Camden New Journal - Letters: Guide dogs

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Camden New Journal - Letters to the Editor
Published: 22 November 2007

It’s legal to eat and take a cab with my guide dog

• IT seems that visually impaired people, at least those who rely on guide dogs to get about, are not welcome in parts of Kentish Town.
I am a registered blind person and a guide-dog user. On Saturday night, November 17, I had a couple of very unpleasant experiences. First I was refused access to a restaurant in Kentish Town Road because I was accompanied by my guide dog.
A couple of hours later, after having had a drink with friends in the Vine in Highgate Road, the cab the pub staff called to take me home also refused to take me because of the dog.
It seems that, if my recent experience is anything to go on, that at least some businesses in the Kentish Town area think it’s OK to discriminate against visually impaired people.
I am in fact very capable of asserting myself in these situations and insisted on being served in the restaurant. After making a rather big scene I was offered a table in an empty back room which I declined and was eventually reluctantly served in the main restaurant – -the meal was ruined but I felt that I had to insist on staying out of principle. The cab driver, however, locked his doors and I was forced to walk away and find an alternative means of getting home. All businesses in the area should be well aware that refusing access to a visually impaired person because they are accompanied by a guide dog is a breach of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, amounts to discrimination on grounds of disability and can result in them being sued for damages.
I’d personally rather not have to launch a new legal action each time I go out to eat or meet friends for a drink.
It would be much better all round if small business people were to wise up to the fact that it’s not acceptable to discriminate against disabled people and that refusing access to any establishment, food supplier or otherwise, on the basis that a person is accompanied by a guide dog is unlawful.
ROB MURTHWAITE
address supplied, N4

Send your letters to: The Letters Editor, Camden New Journal, 40 Camden Road, London, NW1 9DR or email to letters@camdennewjournal.co.uk. The deadline for letters is midday Tuesday. The editor regrets that anonymous letters cannot be published, although names and addresses can be withheld. Please include a full name, postal address and telephone number. Letters may be edited for reasons of space.

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