Wheelchair Provision: Independent Review Body

Allison Gardner Excerpts

Tuesday 21st April 2026 Westminster Hall

[Dr Allison Gardner (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Dr Murrison. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis) on securing this important debate, and on his excellent work across the board on wheelchair services through the APPG that he leads.

As vice-chair of the APPG for wheelchair users, this debate is incredibly close to my heart. The reason I became part of the APPG is that so many of my constituents were contacting me in desperate need of a new wheelchair or vital wheelchair repairs. One young lad, Noah, had long outgrown his moulded wheelchair to the point that it was becoming unsafe and causing him harm. When he went into hospital for spinal surgery, despite being well enough to be discharged, he could not leave for weeks because he did not have a safe wheelchair to go home with.

Disabled people, including children, with life-limiting conditions have been left waiting for up to two years to receive a new wheelchair. In the young life of a child such as Noah, that is unacceptable. They are left in pain in unsuitable chairs, and some of my constituents are unable to leave the house altogether because their chair has broken down. The long waits have affected my constituents’ physical and mental health, and have placed great strain on their carers.

Preston, the 19-year-old son of my constituent, Kelly Williams, was left with a collapsing wheelchair for six months before vital repairs were made, and it was a further four months before his wheelchair was eventually replaced. Preston lives with a progressive brain disease. He cannot walk or bear weight, and for almost an entire year he was forced to sit in an uncomfortable chair that was not fit for purpose. That is completely unacceptable.

When many of my constituents contacted AJM, the previous provider, there was a complete lack of communication and an all-round failure to consider their needs. I will name one more constituent among the many: an ex-Paralympic medallist, Ian Marsden, runs the risk of being bedridden because, if his broken wheelchair is not fixed, he is stuck. Having raised the issue with the ICB, I was pleased to see that it issued a performance notice against the provider in August last year, but the fact that enforcement action had to be taken raises serious concerns about contract oversight, risk escalation and safeguarding of disabled service users. The service went out to retender; a new provider has been appointed and is due to start, as my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield (Dave Robertson) outlined. The contract was awarded on 24 February 2026.

I trust that lessons are learned, but a new contract means that wheelchair users in Stoke-on-Trent South will once again have to get used to a new system and possibly a service in a new location. I strongly encourage the ICB to be diligent in monitoring and reviewing the performance of the new contractor. Playing the blame game with previous providers, as AJM did, will not wash this time.

At this point, I will slightly veer off track to express the significant concerns regarding the changes to car mobility schemes, which were raised by my constituent Ryan. With those changes in mind, it is even more vital that we get wheelchair services right. Given the history and legacy of these issues, I strongly support an independent review body to oversee wheelchair provision and ensure that wheelchair users receive an outstanding service. The time is now, and I ask the Minister to act and fix this situation—it is bad in Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire, but it is a national issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Gardner]

I acknowledge the personal wheelchair budget, but constituents have raised with me that it does not fit the cost of wheelchairs nowadays. It does not quite match, so they sometimes have to use their own funds to get the wheelchair they need, which is not good enough.

[Dr Ahmed]

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. That is partly a reflection of the underfunding of aspects of the NHS over the past decade and a half. As she well knows, our party supports the NHS, and we have funded it with £26 billion of additional funding. That will clearly take time to filter through to the services that require the most.

The Government are also driving forward improvements for disabled people through our wider reforms to health and social care. The recently published neighbourhood health framework aims to improve health and care outcomes, and reduce inequalities through more convenient, personalised and joined-up care. It includes a focus on improving the diagnosis and treatment of people with long-term conditions, so that they feel more in control of their care.

In July 2025, the Government announced that we will develop a new plan for disability, setting out a clear vision to break down barriers to opportunity for disabled people. We are making more than £4.6 billion of additional funding available for adult social care in 2028-29 compared with 2025-26, to support the sector and make the improvements that we all crave. We have also established the better care fund, a framework for ICBs and local authorities to make joint plans and pool budgets to deliver better, joined-up holistic care.

This financial year, ICBs and local authorities plan to spend £440 million on assistive technology and equipment such as wheelchairs. We also continue to invest in support for home adaptations to enable independent living, with £723 million confirmed for the disabled facilities grant this year. The disabled facilities grant budget across 2025-26 and 2026-27 is £150 million more than the total budget across the previous two years, representing an 11% increase that exceeds inflation. The independent commission into adult social care, chaired by Baroness Louise Casey, is building consensus on the medium and long-term reforms required to create a social care system that is fit for the future, with the phase 1 report due this year.

I recognise the profound impact that delays in wheelchair provision are having on the quality of life of hon. Members’ constituents, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford for highlighting that today. He had a number of asks of me, to which I hope I have responded. I am cognisant of the work he has done and the personal attention he gives to these matters, and I offer him a meeting with Department officials in my office to go through them in greater detail. My officials will be in touch to arrange that.

I hope that the work, reforms and modernisation I have set out address the questions he has raised. I assure hon. Members that we take this issue extremely seriously, and remain committed to improving the lives of disabled people up and down our country.