The claimant a wheelchair user had been unable to travel on a bus when a mother had left her sleeping child in a pushchair. The mother said she was unable to fold down the pushchair, and would not move the child. The claimant said that the driver should have had instructions to insist on this, and wone his case at the county court. The bus company appealed.
Held: The appeal succeeded. The case: ‘is not about whether non-wheelchair users should move out of the wheelchair space on a bus in order to accommodate a passenger in a wheelchair. Of course they should if that is possible. Nor is it about whether mothers standing in the wheelchair space with a child in a folding buggy should fold their buggies in order to make way for a wheelchair user. Of course they should if that is possible. Non-wheelchair users, unlike wheelchair users, will normally have a choice about which part of the bus to sit or stand in. Common decency and respect for wheelchair users should mean that other passengers make way for them. What is at issue is whether the bus company must have a policy to compel all other passengers to vacate the wheelchair space irrespective of the reason why they are in it, on pain of being made to leave the bus if they do not, leaving no discretion to the driver. ‘
He continued: ‘the applicable Regulations do not specify the mode of use of the spaces required to be made available. They simply set out what space must be available, and ‘whereas the regulations give explicit priority to disabled persons who wish to use the priority seats, they do not give similar priority to wheelchair users who wish to use the wheelchair space.’
As to the judge’s statement that inconvenience to mothers with buggies is ‘a consequence of the protection that Parliament has chosen to give to disabled wheelchair users and not to non-disabled mothers with buggies’: ‘This was, in my judgment, a misapprehension. What Parliament has given by way of protection (over and above the Conduct Regulations) is a right to reasonable adjustments. What is a reasonable adjustment depends, among other things, on the impact of the adjustment on others. They do not need to have any particular protection in order for the impact on them to be given weight. The judge seems to me to have thought that the needs of wheelchair users trumped all other considerations. If that is what he meant, I respectfully disagree. ‘
Arden, Lewison, Underhill LJJ
[2014] EWCA Civ 1573, [2014] WLR(D) 525
Bailii, WLRD
Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations 2000, Public Passenger Vehicles Act 1981, Equality Act 2010 6(3), Public Service Vehicles (Conduct of Drivers, Inspectors, Conductors and Passengers) Regulations 1990
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Black and Others v Arriva North East Ltd 1-May-2013
Middlesborough County Court. The claimants complained of a policy by the defendant bus company as to the use of wheelchair spaces on buses in that disabled users were not given absolute priority above buggy users.
Held: The company were not . .
Cited – Roads v Central Trains Ltd CA 5-Nov-2004
The court considered the meaning of the ‘duty to provide a reasonable alternative method’.
Held: The policy of the 1995 Act was to provide access to a service as close as it was reasonable possible to get to the standard offered to the public . .
Cited – The Royal Bank of Scotland v Ashton EAT 16-Dec-2010
EAT DISABILITY DISCRIMINATION
Disability related discrimination
Direct disability discrimination
An Employment Tribunal failed to focus on the wording of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 . .
Cited – Lancaster v TBWA Manchester EAT 17-Feb-2011
EAT UNFAIR DISMISSAL – Compensation
DISABILITY DISCRIMINATION – Reasonable adjustments
AGE DISCRIMINATION
The Appellant, a senior art director at a marketing and advertising agency, was aged 50 . .
Cited – Nottingham City Transport Ltd v Harvey EAT 5-Oct-2012
EAT Disability Discrimination: Reasonable Adjustments – Employee unfairly dismissed, because the employer did not conduct a reasonable investigation nor consider mitigating circumstances when disciplining a . .
Cited – Black and Others v Arriva North East Ltd 1-May-2013
Middlesborough County Court. The claimants complained of a policy by the defendant bus company as to the use of wheelchair spaces on buses in that disabled users were not given absolute priority above buggy users.
Held: The company were not . .
Cited – Finnigan v Northumbria Police CA 8-Oct-2013
Officers had searched the claimant’s house on three occasions. Though it was known that he was profoundly deaf, no signer had been brought along to assist. The judge had held that on two occasions communication had been effective, and on the third, . .
Cited by:
Appeal from – Firstgroup Plc v Paulley SC 18-Jan-2017
The claimant wheelchair user alleged discrimination by the bus company. The space reserved for wheelchair users on a bus had been wrongly occupied by a passenger who refused to vacate the space. The claimant said that the bus driver should have . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Transport, Discrimination, News
Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.539764