Invisible Disabilities and Accessibility Challenges — House of Commons, 2019-06-05
Topic: Civil Rights
Justin Paul Tomlinson (Conservative, Centre-right): It is a real pleasure to respond to this proactive and constructive debate. Until the last two, the majority of speakers stuck to the spirit of this incredibly important subject, and I know that people worked incredibly hard to get this vital debate secured through the Backbench Business Committee. First, I say to the hon. Member for East Lothian (Martin Whitfield), "Yes, yes and yes." How about that? There are not many debates in which a Minister can just totally and whole- heartedly agree I had a stroke of luck, because on Saturday a Red Box was dispatched to my house. We knew this debate was coming up, so a 3,500-word draft speech was prepared and there was a lot of briefing on what subjects would be covered. I thought that the best thing to do was to pop the kettle on, have a cup of tea and look at something else first. As I did so, I found an invitation to a meeting of the all-party group on this very subject on Tuesday. As a matter of luck, I was therefore able to attend a brilliant meeting to discuss exactly what would be coming forward. I had further luck, as the various areas of priority for us were then connected to three further meetings I had later in the week, prior to this debate, and I will be covering all those in a little more detail There is a huge amount of respect for the hon. Gentleman, who has built a brilliant reputation in this area for a long time, both in his role before he came to the House and in the House. He is widely respected and he is right to recognise the progress that has been made since the Equality Act 2010. I pay tribute to the Labour party for its work in that area. Our Government has rightly continued, as I am sure all future Governments will, to work with stakeholders to build on that incredibly important step, which does make a real difference The hon. Gentleman is right to highlight that we need to improve awareness. He talked about how 93% of people who challenge feel that they are doing the right thing because they want to stand up for those who are marginalised in society, and I am acutely aware of that point. This was summed up by an incident I saw where someone with a disabled autistic daughter parked in a disabled parking space, with a blue badge, yet received abuse It was not a one-off—I am sure it happens all over the place. On that stat—93% of people would challenge someone—they probably feel that they are doing the right thing, but because of the lack of awareness and the additional challenges of hidden disabilities, society is creating awkwardness and putting people off and that is affecting people’s lives I shall come shortly to Grace, the inspiration, but first let me whizz through some of the excellent speeches and respond to them directly. My hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) has done brilliant work, both in her constituency with the partnership board and in her former role as everybody’s favourite sports Minister. When I was previously a disability Minister, we worked together carefully to push organisations such as the Premier League, which was, to its credit, very proactive. Richard Scudamore, the departing chief executive, took a personal interest in improving disability access in premier league stadiums. I could not have asked for more support from the sports Minister in that policy area My hon. Friend was absolutely right to highlight the importance of the Special Olympics. The point that I really picked up on was just how happy people are—in all the visits in my 19 years as an MP, a Minister and a councillor, nothing has come close to the joy that I saw when I went to a learning disability netball session. I literally thought that the young adults were going to explode with excitement. I am glad that my hon. Friend also took the time to highlight the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), who has done a huge amount in this policy area The hon. Member for Newport West (Ruth Jones) has made a good impression since her recent arrival in the House, from which we are all benefiting. This is the second debate to which she has contributed and I have responded. She brings real-life experience in this area, particularly in respect of strokes, and it was really important to highlight that. She reminds us how important it is that we do this because some people will need extra time and space. That is crucial My hon. Friend the Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant) led a brilliant Westminster Hall debate just a few weeks ago and carried on today in the same form. Not every disability is visible. He was right to highlight that there is not an immense cost to making a real difference in this policy area. That came through in many speeches, and I will cover it in more detail later Through the direct experiences of his wife, the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) raised some incredibly important points about access to work and sanctions. He has raised them before in other debates and he always raises them in a constructive manner. I want to try to keep to the spirit of the debate, so I offer him a personal meeting so that we can explore the issues in more detail and do them justice My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mary Robinson) was absolutely right to highlight the challenges in respect of public transport, an area on which she has worked tirelessly. She also raised the issue of assistance dogs, on which British Guide Dogs has been one of the best and most visible campaigning charities, particularly in respect of the misunderstanding of what taxi drivers should or should not do and how we can tighten things up through licensing. My hon. Friend was also right to highlight the brilliance of medical dogs that can smell certain conditions—it is the equivalent of detecting one particle in a swimming pool, which is absolutely amazing. What a difference we can also make in the retail environment, which I will cover a little later Perhaps the hon. Members for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) and for Lanark and Hamilton East (Angela Crawley) did not quite follow the spirit of the debate—that is one of the challenges when one arrives with a pre-written speech. I gently say to them that we are spending £55 billion a year on supporting those with long-term health conditions and disabilities. That is a record amount and is up £10 billion. Only 16% of DLA claimants had the highest rate of support, compared with 32% of those on PIP. Disability employment is at a record high: in respect of our target of 1 million by 2027, we are at 440,000 after two years. As I said in an intervention earlier, for the first time we have more disabled people in work than not in work. There is still more to do, though, specifically for people with autism in jobcentres. I am grateful for the work of Autism Alliance UK, which helped to create the autism toolkit. In the spirit of the debate, I am happy to meet both Members to discuss all those issues in detail, but will keep to the theme—