Tanni Grey-Thompson, the former Paralympic athlete, has said apologies are not enough after she had to drag herself off a London North Eastern Railway (LNER) train because no staff were there to help her.
The multiple gold medallist was left stranded on Monday night at London’s King’s Cross station on a train from Leeds as she tried to make her way to Wednesday’s opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games in Paris.
After 16 minutes waiting in vain for assistance she decided to drag herself off the train before yelling for help.
Speaking to the Guardian she said: “I got on the floor, pushed my bags and my chair off and then I climbed off. I started just shouting on the platform and there was no one around. I’ve got a pretty loud voice – I can scream across a 400m track.”
She added: “I was really angry. Leeds and King’s Cross are two of the biggest stations in the country. It shouldn’t be difficult.”
Grey-Thompson, a crossbench peer, said she was finally helped when a train manager on a service heading back to Leeds saw her on the platform.
“She immediately apologised and offered to help. She was mortified, but it was not her fault,” she said.
During the ordeal the peer also texted LNER’s managing director, David Horne. He later offered his “sincere apologies” and in a post on X added: “Something has clearly gone wrong here and we’ve let you down. We’ll investigate what went wrong and share the details.”
Grey-Thompson said she and other disabled passengers frequently suffered humiliating incidents getting on and off trains.
She said: “He [Horne] did apologise but it’s like ‘and?’ They are nice people but it doesn’t mean much.”
She also revealed she had had an apology from a senior figure at the Department for Transport and the offer of a meeting at the department to discuss the issue when she returns from Paris. Grey-Thompson also plans to write to the transport secretary.
“It gives me a good reason to write to Louise Haigh. It’s about disabled people having dignity on trains. When are they going to do something about level boarding on trains?”
She pointed out that under legislation in the 1990s level boarding was supposed to be introduced by 2020. But the last government admitted that at current rates of progress this target would take 100 years to reach.
During the incident Grey-Thompson pleaded in vain to LNER for help in a series of messages on X as she waited for assistance. She posted: “At 22.17 (train got in at 22.02) I decided to crawl off. Had to move all my stuff onto the platform. Member of cleaning staff offered to help. They’re not insured.”
She said she suspected LNER was only investigating the incident because of her high profile. “They’ll investigate, because it’s me. What about the people who aren’t me? That’s what I’m mostly angry about.”
Two years ago Grey-Thompson said she was also forced to crawl off a train at Euston. And last week she was told she could not board a train to Aylesbury because staff were not trained to use a disabled ramp. She said: “Under regulations, every member of facing staff is meant to be trained to use a ramp. If you don’t know the rules you can get fobbed off.”
She added: “The system is just not working. I’m really worried we’re going to lose our legal right to turn up and go. Anytime there’s a fail, one of the first questions they’ll ask is did you book? But it doesn’t matter whether I booked or not. I was on a train.”
Since the incident Grey-Thompson has received a number of supportive messages. She said: “I’ve had several emails from disabled people saying, ‘Keep going, We get it too.’ It just happens to so many other people.”
Grey-Thompson who regularly commutes to London and Cardiff, added: “I spend hours every week longer than anyone else would have to spend to just to get on the train. A train exec asked me once, what do you want? I told him I just want the same miserable experience of commuting as everyone else. I’m not asking for a gold-plated carriage.”
