Transport for London is to consider making changes to the training it gives staff on how to help disabled passengers after concerns were raised by The Independent.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan’s office said TfL would seek feedback from disabled people after London Assembly members heard of problems being raised and demanded improvements.

It comes after Independent columnist James Moore wrote about his experience during a recent tube journey, during which the driver announced that “a mobility-impaired person” was the reason the train was being delayed.

Mr Moore said the experience was “humiliating” and that other passengers had “gawked at me as if I were some pregnant panda in a zoo”. He said he had not asked for any assistance getting off the train.

After writing about his ordeal in The Independent, Mr Moore was contacted by Andrew Boff, a Conservative member of the Greater London Assembly (GLA).

7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Show all 7 1 /7 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Closing Remploy factories The Work and Pensions Secretary called time on Britain’s system of Remploy factories, which provided subsidised and sheltered employment to disabled people. People employed at the factories protested against their closure and said they provided gainful work. “Is it a kindness to stick people in some factory where they are not doing any work at all? Just making cups of coffee?” Mr Duncan Smith said at the time, defending the decision. “I promise you this is better.” The Remploy organisation was privatised and sold to American workfare provider Maximus, with the majority of the organisation’s factories closed. The future of the remaining sites is unclear 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Scrapping the Independent Living Fund The £320m Independent Living Fund was established in 1988 to give financial support to people with disabilities. It was scrapped on July 1 2015, with 18,000 often severely disabled people losing out by an average of £300 a week. The money was generally used to help pay for carers so people could live in communities rather than institutions. Councils will get a boost in funding to compensate but it will not cover the whole cost of the fund. This new cash also doesn’t have to be spent on the disabled 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Cut payments for the disabled Access To Work scheme Iain Duncan Smith is bringing forward a policy that will reduce payments to some disabled people from a scheme designed to help them into work. The £108m scheme, which helps 35,540 people, will be capped on a per-used basis, potentially hitting those with the more serious disabilities who currently receive the most help. The single biggest users of the fund are people who have difficulty seeing and hearing. The cut will come in from October 2015. The charity Disability UK says the scheme actually makes the Government money because the people who gain access to work tend pay tax that more than covers its cost. The DWP does not describe the reduction as a “cut” and says it will be able to spread the money more thinly and cover more people 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Cut Employment and Support Allowance The latest Budget included a £30 a week cut in disability benefits for some new claimants of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA). The Government says it is equalising the rate of disability benefits with Jobseekers Allowance because giving disabled people more help is a “perverse incentive”. The people affected by this cut are those assessed as having a limited capability for work but as being capable of some “work-related activity”. A group of prominent Catholics wrote to Mr Duncan Smith to say there was “no justification” for this cut. Mental health charity Mind, said the cut was “insulting and misguided” 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Risk homelessness with a sharp increase disability benefit sanctions Official figures in the first quarter of 2014 found a huge increase in sanctions against people reliant on ESA sickness benefit. The 15,955 sanctions were handed out in that period compared to 3,574 in the same period the year before, 2013 – a 4.5 times increase. The homelessness charity Crisis warned at the time that the sharp rise in temporary benefit cuts was “cruel and can leave people utterly destitute – without money even for food and at severe risk of homelessness”. “It is difficult to see how they are meant to help people prepare for work,” Matt Downie, director of policy at the charity added 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people Sending sick people to work because of broken fitness to work tests In 2012 a government advisor appointed to review the Government’s Work Capability Assessment said the tests causing suffering by sending sick people back to work inappropriately. “There are certainly areas where it's still not working and I am sorry there are people going through a system which I think still needs improvement,” Professor Malcolm Harrington concluded. The tests are said to have improved since then, but as recently as this summer they are still coming in for criticism. In June the British Psychological Society said there was “now significant body of evidence that the WCA is failing to assess people’s fitness for work accurately and appropriately”. It called for a full overhaul of the way the tests are carried out. The WCA appeals system has also been fraught with controversy with a very high rate of overturns and delays lasting months and blamed for hardship 7 ways the Tories have ‘helped’ disabled people The bedroom tax The Government’s benefit cut for people who it says are “under-occupying” their homes disproportionately affects disabled people. Statistics released last year show that around two-thirds of those affected by the under-occupancy penalty, widely known as the ‘bedroom tax’, are disabled. There have been a number of high profile cases of disabled people being moved out of specially adapted homes by the policy. In one case publicised by the Sunday People last week, a 48 year old man with cerebral palsy was forced to bathe in a paddling pool after the tax moved him out of his home with a walk-in shower. The Government says it has provided councils with a discretionary fund to help reduce the policy’s impact on disabled people, but cases continue to arise

Along with one of Mr Khan’s deputy mayors, Joanne McCartney, Mr Boff proposed a GLA motion urging the London mayor “to ensure TfL staff are trained to assist passengers with disabilities by: respecting the passenger’s wishes as to the level of help they require, not drawing unnecessary public attention to the passenger and by providing reasonable assistance to passengers to enable them to travel in the way that they choose”.

The motion was passed by the GLA on Thursday.

Afterwards, Mr Boff said: “It is sadly still the case that our city’s public transport network is simply not accessible enough for Londoners with disabilities. Disabled passengers should receive not only the assistance they need, but also the respect they deserve.

“Recent press reports of mobility impaired passengers being publicly identified as the reason behind train delays are very concerning. These instances only serve to make a stressful situation even more distressing for people with disabilities.

“It would clearly be beneficial for the mayor to ensure that TfL employees are aware of how to assist disabled passengers in a way which respects their wishes”.

The Mayor of London’s office said TfL would be seeking to discuss the issue with Mr Moore to find out how it could make improvements to its training programme.

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A spokesperson for Mr Khan said: “TfL are committed to delivering an excellent service for all their passengers so it’s essential that frontline staff are given the tools and training to remove accessibility barriers.

“TfL provide comprehensive disability and inclusion training for all their staff to ensure they support passengers in a way that respects their choices and independence.