Accessibility must be at the heart of rail reforms
Transport for All CEO Caroline Stickland tells the Transport Times conference that accessibility must be at the heart of rail reform.
On 3rd of March 2025 Transport for All CEO Caroline Stickland gave a speech to the Transport Times conference.
She challenged the Government’s current rail consultation, and called for accessibility to be at the heart of proposals for reform, so that disabled people can travel easily and safely on our rail network.
This is the transcript of her speech.
I’m Caroline Stickland, CEO at Transport for All – the disabled people’s organisation working for transport justice for all disabled people.
20% of the UK population is disabled, yet we make 30% fewer journeys than non-disabled people each year. And when we do travel, those basics of reliability and affordability are even more important.
We face significant barriers to us getting around freely, safely and with dignity.
Last year, the Transport Select Committee conducted an inquiry into legal obligations around accessibility. Their conclusion was clear: disabled people are being let down.
Let down by ineffective enforcement of our rights, by regulators who fail to act proactively, and by an industry culture that treats accessibility as simply a matter of customer service rather than the safety and civil rights issue it truly is.
To fix this, the committee called for a practical, long-term plan to achieve equal access to transport.
Crucially, they highlighted the need to end the all-too-common practice of deprioritising accessibility whenever it conflicts with other policy goals, technical requirements, or cost pressures.
In August 2024, the Prime Minister added his voice to our cause and said transport accessibility should be “a basic requirement”. This followed Baroness Tanni Grey Thompson, a Paralympian and member of the House of Lords, was forced to crawl off a train at King’s cross because there was no one to provide her with the necessary assistance to alight the train safely. These occurrences are far from rare yet rarely make headlines.
Yet the proposals in the Rail Reform Consultation that launched in February – 2 weeks ago – are insufficient to meet the promises Labour made on train accessibility in their Plan for Rail ahead of the General election.
when it comes to accessibility, ambition is nowhere to be found in these proposals.
With the gaps and omissions in this new consultation there is a real and pressing risk of creating a network where accessibility will continue to not be prioritised, and disabled people’s voices not heard.
Rail reform is an opportunity for ambitious change —change that outlines sweeping, generation-defining reforms that shape the industry for decades.
Yet when it comes to accessibility, ambition is nowhere to be found in these proposals. Instead, it feels like disabled people are once again being offered the bare minimum and asked to treat it like a radical step forward.
The new proposals
Let’s look at what’s missing on accessibility in the new proposals. While accessibility is listed as one of the six objectives of GBR, there is little to suggest how this will be achieved.
We were promised legislation would include an accessibility duty in GBR’s licence. But the consultation does not mention a statutory duty for GBR on accessibility.
We were told GBR would be required to consult with disabled passengers and representative organisations. But the consultation does not include questions on a clear requirement to engage disabled passengers.
Previous proposals set out a plan for a National Strategy on rail accessibility to standardise improvements. But the consultation has no mention of such a strategy.
The White Paper committed to making the Disabled People’s Advisory Committee a statutory advisor to GBR. But the consultation has dropped this proposal.
We were told regulators would hold GBR to account for accessibility by playing an enforcement role. But the consultation offers no clarity on enforcement – instead, talking of monitoring or advocating.
Previous proposals said GBR would work in the public interest, with accessibility highlighted as a key tenet of their license. But the consultation has either weakened or removed these commitments.
I could go on.
To add insult to injury, the consultation itself isn’t even accessible.
To add insult to injury, the consultation itself isn’t even accessible. Accessible formats haven’t been proactively provided, meaning many of us won’t be able to access the proposals or have our say. It’s only running for eight weeks – covering half term, Ramadan and Easter.
If we want a rail network that gets the basics right, we must have legislation that enables this.
History has shown that without statutory obligations and strong regulatory enforcement, progress on accessibility stalls. In 2022, a report by DPTAC concluded that “at current annual rates of investment spend on station accessibility, it will take around 100 years to make the entirety of the station estate step-free to new-build standards.”
Instead, this consultation omits earlier proposals to deliver the necessary steps toward real, meaningful change—repeating the very same pattern the Transport Select Committee warned against.
So, while these plans may bring progress for some, for our community, it’s the same story as always: some warm words, but ultimately, a rail network that continues to leave us behind.
Take action
I end with two asks.
To those of you in the room who believe in getting the basics right – I ask you to act in solidarity with our community and join the call for accessibility to be placed at the centre of the plans for rail reform.
To those in power, I say 2025 is the 15th anniversary of the Equality Act. Now is the time to enhance the status of transport access in legislation – not to travel backwards.
Thank you.
