Access day could spur disabled people to new adventures

Campaigners are hoping that their new access initiative will encourage disabled people to spend one day exploring somewhere new.

Disabled Access Day will be held for the first time on Saturday 17 January 2015, with the backing of the disabled-led website Euan’s Guide.

The organisers want to encourage disabled people and their families and friends to visit somewhere they have never been before on 17 January, such as a coffee shop, sports centre, cinema or a tourist attraction.

Euan’s Guide is hoping to encourage venues, retailers and businesses to sign up as partners, and provide promotional offers to disabled people who register to take part.

The aim of Disabled Access Day is to highlight the best accessible businesses in Britain, and “showcase the commercial value that can be yielded from the custom of millions of disabled people”.

Euan MacDonald, founder of Euan’s Guide and himself a wheelchair-user, said: “Many disabled people feel wary about visiting new places because it’s all too common to go somewhere new and find out that it hasn’t got the accessibility features promised on its website or marketing materials.

“Disabled Access Day is intended to promote good disabled access amongst businesses and to demonstrate the commercial power that the 11.6 million disabled people in the UK represent for big and small companies.

“I’m excited to get involved myself next year and visit somewhere I’ve never been before.”

Euan’s Guide offers access reviews of venues such as restaurants, bars, theatres, and even supermarkets, and has been endorsed by Professor Stephen Hawking.

For more details about Disabled Access Day, email [email protected].

1 May 2014