Posted: Friday 8 April 2011
This is a guest post from the Mental Health Action Group (MHAG) in Derbyshire.
Back in 2008 the Government introduced national concessionary bus passes. People with physical disabilities, learning disabilities and sensory disabilities were eligible but as you may well be aware, and to our cost, they did not include a category for people with mental health problems — our difficulties are sometimes less obvious!
Up to this point anyone with an ongoing mental health condition in Derbyshire had been given a discretionary concession. Unfortunately, this went out the window with the introduction of the national concession as the Council could no longer afford it. So many of us became worse off after the new national concession came into play.
Mental health is now simply included in the catch-all category (g) “non-qualification for a driving licence”.
When we started campaigning on this issue we discovered that, lo and behold, the body advising the Government on transport disability issues the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee (DPTAC) did not have even one member out of its 21 strong committee who had experience of mental health difficulties. Worse still we uncovered a great deal of ignorance of mental health within the Department of Transport itself.
“There is a qualifying category for mental health,” said one fairly senior civil servant, “there it is, category (f) - learning disabilities.” Aargh!! We wanted to yell. Where do we start to unravel the layers of ignorance and exclusion around mental health which in this case have resulted in discriminatory legislation?
Following umpteen trips to London to meet with two Transport Ministers, a number of senior civil servants and with DPTAC we discovered that without hard evidence it seems that the Government will do nothing to redress the unfair situation that this legislation has produced. Even then it is unlikely they will do anything in the current economic climate but we must provide evidence for the future. We are determined that the Department of Transport will never forget mental health that easily again!
This week we launched our Public Transport & Mental Health survey which aims to gather evidence on this unfair situation. We also want it to show, through your experiences, the important link between good access to transport and good mental health.
We have extended the survey to cover not just the impact of concessionary fares but also any other barriers and difficulties. Many of our members have reported, for example, that even when they managed to get a bus pass they were promptly challenged by a bus driver who said to them “What have you got a pass for? You look alright to me”. Must we face obstacles and humiliation at every stage of our journey?
There are many national surveys about transport but precious few, if any, that focus in on mental health. We hope that this will become a valuable case for change.
We hope you will agree with us and give us the benefit of your experience and recommendations by filling out our survey.
Niki Glazier, on behalf of the Mental Health Action Group
MHAG is an independent user led campaign group launched in October 2006. We emerged from what was Derbyshire Patients’ Council which itself ran a successful national campaign to reform benefits for in-patients. The issue of transport concessions looks set to become an equally long running campaign for us.
Thank you for picking up on this issue Niki because there's been so little outcry to date. In London, which has the most expensive travel system in europe, the councils have just excluded mental health completely. Sensory and physical disability still counts but not mental health, it's as though government has decided it no longer qualifies as a disability.
This is all very well but if benefits & services are going to be cut how are people supposed to get around? Isn't getting around supposed to be part of recovery? In which case recovery is being deliberately hindered.
With the changes to DLA many people will also lose their national rail card which for some people will make the difference between seeing their families or not. It's hard to not see this as singling out mental health.
Freedom/travel passes/cards is not simply about money - negotiating machines and people can be really hard when distressed and a Freedom pass means just that - the knowledge and freedom to know that you can get home without having to speak to anyone or get it right using a mchine with impatient people behind you.
In addition, for people paying the fares of someone to accompany them somewhere, having to pay for their own in addition and on a limited budget will mean people are going to stay indoors - then no doubt get berated for not trying hard enough to recover or attend appts.
Mind and all the charities need to put their weight behind this campaign because this is a disability access issue. Could Mind please state how you intend to support this issue?
I know people who have been verbally abused by staff for having concessionary travel passes on the grounds that they 'look alright'.
Whilst people still have travel passes I'd suggest putting them into a generic card holder to avoid the verbal abuse
I have had the 'you look alright' excuse before too.
London is a post-code lottery when it comes to accessing mental health services and as a knock-on effect, accessing a Freedom Pass. Obtaining a Freedom pass, is dependent on being on an enhanced care plan, but sadly, being on an enhanced care plan, all too often, has little to do with level or need, but on where you live. So when I lived in the borough next door, I got help, when I moved borough, I got next to nothing. I am told by mental health workers too that it depends on where you live in the borough (if you live on one side of the borough, you get more services than if you live on the other side). I have discovered too, that it is dependent on diagnosis (a psychotic condition means more help, an equally severe non-psychotic condition, means less). Also, if you take medication, you get help, if you refuse, you are barred access. I discovered today I am not the only one who has been told this by services. So I am surrounded by people with Freedom Passes, who are far more able than me, yet they get access to lots of help, whilst myself and many others get nothing. What we do get, however, is an extortionately expensive capital city transport system (the most expensive in the world I believe) that means you can't even afford to travel to its city centre except occasionally. It seems ironic that I saw a recovery worker for over a year, but barely did any recovery activities as I couldn't afford to travel to them.
What we also get is a lovely Oyster system that sees many of us hammered with £6.50 penalty fares on a regular basis because our station doesn't happen to have ticket barriers and our brain is too addled to remember to touch out. Great to know that my disability benefits contributed to the £56 million that Londoners paid in Oyster penalty fares last year. Surely this extra money could be used to fund Freedom Passes rather than line the pockets of train companies? After all disability benefits were never intended to be spent on penalty fares.
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