Spinal Injuries Association awarded £800k grant to support disabled people travel independently
The Spinal Injuries Association has been awarded a grant of £800,000 from the Motability Foundation to help with its work in supporting disabled people travel independently and confidently.
More than 700,000 disabled people receive their cars, wheelchair accessible vehicles, scooters and powered wheelchairs through the Motability scheme. The Motability Foundation funds, supports, researches, and innovates so that all disabled people can make the journeys they choose.
The grant of £800,000 will be delivered over two-years through its Traveling with Confidence Grant Programme.
Travel is regularly reported as a challenge for the spinal cord injury (SCI) community and those with disabilities more widely. Between 64 per cent and 90 per cent of respondents to the Spinal Injuries Association (SIA) 2023 What Matters? survey highlighted difficulties with access to the outdoors and countryside, parking, shopping, hotels, leisure, public transport, air travel, and blue badge schemes.
Furthermore, 35 per cent of people reported access to wheelchairs and mobility equipment as their main concern related to daily life with SCI; factors which it found directly impacts people’s confidence and independence to make journeys.
The SCI Travel Confidence Project aims to improve the skills and knowledge of the SCI community to travel independently and confidently. The SIA plans to build on its digital resource, the SCI Knowledge Hub, to boost the information available for the SCI community specific to active travel and making journeys.
Mark Ridler, Director of Programmes at the SIA, said: “Confidence to travel is a major prerequisite to engaging with family, access to a livelihood, maintaining a social life and, in other words, living a fulfilled life. This relies on knowledge and the necessary tools and access.
“This amazing award will enable SIA to greatly enhance member education, access to wheelchairs, and public awareness. We seek to transform the lives of 4,000 people in the first year and through systematic change, ultimately tens of thousands of people accessing all the travel support and advocacy they need.”
Lisa Jones, Director of Charitable Operations at the Motability Foundation said: “We’re delighted to award Spinal Injuries Association (SIA) with this grant to work with the spinal cord injury community to support them to travel independently and confidently.
“SIA will build on their SCI Knowledge Hub, to embed travel support and confidence building, which is essential in enabling disabled people to live independently. Awarding grants to important local organisations like the Spinal Injuries Association helps us to make an immediate difference to the transport needs of disabled people.”
The SCI Travel Confidence Project has recruited several specialist roles, including therapists, a project advisor, project lead, and an administration assistant.
In October 2023, the Motability Foundation gave its endorsement to assessment schemes run by AccessAble and BSI Assurance UK that check the accessibility of public electric vehicle (EV) charge points.
