We recently published part 1 – But you don’t look disabled –  where Lauren introduced herself and talked about not looking disabled. Now, in this blog, she’s focusing on work and daily living. Daily life isn’t that easy….

We’ve been talking to York Ending Stigma recently about their work and also what it’s like to have a physical impairment and poor mental health. Lauren, one of York Ending Stigma’s champions, has kindly written about this, and…

We are very excited to tell you about York Anti Racist Collective’s (YARC) Art Liberation Program, especially as they’re committed to making the workshops inclusive of disabled people! York Anti Racist Collective Art Liberation Program Starting Summer 2022,…

There are a lot of negative assumptions in our society which are damanging to disabled people. Obviously these more negative assumptions affect people’s attitudes towards disabled people. But it has wider impacts on our lives; if you underestimate…

Feeding Tube Awareness Week 2022 runs from 7th till 11th February and is, as the name suggests, a chance to increase awareness around feeding tubes! Helen from the Steering Group has had her feeding tube for a few…

Hazel writes about experiencing feelings of ‘not being disabled enough’ and the effect this has on disability identity. When growing up I essentially learnt that “disabled” only really meant physical things, in fact mainly visible ones. Disability was…

We were recently asked how taxis in York work, or don’t work, for the disability community. This is what you told us. Primarily wheelchair users responded to us so the comments mainly reflect that experience. We are anecdotely…

On 13th January, Executive (made up of some councillors from York Greens and York Lib Dems) were asked to consider the location of barriers around the footstreets, to approve a increased budget to implement the scheme and to…

Our annual survey highlighted three key areas for us to work on; health and care, physical accessibility and attitudes and awareness. Further discussion has helped us get a bit more detail about those areas. We’re holding a couple of…

York Accessibility Action tell us who they are and what they’ve been up to: “In the summer of 2020, City of York Council closed various streets that Blue Badge holders were previously permitted to access, including Goodramgate and…

Helen has been looking into the rise in cashless shops and venues and how they might affected disabled people. With Covid came a reluctance to handle cash. From a risk management perspective it made sense to ask people…

AccessAble helps disabled people to find accessible venues and are here to tell us a bit about their work with City of York Council. In November 2020, when City of York Council renewed their partnership with AccessAble, they…

Last night, we held a meeting to talk about what you want us to work on in the coming year. Our annual survey helped us establish three priorities: Health and CareAttitudes and AwarenessPhysical Accessibility The discussion doesn’t stop…

Last night in York, the lives of many Blue Badge holders were changed forever. A devastating vote from Exec means the permanent exclusion of Blue Badge holders from the footstreets area.  If you haven’t been following, catch up…

Helen has been reading a lot of reports about the footstreets and she wanted to tell us about one in particular, the Martin Higgitt Associates report which includes some sensible ways forward and some interesting data. We read…

The North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner elected in May 2021 resigned on 14 October 2021. On Thursday 25 November you can vote for the next Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner (PFCC) for North Yorkshire. As we did…

Yesterday night, there was a meeting that lasted over 4 1/2 hours. It was considering additional information which had been requested at the meetings on 25th October. Once the information had been considered, the councillors were asked to…

Today’s guest blog post comes from the In With The Bins campaign and talks about the need for sanitary bins in men’s toilets. Note: Cis is short for cisgender which describes a person whose gender identity is the…

Jamie has kindly written a guest blog for us, talking about the footstreets issue specifically around a Freedom of Information request he made. You have the right to ask to see recorded information held by public authorities and…

Dyslexia Awareness Week was held at the start of October but as anyone with dyslexia knows, it’s about much more than one week a year! My name is Lydia and I was diagnosed with dyslexia and irlens syndrome…

The footstreets issue continues to be an important issue for many disabled people and Blue Badge holders. We mention both groups as we know not everyone who is disabled has a Blue Badge, and not everyone who has…

Thanks to Olivia, who has written about our first online event about Disability Hate Crime. York Disability Rights Forum (YDRF) hosted its first online Disability Hate Crime event on Thursday 14th October. Its aim was to raise awareness…

There’s some exciting things coming up! Book through the eventbrite links, or email hello@ydrf.org.uk. York Disability Week is 27th November to 4th December and the programme will be out soon so keep your eyes open for that! How…

We have another guest blog from the lovely Pippa, this time she’s talking about working with a disability; the challenges and the rewards. She’s also part of a team which are running an online career networking event especially…

Ambulatory is a bit of a mouthful but it just means you can get around on foot. Open Country is a Yorkshire-based charity with over 30 years of experience in enabling disabled people to access and enjoy the…

City of York Council have yet another survey out about the footstreets extensions. We fully appreciate that it’s exhausting responding again and again, especially when the topic hasn’t really changed. However another way of having your thoughts raised…

If you’ve been paying attention to the news, or recieve Universal Credit, you are probably aware that the £20 increase in Universal Credit is being cut. If not, we’ve got a quick summary: In March 2020, as the…

National Hate Crime Awareness Week runs from 9th to 16th October with the purpose of raising awareness of Hate Crime. York Disability Rights Forum has taken this opportunity to raise awareness of Disability Hate Crime. We formed a…

The footstreet issue has dominated our activity for the last 17 months and, as we’ve had the same conversations repeatedly, we thought it’d be good to set out clearly the reasons the council has put forward for making…

Being a good ally to any community is an ongoing process. It requires being open-minded, reflecting and learning from that. Even as disabled people, we need to work at being a good ally. How to be a good…

Disability hate crime is on the increase As part of Hate Crime Week, join us to find out more about disability hate crime, including how to report it and how you can be an ally to anyone experiencing…

Edited to update: Dial & Ride do run to the city centre, the information we used for this post was based on their website at time of writing. Whilst Shopmobility and Dial & Ride are great services which…