Terminally ill Shropshire woman in 12-week blue badge wait

A woman living with a terminal cancer diagnosis was told she would have to wait 12 weeks to receive a blue badge to park in accessible spaces.

Sarah Jackson, from Whitchurch in Shropshire, struggles to walk and said the delay affected her independence.

"If I can't park in a disabled spot I'm having to get to my appointments two-three hours early to get a space near to where I need to be," she said.

Shropshire Council said it was training staff to speed up the process.

After the BBC contacted the local authority about Mrs Jackson's case, it confirmed her blue badge had been ordered.

Mrs Jackson, 51, was first diagnosed with breast cancer five years ago, but last year was told the disease had spread.

After applying for personal independence payments, she said she was told she would automatically qualify for disabled parking.

Government figures show the average wait is 17 days for a blue badge, however when her case was passed to her local council, Mrs Jackson was told she would need to wait for 12 weeks.

"It seems ridiculous," she said, adding that not being able to park in accessible spaces was making getting to her hospital appointments "really difficult".

"It makes something that's not a great experience anyway 10 times worse."

It is possible to fast-track applications for people with a terminal diagnosis, but life-expectancy needs to be a year or less.

"I'm very much hoping I don't have less than a year" said Mrs Jackson. "It feels very much like tempting fate."

Shropshire Council said it understood the impact on people waiting for their applications to be processed.

"We have a responsibility to ensure our assessment is fair and robust for each applicant, which does take time," a spokesperson said.

"Nevertheless, we want to make the application process as efficient as possible and we are investing new staff in the Blue Badge Team who are currently being trained to undertake the assessments and to develop how we can streamline the application process."

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