A recent news story had come to light of how a 35-year-old disabled woman in England was left behind in a Premier Inn, which is a chain of hotels when there was a fire alarm triggered, and an evacuation was carried out.
Dr Hannah Barham-Brown was staying at the hotel located in central London when there was a fire alarm at 1:15 GMT in the morning. The hotel staff informed her that in the event of a fire, somebody would come and collect her and help her with evacuating the building as she has disabilities that impede her mobility, but during the actual event, nobody came for her.
The hotel chain is insisting that all correct procedures were followed and that they have done no wrong, but the situation just serves to highlight the growing inequality that still exists in the world between disabled people and the rest of society.
If disabled people make the decision to go abroad or even stay in a hotel for an evening, they have to feel like their needs will be taken care of. The hotel is not like their normal living space, where they have changed things and made adjustments to the inside of their homes to compensate for the fact that they do have limited mobility or some kind of disability, and when those needs are not in place, because they have chosen to stay elsewhere, they need to be able to feel safe. This was not the case for Hannah, and it was a disturbing event.
Ultimately, as disability support workers Gold Coast, we are seeing people who are disabled not getting the support that they need in public settings time after time. We understand that it’s probably a little bit of extra work for hotels to make arrangements and look after people properly, but at the same time, they’re in the hospitality industry. It’s a given that they need to provide service to everybody, including people with disabilities.
There definitely needs to be some kind of complete change if we’re ever going to move past the cycle of not respecting the liberties and rights of disabled people. It’s all about making sure that we give people who need support the freedom to be supported but also to retain their independence. Somebody should have come and helped this woman in her hotel room, but nobody did. Therefore, even though she had tried to be independent to the best of her ability, they stopped her.
We’re not happy with the fact that this has taken place. We challenge people to do better in their everyday lives. If you’re working in a hotel and somebody with a disability comes in, make it your mission to try and help them. Ask them what they can benefit from whilst they stay with you, and try to show a little bit of kindness. It really could go a long way to helping change society’s interpretation of disabled people, and will definitely help them.