The court said "The company should consider some further step to pressurise the non-wheelchair user to vacate the space, depending on the circumstances, it said."
This is daft. Firstly, mothers with babies in double-buggies use the same space on the bus. The idea that an adult wheelchair user on a freezing windswept night can demand that a young mother with two babies can be ejected from a bus is not the right answer. Secondly, there is nothing more the bus driver can do other than ask the mother and babies to get off the bus - the bus driver has no power beyond that.
As a bus driver said to me, no way is he going to try to eject a mother and babies from him bus - his family would disown him!
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He seems to have missed the point that it goes the other way too - sometimes someone else will get fucked over because he's already in that spot.
This is a tricky one. I'm not so sure of the specifics of the case but I've seen in the past parents refuse to move to allow a wheelchair on in situations where they absolutely should have moved. A lot of the time its sheer laziness on behalf of the parent: when the child is big enough to walk and is wide awake then there's no reason not to take them out the buggy and fold it up so someone else can get on.
As a parent I get a bit annoyed at people who insist on taking buggies absolutely everywhere. Its rush hour and you're on the tube or bus ffs, do you really have to use the buggy? Personally I'm a big fan of wraps and slings: when its busy its so, so much easier to get around with a child strapped to you than by pushing an unwieldy buggy around.
As to the specifics of the case, it really depends on just how reasonable everyone involved was being. Hard to tell without actually being there.
I'm not currently disabled but there is a chance I could end up disabled.
I'll never be a mother with two children.
Therefore, correct.
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Football is rubbish.
I was in Argos a few months back when some woman in a mobility scooter who very loudly claimed to be disabled made a massive fuss about not being dealt with instantly by the staff, when everyone else had been queueing for 15 minutes because there weren't enough staff on. She expected to be able to just jump to the front of the queue. Not all are like that, but this does smack of that to some extent.
If the space is used then wait for the next bus. Another mother with a double buggy would have had to.
A more legitimate argument is that more folding seats are needed so that there is flexibility for fitting more wheelchairs or buggies in as required, or that a more frequent bus service is required to cope with demand.
Arguing that they can kick a passenger who is already on the bus and paid for their ticket off the bus is ridiculous. They would just get sued the other way.
Ultimately, the moral of this story is that if you actually want to get somewhere in a timely fashion, why on earth would you take a bus anyway?
One particular occasion, the driver asked a woman to fold her buggy for a woman in a wheel chair and the woman refused, and another woman on the bus launched into a racist tirade against the bus driver. The child wasn't even a small one, but large enough to sit on a bus seat as well.
Everyone has a right to travel. Someone should not be refused travel when a parent can't be bothered to fold their buggy (if possible) or even move their buggy in a position to allow others to use the bay.
I’m so bored I might as well be listening to Pink Floyd
I’m so bored I might as well be listening to Pink Floyd
http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKSC/2017/4.html
Always better to get the proper one rather than a journo deadline panic written pile of arse.
I’m so bored I might as well be listening to Pink Floyd
You could argue that if the child is old enough to walk unaided then you should fold up the buggy and sit the child on your lap or seat next to you to allow a wheelchair user the space. however you could also argue that this shouldn't be allowed either as dont they request all school buses to be fitted with seat belts for young children?
what would be more preferable a disabled person to wait 20 mins for the next bus or a parent and young infant?