31 Oct 2012

Blunkett: I’ve had problems flying too

Last week, easyJet told Sophie Morgan she couldn’t fly alone because she uses a wheelchair. Ex-home secretary David Blunkett advises the airline on accessibility – watch what happened when they met.

Sophie Morgan, who made a film for Channel 4 News last week on the difficulties of flying for disabled people, was told days later by easyJet that she herself could not book a flight.

While easyJet does allow wheelchair users to travel alone, in Sophie’s case the airline had the wrong information about whether or not she could reach the emergency exits unaided and as such told her she could not fly unaccompanied.

While easyJet says this was a mix-up, the incident did further highlight the problems disabled people have when trying to travel by air – problems Channel 4 News has covered in depth in our No Go Britain series.

The airline agreed that balancing safety and accessibility was difficult – and invited Sophie to come and meet former home secretary David Blunkett, who chairs an independent advisory group for easyJet on accessibility, to discuss the issue.

People were looking for problems that didn’t exist. David Blunkett

Mr Blunkett, who is blind, said he had faced all sorts of different problems flying, including one last weekend where he had to change airports in order to take his assistance dog on a Flybe flight to Belfast.

He said all airlines – including easyJet – were “struggling to get the balance right”.

In a statement, Flybe told Channel 4 News: “When a passenger needs to travel with an assist dog, they are advised at the time of booking to first contact the airline to ensure that Flybe can provide the quality of customer care it will always offer to such passengers.

“In this instance, the travel agent did not contact Flybe before booking online to confirm that seats were available and to advise that this passenger was travelling with an assist dog. Flybe was not advised of this until two days later, on October 19th, by which time the flight was full, there being no additional empty seat to accommodate the dog.”

The airline allowed Mr Blunkett to change his flight to one leaving from Manchester, rather than East Midlands Airport, free of charge. But there have been other problems, Mr Blunkett said.

“We’ve had funny incidents where I was flying to Geneva and I was told that because I hadn’t notiifed the airline that I was using a dog I wouldn’t be allowed to fly.

“I had to point out to them I hadn’t got the dog with me so that wasn’t a problem. But people were looking for problems that didn’t exist.”

Anger and determination

When Sophie asked Mr Blunkett whether this kind of treatment made him angry, he responded: “It used to make me angry, it makes me determined now. I think someone experiencing, as you have, will explore and display the kind of anger I used to.

“I’m now determined to be a little bit calmer about it and to make sure we can do something because that terrible embarrassment – and we’ve all felt it, where our faces go red, where we feel humiliated – we’ve got to take that we take that out of our society and if, as I know you’ve described, the true legacy of the Paralympics is that people change their attitude and change their minds then that will be the true lasting legacy that we seek.”

Mr Blunkett urged anyone having problems flying to get in touch with him or their local MP to try and change the situation.

According to the register of members’ financial interests, the Sheffield MP is paid £20,000 for his advisory post with easyJet.

Flybe statement
Airline Flybe sent the statement below regarding the incident David Blunkett describes in the video above, of having difficulties travelling with his guide dog recently.

"Having investigated this particular booking, Flybe can confirm that the flight from East Midlands to Belfast City Airport was made through a third party travel agent online on October 17th.
"When a passenger needs to travel with an assist dog, they are advised at the time of booking to first contact the airline to ensure that Flybe can provide the quality of customer care it will always offer to such passengers
"In this instance, the travel agent did not contact Flybe before booking online to confirm that seats were available and to advise that this passenger was travelling with an assist dog. Flybe was not advised of this until two days later, on October 19th, by which time the flight was full, there being no additional empty seat to accommodate the dog.
"The travel agent was therefore advised by Flybe that the passenger could travel on an earlier flight, have a full refund or travel from an alternative airport. In this instance, the passenger chose to fly from Manchester and the booking was changed free of charge."