The disability charity AbilityNet, which analysed the accessibility of five sites for its report, said disabled people should be a significant market for any retail website, because they “often have less cash and less opportunity to shop around the physical high street”.

The charity tested the accessibility of Compare the Market, Go Compare, mySupermarket, Kelkoo and Confused.com.

Not one of the five achieved the three-star rating that indicates a basic level of accessibility for disabled people.   It found four of them – with one star each – were potentially breaching the Equality Act, while Kelkoo – the only site to gain two stars – only satisfied some legal accessibility requirements.

One blind user of screen-reading software who tested the mySupermarket site said they would rather “starve” than use it to buy groceries.

Robin Christopherson, AbilityNet’s head of digital inclusion, said: “Like everyone else in these hard times, the country’s 12 million disabled people want to get the best deal when they’re shopping, whether that’s for insurance, groceries or anything else. “But these cash-strapped shoppers are losing out due to badly-designed web pages that prevent them from shopping around and accessing the online bargains they need to make ends meet.”

He added: “It is just as illegal to bar disabled visitors from accessing your goods and services online as it would be to keep them out of your shop in the ‘real world’.”

A Compare the Market spokeswoman said: “We are always looking at ways to improve what we do and we have taken AbilityNet’s report very seriously. We are reviewing the report and looking at their findings and after that process has concluded we will see what changes we can make.”

Chris Simpson, chief marketing officer for Kelkoo, said his company would “look carefully at the findings of this research and, where possible, review our practices to improve this experience for disabled people”.

He said: “We are certainly open to further talks with AbilityNet to understand more about the study and how we can improve our score going forward.”

A Gocompare.com spokeswoman said: “We’re keen that Gocompare.com should be easily accessible to as many users as possible. We welcome this report and will be looking carefully at the findings to see where improvements can be made.”

No-one from Confused.com was able to comment, and mySupermarket did not reply to requests for a response to the report.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Phillips has faced repeated criticism during his two three-year terms as chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).

His decision not to seek a third term was revealed in a foreword to the commission’s new strategic plan. The plan also reveals that – due to drastic cuts in its budget – staffing levels at the EHRC are set to fall from 420 to between 150 and 180.

Two years ago, the parliamentary joint committee on human rights said “major questions” remained over Phillips’ leadership, following a series of resignations by commissioners.

Two disabled commissioners, Baroness [Jane] Campbell and Sir Bert Massie, had been among those who resigned in 2009 over concerns at his leadership.

Phillips also faced criticism in a report by the public accounts committee in March 2010. More recently, he had appeared on a collision course with the coalition, after arguing last year that its plans for reform risked turning the EHRC into an “anonymous, cowed, nit-picking compliance factory, remote from the everyday challenges that face ordinary people”.

The Government Equalities Office had laid out plans to slash the commission’s budget and reduce its powers, remove funding for its grants programme, and ask the private or voluntary sector to take over its national helpline.

A Home Office spokeswoman said: “Trevor Phillips’ appointment as the chair of the EHRC ends in September 2012. The government are looking for an appropriate successor. It was Mr Phillips’ decision to leave.” She declined to comment further.

An EHRC spokeswoman said: “As I understand it, he is not seeking another term.” She also declined to comment further.

The EHRC’s budget is set to fall to £26.8 million by the end of 2015, compared with £70 million when it launched in 2007, and it warns in the plan that this will mean “significant” changes.

The strategic plan lays out the EHRC’s three “strategic priorities” for the next three years.

The first is to promote fairness and equality of opportunity in the economy, such as tackling the causes of the “pay gap” between the salaries of disabled and non-disabled people, and ensuring decisions by the government and the public and private sector “take full account of equality and human rights”. 

It also wants to promote fair access to public services, including “dignity and autonomy” in social care.

Its third priority will be “promoting dignity and respect and ensuring people’s safety”, including a programme to reduce disability-related bullying in schools and workplaces, and tracking the implementation of recommendations from its well-received inquiry into disability-related harassment.

The plan says legal action will continue to be the EHRC’s “last resort, when nudge, persuasion and advice have not proved effective”, and that it will have to move from providing direct services such as a helpline and grants to being “a catalyst for change and improvement”.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The 19-year-old was often prevented from leaving the so-called “Blue Room” at Beech Tree School, near Preston, which is run by the disability charity Scope.

The mother of the young man – known only as C – has only now been able to speak out publicly after a judge lifted an anonymity order which had prevented any naming of the school or the local authority involved, Wigan Council.

C’s mother took the council to the Court of Protection, which ruled 12 months ago that it was a breach of her son’s rights to confine him to the padded room to control his “challenging behaviour” – at one stage on 192 occasions in just one month – without seeking a court order under the Mental Capacity Act authorising the school to deprive him of his liberty.

In delivering his ruling last year, Mr Justice Ryder concluded that the failure to provide C with the “specialist, qualified care and treatment” he clearly needed was “unacceptable”.

C’s mother said the improvement her son had made in the last year had vindicated the family’s battle.

 Her son now enjoys walks in the country and trips to a swimming pool, while his attention span and vocabulary have “dramatically increased”.

She said: “The ‘professionals’ within the named organisations each had the authority to halt the tragic existence of my son’s incarceration within the Blue Room but failed in their duty to do so over a considerable period of time.  His elder brother and I have witnessed the practice of seclusion enough to know that it is unnatural, particularly cruel to someone with the diagnosis of C and serves only to dehumanize, and there should be no place for its use in 21st century ‘care’.”

C’s brother added: “He has gained weight, grown taller and shows affection to those around him. I can now enjoy a relationship with him where we laugh and have fun, which is something I hadn’t seen my brother do for some time.”

Mathieu Culverhouse, a lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, which helped the family win the case, said: “This shocking case is one in which the responsible authorities failed to obtain the legal authorisation needed to deprive someone of their liberty.

“It’s clear from the progress C has made over the past nine months that the unlawful treatment he was receiving was not working.”

 As a result of the case, and falling pupil numbers, Scope has decided to close the school.

Tara Flood, director of the Alliance for Inclusive Education, said: “On the one hand it is good to see a special school closing but it is terrible it took such an appalling breach of human rights for the decision to be made.”

Richard Hawkes, Scope’s chief executive, said the charity was “very sorry” that C “didn’t get the support he needed”.

He said: “It took us too long to realise that we had become over-reliant on an approach that wasn’t working.” He said it had been a “really challenging case” and that the charity had acted with “nothing but the best intentions”.

He added: “We tried too hard and for too long, to manage a very difficult situation without securing the right combination of external expertise and support.” Wigan Council declined to comment.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The move was mentioned last week by BAA, which runs Heathrow, at a meeting of the all- party parliamentary group for young disabled people.

Two years ago, research by the Trailblazers group of young disabled campaigners found that the fear of damage to electric wheelchairs – which can cost up to £16,000 – while being loaded and unloaded from flights was a major source of anxiety for young disabled people.

The Heathrow trial is set to run from July to September, spanning both the Olympics and Paralympics, and will see a specialist technician stationed at the airport to fix faults on the spot.

About 80 per cent of London 2012 visitors – including many Paralympic athletes – are expected to pass through Heathrow.

Trailblazer Jagdeep Sehmbi, from Birmingham, said: “This is great news for disabled flyers. A couple of years ago, I arrived back into Heathrow after a holiday to find my wheelchair broken and bent out of shape.  I’m dependent on my wheelchair for independence day to day, so I’m stranded when it is out of action.  I really feel for disabled people from other countries who experience the same thing, when they have paid hundreds or even thousands of pounds to come here and enjoy their holidays.  Knowing there will be an expert at the airport should the worst happen means that people can relax and enjoy their breaks.”

A Heathrow spokeswoman said: “Heathrow faces a huge challenge during London 2012 as we will see large numbers of passengers with reduced mobility arriving and departing during the Paralympic Games.  To ensure the facilities we already have available are suitable we will be putting in place additional measures which include ramp-lifting devices [to allow baggage handlers to move wheelchairs up and down], toilets, lightweight aisle chairs, changing places and a wheelchair repair service. Final details of the wheelchair repair service are still being finalised.”

The Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, which runs Trailblazers, said it hoped the wheelchair repair trial would be successful and that London 2012 “might bring us the legacy of a permanent wheelchair repair service at our busiest airport”.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Boris Johnson launched his high-profile cycle scheme – which is sponsored by Barclays – in 2010, allowing anyone to hire a bike from one of hundreds of “docking” points across the city.

The scheme – which is not accessible to many disabled people – has so far been used more than 10 million times, with nearly 140,000 cycles being hired every week.

But despite the scheme’s apparent success, the mayor has refused to pilot a scheme that would allow disabled Londoners and tourists to increase their enjoyment of the city’s royal parks by hiring one of a small number of accessible hand-cycles.

The idea was suggested by disabled access consultant Tracey Proudlock, a wheelchair-user who lives in north London, who wrote to Johnson about her idea in January 2011, and has suggested Hyde Park as the venue for a pilot.

She thought it would be an ideal scheme to trial in the lead-up to the London 2012 Paralympics.

She said: “If you invested some money in having some decent bikes than I think it would be a big success.

“It’s about just getting a little bit fitter and getting out and having a good time.”

Johnson passed Proudlock’s idea to his deputy, Richard Barnes, who met with Proudlock last year but has now told her the mayor’s office was “not able to progress this particular idea”.

She suggested that the mayor’s refusal to set up an accessible trial of the scheme could be a breach of his public sector equality duty under the Equality Act.

Among the problems the mayor’s team blame for turning down the idea include the difficulty of finding space for the docking stations for the hand-cycles, problems with designing a bike “to suit all disabilities”, and ensuring the bikes were evenly spread across all the hire stations, as well as the cost of the project.

But Proudlock said all of these problems could be easily solved, particularly as there were many existing suppliers of hand-cycles, and the pilot scheme could be restricted to just one of London’s spacious royal parks, such as Hyde Park.

The mayor’s office has so far been unable to comment.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

The government announced last week that 36 of the 54 Remploy factories across the UK would close by the end of 2012, with the loss of more than 1,500 disabled people’s jobs, while there would be further consultation over the future of the other 18 factories.

Stephen Lloyd, the Liberal Democrat MP for Eastbourne, told Disability News Service this week that he supported the coalition’s decision.

The former disability consultant said those disabled people who were losing their jobs would understandably be “very angry and upset by what’s happened”, but he added: “The old-fashioned, paternalistic, institutionalised approach of Remploy has no place in the modern world.”

He said his support for the decision depended on the government meeting its pledge that “every penny saved will go into helping more disabled people into [mainstream] jobs”, with “significant levels of support” to help former Remploy workers into mainstream work, and “generous” packages for those for whom this was not possible.

He said it was “not realistic” to expect all former Remploy workers to find mainstream work, but he was “very, very hopeful” that more would be found work than happened with those who lost their jobs after the closure of Remploy factories by the last Labour government.

He said: “Having been involved in disability equality for over 20 years I have always been passionate about ensuring more disabled people are in mainstream employment.

“Disability equality, respect and opportunity for disabled people is one of the things that brought me back into politics. In their heart of hearts, people who actually understand this subject know that this decision by the government is correct.” But he added: “If I get a sniff that this is part of a Treasury-driven initiative and the money [from the Remploy closures] goes back to the Treasury, I will publicly fight it tooth and nail.”

Tracey Proudlock, a leading disabled access and disability consultant, said she believed that about a third of Remploy’s employees would find sustainable, worthwhile jobs through Work Choice, the government’s scheme for supporting disabled people into employment.

Proudlock said she expected the other two-thirds would either resist the idea of a new career in mainstream employment, possibly because they were close to retirement, or would find it impossible to find jobs.

Her experience of supporting disabled people into mainstream employment from a sheltered workshop run by a London local authority in the early 1990s has convinced her that many ex-Remploy workers will be successful in finding work, if given the right support.

She said: “I think these people leaving Remploy will probably need high levels of support for an appreciable period of time. It is not a temporary thing. “Finding them mainstream work will be complex, but very, very worthwhile, because some of them will come away with meaningful, inclusive work.”

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Much has changed since the first Remploy factory was opened at Bridgend in South Wales in 1946 by Ernest Bevin, the Minister for Labour. Segregated workshops are by today’s standards seen by many as simply wrong and in fact reforming Remploy has been a hot potato for many years.

I am reminded of the times when I have successfully supported people transferring from sheltered workshops to open employment and hope that this can be replicated in these testing times. Many disabled people have only ever known a sheltered work place.

The government budget so far to do this is £8m, which will provide “tailored support” for staff who lose their jobs.

I know time will be key – many disabled people will need to get to grips with the changes and won’t be able to do so overnight. Top of the shopping list should be some time for people to explore what jobs they enjoy, learn more about new work and find out about reasonable adjustments to the workplace. There are a vast range of adjustments that many disabled people and employers can explore. Emergency escape, building alterations, auxiliary aids such as temporary ramps and hearing enhancement are perhaps more familiar to employers than ‘managed’ adjustments such as flexible working.

With 1000+ new jobs having just been announced at Nissan in Sunderland and 20,000 at Tesco across the UK, I hope they are thinking seriously about recruiting from the Remploy pool and using all available support and grants for making ‘reasonable adjustments’.

If you’re not sure just what’s involved with recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce drop us a line, we can chat through what you want to achieve and how you get there.

Maria Miller, the Conservative minister for disabled people, announced this week that 36 of the remaining 54 Remploy factories across the UK would close by the end of 2012, with the loss of more than 1,500 disabled people’s jobs.

The government will consult with Remploy bosses over the future of the other 18 factories, Remploy’s employment services business and about 30 contracts providing CCTV services, to examine whether they can be sold or survive as social enterprises run by employees.

The announcement was part of the government’s response to a consultation on last year’s review of employment support by Liz Sayce, chief executive of Disability Rights UK (DR UK).

Government funds currently used to subsidise the factories will be “recycled” into other forms of employment support for disabled people, including the Access to Work (AtW) scheme.

Rhian Davies, chief executive of Disability Wales, said the announcement would be “devastating” for Remploy workers and called on the government to do “everything it can to find alternatives or retraining”.

But she added: “Disability Wales campaigns for full inclusion and rights and equality for disabled people. “We have questioned the role of any kind of segregated provision, whether it is sheltered workshops, day centres or special schools. These were 20th century solutions and the world is very different now. “In the long-term the hope is it will release more funding to help more disabled people in mainstream jobs. We hope they will have more chance to develop their careers and potential.”

Julie Newman, acting chair of the UK Disabled People’s Council, said the idea of sheltered, segregated workplaces belonged in the last century, but disabled Remploy workers should be supported to take control of factories themselves, setting up user-led social enterprises.

She said: “That is more of a 21st century picture. They would no longer be the stereotypical sheltered workshops. They would become organisations run by and for disabled people.”

Jeremy Long-Price, independent living development lead for Southampton Centre for Independent Living, also backed the withdrawal of government funding. He said: “As an organisation we are against the notion of segregated employment and would rather see money previously spent on subsidising the Remploy model of supporting disabled people more widely available and directed to allow greater inclusion in the overall population and workforce.”

But he said he was not convinced that the government would redirect the Remploy funding into supporting disabled people into mainstream jobs, as it has promised.

Mike Smith, a DR UK trustee and chief executive of Real, a disabled people’s organisation in the London borough of Tower Hamlets, said the disabled people he worked with at Real “do not want to go into specialist, segregated work” but want adequate support to find mainstream jobs.

He dismissed arguments that the country’s economic situation meant it was the wrong time to be closing the factories. He said it was “absolutely the right time”, because every £1 spent on AtW brings the Treasury £1.48 in tax and national insurance, while greater inclusion of disabled people into society would reduce disability hate crime.

He said: “It is uncomfortable but it is the right thing to do. If it is the right message, we should not be shy about saying it, just because it upsets some people. “We want more disabled people throughout the whole country supported into real and meaningful employment.”

He pointed to the £25,000 cost of subsidising every disabled employee in Remploy factories, and said this sum could support eight disabled people into mainstream employment through AtW.

But the response of leading disabled people’s organisations (DPOs) to the government’s announcement has angered unions. Les Woodward, Remploy convenor for the GMB union, who has worked for the company for 28 years, criticised DPOs for taking an “ideological viewpoint” and ignoring the perilous economic situation, and appealed for disabled leaders to visit Remploy factories and talk to workers.

He said: “I cannot see how making the best part of 2,000 people redundant is going to advance the disability agenda one iota.” He said disabled people looking for mainstream jobs faced inaccessible workplaces, bullying and discrimination.

He said: “Where’s the jobs? This argument that everybody should work in mainstream employment is totally facile. That’s like saying everybody should work in Marks and Spencer. “I guarantee there is not one person in this factory [in Swansea] considers themselves to be working in segregated employment. It would take a very brave bloke to tell me that I work in a ghetto.”

Linda Burnip, a member of the steering group of Disabled People Against Cuts, also called for the factories to become social enterprises run and controlled by disabled people. She said the government had failed to think through its decision to close the 36 factories, and pointed to widespread problems with securing access to AtW funding. She added: “We have got the highest unemployment rates for 17 years, so where are these jobs going to come from?”

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com

Two years ago, the previous government launched a consultation on possible reforms aimed at modernising the law on mobility vehicles.

The consultation document pointed to a “growing concern” about safety – particularly with scooters – although it said evidence suggested a “very low” number of injuries.

Responding to the subsequent consultation – which ended in May 2010 – Norman Baker, the Liberal Democrat transport minister, said he would be meeting with “interested parties” to review the evidence on insurance, training, and the possibility of mandatory eye tests for users of class three scooters – those that travel at up to eight mph.

He said: “I am conscious of the crucial role such vehicles play in some people’s lives and that will be an important factor in deciding what further actions, if any, to take.”

Helen Dolphin, director of policy and campaigns for Disabled Motoring UK, said: “Our policy is that insurance should be compulsory because of the kind of problems people get into when they do not have insurance, such as injuring other people.”

But she said it would not be easy to introduce compulsory insurance, as there would probably also need to be some kind of driving test and licensing system for scooter-users. She added: “We are very much in favour of training. People need to take responsibility for themselves and should seek training if they feel they need it.”

Dolphin said Disabled Motoring UK would continue to call on the government to introduce compulsory insurance.

Baker also said he had decided to make no changes to maximum permitted speeds or the current minimum age of 14 for using a class three vehicle. But he did announce that the government would replace the outdated term “invalid carriage” in legislation.

And following recommendations by the transport select committee, Baker said the Department for Transport was now working with the industry to develop a kite-marking scheme that would let disabled people know in advance if they would be able to use their scooters on buses and trains.

Dolphin said she would be in favour of a kite-marking scheme if it helped cut the large number of scooter-users who are unfairly refused entry onto public transport. Baker also announced the publication of new guidance for users of mobility scooters and powered wheelchairs on the road.

News provided by John Pring at www.disabilitynewsservice.com