Rights and Reality report

Two in five (40%) disabled people have experienced difficulties accessing goods and services in the last twelve months, with around a quarter of all disabled people (23%) directly identifying their experiences as discriminatory, according to a major new report by a leading disability charity.

The report, based on research conducted by Ipsos MORI for the charity Leonard Cheshire Disability, finds that disabled people continue to face issues like poor accessibility and a lack of appropriate facilities in premises, as well as difficulties in using public transport.
On Tuesday 6 April the new Equality Act was passed through parliament. It replaces the current Disability Discrimination Act and provides an opportunity to make improvements to the way in which the law works for disabled people.

Leonard Cheshire Disability is calling for the establishment of a pilot project allowing formal arbitration of cases, so that they can be heard and settled before having to go to court, as well as the use of ‘Equality Tribunals’ to make it easier for disabled people to take a case.
The report finds that only 1% of disabled people who have encountered discrimination when accessing goods and services have taken legal action to challenge it. The potential costs and stress of taking action, as well as a lack of knowledge of disabled people’s rights under the Act, are cited as major barriers to doing so. Only 9% of those disabled people who had taken any form of action in relation to the discrimination they had experienced reported that the organisation in question had made improvements in its provision of services for disabled people. (“Disability Now”, May 2010).