[BobbyB]

17 December 2006
INCONSIDERATE MORONS WHO MAKE LIFE HELL FOR PEOPLE IN WHEELCHAIRS ARE AS BAD AS DRINK DRIVERS
ACCESS ALL AREAS
THE Sunday Mail's Access All Areas campaign is fighting for a law against able people using disabled parking bays. We asked James Scott, 46, of Arbroath, who is paralysed from the chest down, just what he thought about people who steal bays earmarked for the disabled...

'THEY'RE the scum of the Earth - lazy, selfish morons who don't care about the problems facing wheelchair users like me.

These idiots have demonstrated that they cannot be trusted to police themselves so there needs to be legislation to punish them - just as there is for drink drivers.

The problem isn't quite so bad on the street because there's always the worry they'll get ticketed by a traffic warden.

It's a crime that has no age limits nor social boundaries. I've seen businessmen in Jaguars and middle aged women doing it just as much as young yobs.

I think offenders should have points put on their licence and that might stop them in their tracks.


I've lost count of how often I've had to drive around for hours because all the disabled places are taken up, mostly by people without a Blue Badge.


They don't seem to understand that disabled bays aren't just closer to the store or business, they're bigger because wheelchair users can't use ordinary parking bays. We need the space to bring our wheelchair alongside the car.


You'd think the bright yellow chevron lines around disabled parking bays would give people a clue, but no.


Just last week in the Odeon cinema car park in Dundee, some idiot parked right next to my car, over the chevrons, and stopped me getting into my car.And there were plenty of other spaces!


I had to sit in the rain for nearly an hour before the man and his wife came back to their car.


When I told him what he'd done, he just shrugged and said: 'So what? **** off!' I'd like him to spend a day sitting where I am and see if he changed his mind about that.


It happened to me again in the car park at the Spinal Unit in Glasgow's Southern General Hospital.


A man in his 30s with no disabled badge was sitting astride two disabled bays and I ended up late for my appointment because there was nowhere else for me to park.


When he came back to his car, he just gave me the two-fingered salute and drove off.


A middle-aged lady who parked in the only disabled bay left in Tesco's car park in Montrose recently said sorry and drove off quickly because she was obviously embarrassed when I spoke to her.


But sorry isn't good enough. People obviously need to be forced to think of others who are less fortunate.


Supermarkets and multi-storey car parks need to re-think the number of disabled spaces they need. There are one million disabled Scots, after all, and relatively few spaces. The situation needs to be policed more vigorously.


I have a friend in a wheelchair who gets so angry when selfish drivers take disabled spaces, he slaps stickers on their windows. I call him the Disabled Vigilante but it's his only way of getting his frustration out.


Drivers also have a nasty habit of parking over dropped kerbs. That means wheelchair users have to trundle for hundreds of yards just so they can get off the pavement safely.


Disabled people have as much right to get out and about as everyone else. Don't make it any harder for us.'

[Alffe]

But how do you really feel Mr.Scott. I actually agree that people who are this lazy and inconsiderate ARE morons! And they SHOULD be embarrassed.

[Wayne]

My solution is to key them.

[rd42]

I was thinking of starting a website where you upload a picture and a Lic number of the offender's, aka morons illegally parked.

What do you folks think of that? I think it might be popular.