Yes, and that is the aim. But with respect, you cannot reasonably expect there NOT to be more issues in transporting such a small number of people versus the whole travelling public. I fully appreciate how lucky I am to not need a wheelchair to get about. And I also fully appreciate just how frustrating it can be to be left with more difficulty than you expect or have a right to expect. But you cannot expect the service to run for such a small minority. No matter how deserving. Surely that's reasonable.
I wholeheartedly agree that if there are platform changes, then something can and should be done at WAT (or elsewhere) to ensure the staff are aware of the changes - and given the tech, it seems bizarre it isn't. It doesn't take long at all to shift from platform to platform at Waterloo. I also think that it's wrong that the TOCs don't pay you delay repay. They should. If they've caused your delay. Who cares about the train itself.
It will be more difficult for you, as you do have a disability. And that's a large cross to bear and I have no doubt you, and all other wheelchair users would like to just get on with it and people make it easier for you to just do that, but sadly, the reality is that life isn't like that.
If the lifts are shot at Bolton, then there needs to be a solution. A quicker call out to repair. An alternative way. A taxi if there isn't one. From the story as printed, it seems he had a 45 minute delay. I think that's reasonable. But I wasn't there. Over the course of his entire journey, that's what, an hour lost over say, a four hour trip. And there are loads of trains from Piccadilly to Euston (if it was meeting a once a day train or similar, different story). The station staff didn't abandon him, they got him sorted in a way they understood could work and it got done. He didn't like the fact he was late and he publicised it - because that failure was down to a lift not working so he, as a disabled man, suffered a delay. I think that is entirely appropriate. But I also think that in this case, what Northern did was not unreasonable. It may not have been optimal for him. But it wasn't unreasonable. But I also can't see how, with the volume of wheelchair users versus the cost, doubling the number of lifts (to add in a contingency) would be commercially sensible.
I also didn't say he had a hidden agenda, I said there was a wider agenda. He's clearly doing it for the publicity, that is his agenda, he's a journalist who specialises in disability issues. And that's fine (well it's more than that, it's laudable, it's worth promoting big style), but I think he needs to say so. Don't you ? And I said "makes me wonder". We all face people in life who do that "I know my rights stuff" - and I am NOT saying he did that, I am saying I wonder if he did. And we treat people as we find them..... my day job gets me about two or three of those 'sorts' each week. And at the same time, about the same number of utterly frustrated people who come to me because they've exhausted other avenues and are genuinely reasonable. And don't give it the same. Guess who gets their stuff sorted first... and that may be colouring my cynicism. It's an odd phrase to stick in the article, unless he wants other people to pick up on it - and it's not likely to help - basically attempting to call the shots.... and the more that do it, the less effect (rightly or wrongly) it will have.
[I will always give the wheelchair user, old Doris, mum with pram, whatever a lift where I can. Christ, I walked some old dear's shopping home for her a couple of months ago....]