I, too, congratulate the noble Lord, Lord McLoughlin, on his sponsorship and advocacy of this Bill in this House. First, I declare an interest as vice-chairman of Level Playing Field, an organisation that promotes, protects and seeks to further the interests of disabled supporters of football and other sports. In that regard, I certainly support the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Mann, about stadia and accessibility. There are also issues inside stadia which can be significant, but I have to say that, overall, the position has improved in recent years.
I congratulate my noble friend Lord Boateng on his comments. I hope this comment will not be misinterpreted, but it was nice to hear a speech in this House about electric vehicle charging points and the necessity for them which went somewhat beyond provision on the Parliamentary Estate.
This Bill amends sections of the Equality Act 2010 relating to disabled people’s use of taxis and private hire vehicles. Its purpose is to reduce discrimination against disabled people by addressing the barriers, which have been set out all too clearly, that they face when accessing taxi and private hire vehicle services. The Bill creates new offences related to drivers and operators of such vehicles in Great Britain. In saying that, we, like the noble Lord, Lord McLoughlin, recognise that the clear majority of drivers and operators treat disabled people with the respect and care that they deserve and, indeed, are entitled to expect in a civilised society. Unfortunately, a small minority do not always do so, as has been said during the course of this debate.
The Bill completed its passage through the House of Commons some two weeks ago. It had our support in the Commons and has our support in your Lordships’
House. Only wheelchair and assistance dog users currently have specific rights and protections under the Equality Act 2010 in respect of taxis and private hire vehicles. The terms of the Act exclude wheelchair users who can transfer into a non-wheelchair accessible vehicle and fold their wheelchair from the protections and provisions of mobility assistance when using a non-designated wheelchair accessible vehicle or private hire vehicle. The Act also excludes all other disabled passengers who do not use a wheelchair from such protections when travelling in any taxi or private hire vehicle.
The Bill remedies this deficiency by creating a new duty to ensure that drivers of taxis and private hire vehicles do not refuse carriage to a disabled person who could reasonably travel in that vehicle at no extra charge and a new duty to make every effort to ensure that the disabled passenger feels comfortable and safe while travelling among other related duties, including duties particularly geared to the needs of visually impaired passengers and those with learning difficulties or cognitive impairments. As we know, disability can come in many forms, and that is often overlooked or not fully understood or appreciated.
The figures show that people with mobility difficulties made more than twice as many trips by taxis and private hire vehicles than those with no mobility difficulty in 2020. The Department for Transport’s September 2021 data on transport accessibility and mobility indicated a similar pattern over the past decade, with people with mobility difficulties making more trips by taxis and private hire vehicles than those with no such difficulty.
Disabled people are not a small minority group and, frankly, even if they were, it would not affect the necessity for legislation. Some 14 million people in the UK, about 22% of the overall population, report having a disability. As I understand it from the figures, of those around 1.2 million use wheelchairs with two-thirds of them being regular users.
I want to make some points and ask some questions, to which I imagine the Government will wish to respond since they rightly support the Bill. According to a 2019 survey by Scope, the disability charity, 30% of disabled people said that
“difficulties with public transport have reduced their independence.”
Four in five said they felt
“stressed or anxious when … planning or carrying out a journey.”
Frankly, that situation will not have been helped by the above-inflation increases in public transport fares and the reduction in bus services and routes which, as I understand it, has contributed to a reduction of some 25% in the number of elderly and disabled passengers.
The shortfalls in public transport mean that a taxi is the only realistic option for getting around for many disabled people. As the Conservative MP for West Dorset put it at Third Reading in the Commons a fortnight ago,
“the dependence on taxis, because of the absence of rural bus services, particularly for disabled people, is an ongoing concern. For the past two and a half years, or just under, since I was elected, we have seen a considerable reduction in rural bus services.
That has put undue pressure on those who do not have their own car, particularly those who are disabled, who need to get to the hospital, who need to go to the doctors and the dentists, who need to go shopping—the most basic of things.”—[Official Report, Commons, 18/3/22; col. 1178.]
The need for this Bill, giving people with disabilities more rights when travelling by taxi and private hire vehicle, is clear, although the Government should perhaps reflect on the reality that the need is even greater because of the shortfalls in public transport that have occurred—not least in more rural areas, as the MP for West Dorset said.
Putting new and much-needed rights on the statute book is only part of the equation, though. Unless those rights result in a real improvement in the experience of disabled people, they will not have any impact. To do that, they have to be applied and enforced. As has already been mentioned, it will be mandatory for local authorities to make and maintain a list of wheelchair-accessible taxis—an issue on which the noble Lord, Lord Borwick, raised pertinent questions. How big an exercise do the Government think maintaining the lists will be for cash-strapped local authorities, which have seen their funding slashed since 2010? The lists will be meaningful and able to be relied on only if they are kept up to date. I do not know what workload that will constitute for local authorities. Maybe the Government will be able to assure me that it will not be a significant workload, but it would be helpful to hear the Government’s view on that. How big a job will that be for local authorities that, frankly, are short of resources?
What action will the Government take to ensure that taxi and private hire drivers are aware of the terms of this Bill, and their responsibilities under it, before its provisions come into effect? That will be quite crucial. Advice and training on the full range of disabilities and the nature of the help and assistance required in each instance will be needed. The point has already been made, not least by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, about the consequences if the training is not meaningful, not understood and not then applied. Who will provide this much-needed training, and who will pay for it? Disabled people will also need to be made aware of their rights under the Bill. Who will be responsible for ensuring that this is done, and how? Who will pay the cost? I assume it will be a bit more than just the production of a few leaflets to be handed around.
Finally, at the beginning of this year the Department for Transport said it would
“develop a new Disabled Persons Passenger Charter for bus, coach, taxi, private hire vehicle and rail”
travel in England that would provide disabled people with
“a clear explanation of their rights”.
I am sure that everybody would support that. I ask this question not knowing the answer: where are we with this new charter, which obviously is very relevant to the Bill?
I reiterate that we support the Bill and hope it delivers on its worthy and much-needed objectives.
12.15 pm