HC Deb 13 May 1977 vol 931 cc1765-6
Mr. Victor Goodhew (St. Albans)

I beg to present a petition to the House containing signatures collected in my constituency. I shall not read the whole preamble, because I wish to save the time of the House, but the main prayer is as follows your humble petitioners pray that your honourable House call upon the Secretary of State for Social Services to promote policies and propose such necessary legislation as will:

  1. (A) Immediately guarantee a right of continued independent mobility to the current invalid tricycle drivers, when the supply of tricycles is exhausted, to allay their great anxiety for the future.
  2. (B) Restore immediately the option of a suitably adapted car or an invalid tricycle to new applicants for mobility assistance under the powers granted to the Secretary of State for Social Services by Section 33 of the Health Services and Public Health Act 1968.
  3. (C) Actively promote projects to design and produce specialised vehicles which will enable an increased number of severely disabled people to enjoy independent mobility
and you yourselves enact the legislation. The petition deals with other matters connected with the mobility of the disabled and concludes: And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc. To lie upon the Table

Mr, James Kilfedder (Down, North)

With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I beg leave to present, as part of this nationwide campaign, a petition on behalf of the Northern Ireland Disabled Drivers' Association signed by 50,000 Ulster men and women from all parts of the Province.

The petition is also supported by the Northern Ireland Council for Orthopaedic Development, the Northern Ireland Paraplegic Association, the Northern Ireland Polio Fellowship, the Northern Ireland Spina Bifida Association, the Multiple Sclerosis Action Group and the Muscular Dystrophy Association of Northern Ireland.

The petition is prompted by a statement made by the Secretary of State for Social Services on 23rd July 1976 on mobility policy for the disabled. That statement caused great concern to the disabled in Northern Ireland, because it removes from those who currently have three-wheeler vehicles the assurance of continued independent mobility and condemns many new applicants for mobility assistance to be housebound because of the inadequate level of the mobility allowance.

The petitioners therefore pray that the House will call upon the Secretary of State for Social Services to

  1. (i) Immediately guarantee the right of continued independent mobility to current invalid tricycle drivers when the supply of tricycles is exhausted…
  2. (ii) Offer immediately the option of a suitably adapted car to new applicants for mobility assistance who are able either to drive or to nominate a driver in order that opportunities for education and employment are not lost as a result of applicants being housebound.
  3. (iii) Actively promote projects to design and produce specialised vehicles which will enable an increasing number of severely disabled people to enjoy independent mobility
The petitioners pray that the House will enact the necessary legislation and take all necessary steps with all possible urgency to promote a total policy on mobility which will ensure that a choice is available to severely disabled people between a mobility allowance set at a level which will enable the purchase and maintenance of the mobility appliance that they need, the issue of a specialised vehicle or the issue of a suitably adapted car… And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc. I regard it as an honour to be identified with this petition, which I present to the House on behalf of the disabled people of Northern Ireland.

To lie upon the Table