inequalities in the borough” and that it cares about equal access for disabled people and is looking to continually improve its understanding of the needs and issues faced by disabled people.
A Scarborough Council spokesperson said: “We do not share the view that disabled people have become increasingly excluded from local decision-making processes such as planning.
“While national planning legislation has never categorised groups such as Scarborough DAG as a statutory consultee, we have always welcomed their comments and formal representations through the planning consultation process and continue to do so.”
They added: “We do, however, feel that more weight should be placed on eradicating the gaps between the various pieces of national legislation that cover these matters.
“For example, national planning policy and legislation is aspirational in terms of promoting accessibility, rather than definitive.”
The council said it was also looking at using legislation “to bring about positive change” where it can.
Treated as ‘second-class citizens’
Concerns about disabled access in the borough have also been raised concerning physical access in public areas such as parks, play areas, and bathrooms.
Sharon Davis says she visited Scarborough in August with a group of 19 children with additional needs, including her son Josh, who has asymmetric quadrapelgic cerebral palsy and epilepsy and is a full time wheelchair user.
She said that they were forced to wait “almost 40 minutes” to gain access to a toilet on the beachfront.
She said: “Just after lunch we went to access the toilet on the beachfront. The disabled toilet was out of order and the changing places toilet was locked with no signage on the door on how to gain access.
“We waited around 40 minutes and two toilet attendants arrived. I politely asked how to gain access to the changing places toilet, and apparently, the sign fell off the door.
“After a few minutes the lady begrudgingly opened the door but wouldn’t give us the code, so we had to ring Scarborough Council for the code for later that day.”
She added: “It is also disappointing that disabled people are treated as second-class citizens with no accessible toilets on the beachfront, accessibility is clearly not a priority.”
Following a refurbishment this summer, the council reopened its accessible changing places bathroom facilities in the South Bay.
A Scarborough Council spokesperson said: “As a landowner, we have a duty to ensure that the buildings we own and occupy or those leased in from other landlords for our own purposes are compliant. In these cases, we would have a duty to improve physical access to them.”
The spokesperson added that when it comes to undertaking physical works to tenanted properties owned by the council, the Equality Act “puts the responsibility on the tenant”.
“This is the same whether a tenant is a council tenant or the tenant of a privately owned property,” they said.
“Our commercial lease agreements do however stipulate that tenants should comply with all acts of parliament, including the Equality Act. We, therefore, work closely with them to ensure we don’t hinder their ability to provide their services equally, to help them understand the needs of disabled people and to promote good practice.”
Meanwhile, Lorna Fillingham, who was holidaying in Scarborough and North Yorkshire with her 12-year-old disabled daughter Emily-May this summer, said that accessibility was an issue every day.
Many of the sites they visited were run by a variety of town councils and organisations, and she called on “the businesses and local authorities in North Yorkshire to see what they can do” to improve accessibility.
She said: “We’re also a family who love the outdoors, so knowing where accessible footpaths are too, would all help make North Yorkshire a place where we could continue to visit as well as making it a better place for the disabled people who live here.”
Investments ‘easily recouped’
The manager of the Scarborough DAG, Mr Vasey, said that when it comes to making sites more accessible, it makes financial sense for businesses and organisations to make initial investments.
He said: “You are making yourself more marketable. Hotels and restaurants, if they spent a few hundred pounds making themselves more accessible they could easily recoup that by attracting more disabled people such as wheelchair users into their businesses.
“But there is none of that kind of idea. People just think ‘oh God, we’re not spending £500 when they’re going to be of very little use’.
“But holiday homes and hoteliers used to get in touch with us to ask that we let our members know about the changes, and we would help people publicise that. But all that seems to have gone now.”
Lorna Fillingham echoed Mr Vasey’s comments, telling the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “Local authorities and businesses need to be consulting with local disabled people to find out what the access issues are and how they can best be overcome.
“The most recent figures I can find suggest that the disabled ‘purple pound’ is worth about £249bn, so providing good access should be considered an investment.”
The purple pound is the estimated spending power of disabled households in the UK.
According to the disability charity Scope, half of families with disabled children say their local playground isn’t accessible and it has launched a campaign that is calling on the government to create an inclusive playground fund.