Daniel Francis

Absolutely; I completely agree. I will refer later to the position that we now know of, how ombudsman complaints have risen exponentially in recent years, and to the experience of many people, including that of my own daughter, who has quadriplegic cerebral palsy, in the kind of delays that my hon. Friend has outlined. In the 2024-25 financial year, there were 630,000 wheelchair users registered in England, with 70,600 of them under 18 according to NHS data. However, that figure does not include those who have purchased their wheelchairs privately, or those unable to obtain the right equipment through the NHS. In 2018-19, the Wheelchair Alliance estimated there were a total of 780,000 users. That was an estimate due to lack of robust evidence to back those assumptions. There is no set location on NHS health records to identify whether someone is a wheelchair user. With many users purchasing their wheelchairs privately, or being provided a wheelchair through a charity, NHS data does not provide an accurate picture and we remain in the dark about the true number of wheelchair users in England. Unfortunately across the country we are seeing countless examples of wheelchair users being systematically failed by their service providers, and I am sure we will continue to hear horror stories throughout this debate. Wheelchair users face long waiting times, poor fitting and unsuitable equipment, and complex and fragmented access pathways, with reports of a postcode lottery in accessing wheelchair provision.