Community activist, Sian Pugh, was at the forefront of the campaign against Bromley Council’s plan for parking charges for Blue Badge holders. In this special guest article, she explains how the power of a local community campaign overturned those plans
Had someone told me that I would have been involved in a campaign, with passionate feelings on both sides, planning silent protests in Bromley’s new Council Chamber and liaising with member of the public, Members of Parliament, Councillors and journalists and that the whole incident would be settled within two months; after laughing out loud, I would have told them that they really were mistaken and that would never happen.
Yet here I am and that is exactly what’s happened.
To say that our campaign against Bromley Council’s policy to introduce parking fees for Blue Badge holders involved the whole Bromley community in a joint effort is not an exaggeration.
Blue Badges enable disabled people to access society
I first became aware of the policy at the beginning of December 2024 when someone posted a reference to it on Nextdoor.com.
As the mother of a Blue Badge-holding, 27-year-old daughter, like so many parents in my position, I would fight tooth and nail to protect her rights as a disabled person. Unless you have some extensive personal knowledge of living with severe disability, it might understandably be difficult to comprehend just how challenging life can be. But to witness someone you love trying to achieve anything in life when they live in constant, excruciating pain, is truly devastating.
So, to discover that one of the aspects of life they most rely on to enable them to access society was to be restricted was deflating, to put it mildly.
I started talking to other disabled people and they were equally outraged, especially when we learnt that the policy had been passed with no consultation or Equalities Impact Assessment.
It felt as if Blue Badge holders were perceived to be fair game when it came to trying to plug the hole in Council finances.
The campaign gets started
Four Bromley residents – Linda, Laura, Paula and I, all facing our own disabilities too – became a passionate, powerful group of friends, supporting each other at every stage, despite not having known each other before.
We posted our opposition to the policy on Nextdoor.com, Facebook, and anywhere else we could think of. When one of us wasn’t feeling great, another would step up to the mark to answer messages and questions. Over the course of two months, other members of the public became actively involved and contributed a great deal to the campaign.
We inundated the Bromley Councillors on the Environment Committee, who had voted for the policy with emails, detailing why we thought their plans were so unfair. This centred on the fact that Blue Badge holders have no choice in how they access their destination – they have no alternative but to drive and park – while able-bodied people can walk or cycle to theirs. If a Blue Badge holder needed to visit more than one spot in a town, they would have to park and pay twice under this plan, while able-bodied people could easily walk. In our view and with our experience of living with, or being a Blue Badge holder, they would end up paying more than their able-bodied peers.
Disability is non-political
Our approach was non-political, which was also important to us. Disability is non-political and we received words of encouragement from Councillors on every side of the Chamber.
Bromley Councillors Alison Stammers and Alisa Igoe were particularly supportive, and local MPs from opposing sides of the House, also wrote to the Council to express their concern at the proposals.
The support we received from other members of the public was mostly very positive, although some comments did make us think that much work still needs to be done to highlight disabled issues – one person asked, ‘If you can only walk short distances, why the hell are you going to Bromley?’
Against this, many Blue Badge holders told us about the detrimental, profoundly negative impact this policy would cause them and many of these accounts were quite heartbreaking. For some, the cost was real issue and for others, the principle that they were easy targets whose sentiments were not worthy of consultation, left them feeling diminished as humans.
A growing petition, and a radio appearance
We started a petition on Change.org and watched as the number of signatures grew. Funnily enough, we thought support for the petition was slow, when it got to around 500 signatures after the first week – we wanted thousands!
We were then contacted by a lovely, local journalist, Joe Coughlan, who informed us that this level of support was actually quite high, and he wrote an article on MyLondon about our campaign. This was then followed up by NewsShopper. Our petition has now passed 4,400 signatures.
My daughter and I were enjoying lunch with friends when I received a text asking me to participate in a radio interview on BBC Radio London the next day. I didn’t have a chance to feel scared. I was told the interview would take place on Facetime, which I assumed meant I’d be filmed, so I made sure I’d washed my hair, put my make-up on and tidied downstairs. I now know that there’s an app called Facetime Audio, which involves no filming!
The national press get involved, and the campaign is successful
The four of us focused on different aspects of the campaign and Laura arranged a pub lunch to discuss how we could proceed. She and Linda produced a leaflet, which was just about to be printed off when we heard that the decision had been reversed. Similarly, I had planned to photocopy many copies of Blue Badges which a large group of disabled people had agreed to hold up during the next Bromley Council Environment meeting on 30th January, as a silent protest.
In the event, a wonderful, national newspaper journalist, The Sun’s Political Correspondent, Martina Bet, got hold of the story and informed the Council that she was planning to write an account. Frantic phone calls to her ensued and within a day or two, she was informed that the Council had reversed its plans to introduce the policy.
As you can imagine, we were all delighted. Without everyone pitching in with their thoughts, advice, opinions and general support, it is unlikely that we would have achieved this outcome and we were very grateful to them all.
It was well and truly a community effort.