SCI Travel Confidence Project
Motability funding for SIA travel project
SIA (Spinal Injuries Association) has been awarded a grant of £800,000 from the Motability Foundation to fund their ‘SCI Travel Confidence Project’.
The two-year project aims to improve the skills and knowledge of the spinal cord injury community to travel independently and confidently.
Motability Foundation supports travelling with confidence
More than 700,000 disabled people receive their cars, wheelchair accessible vehicles, scooters and powered wheelchairs through the Motability scheme. The Motability Foundation funds, supports, researches, and innovates so that all disabled people can make the journeys they choose.
They have recently confirmed a grant for SIA of £800,000 over two years through their Traveling with Confidence Grant Programme.
Travel is often challenging
Travel is regularly reported as a challenge for the spinal cord injury (SCI) community and those with disabilities more widely.
Between two-thirds and 90 percent of respondents to the SIA 2023 What Matters? survey highlighted difficulties with access to the outdoors and countryside, parking, shopping, hotels, leisure, public transport, air travel, and blue badge schemes.
Access to mobility equipment a major concern
Furthermore, a third of people reported access to wheelchairs and mobility equipment as their main concern related to daily life with SCI. We know that poor wheelchair provision directly impacts people’s confidence and independence to make journeys.
SIA’s SCI Travel Confidence Project aims to improve the skills and knowledge of the SCI community to travel independently and confidently. We will build on our digital resource, the SCI Knowledge Hub, to boost the information available for the SCI community specific to active travel and making journeys.
Mark Ridler, director of programmes, said:
“Confidence to travel is a major prerequisite to engaging with family, access to a livelihood, maintaining a social life and, in other words, living a fulfilled life. This relies on knowledge and the necessary tools and access. This amazing award will enable SIA to greatly enhance member education, access to wheelchairs, and public awareness. We seek to transform the lives of 4,000 people in the first year and through systematic change, ultimately tens of thousands of people accessing all the travel support and advocacy they need.”
Lisa Jones, director of charitable operations at the Motability Foundation, said:
“We’re delighted to award Spinal Injuries Association (SIA) with this grant to work with the spinal cord injury community to support them to travel independently and confidently. SIA will build on their SCI Knowledge Hub, to embed travel support and confidence building, which is essential in enabling disabled people to live independently. Awarding grants to important local organisations like the Spinal Injuries Association helps us to make an immediate difference to the transport needs of disabled people.”
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Further reading and resources
You can read more about the work of SIA on their website (external link will open in a new browser tab or window)
2 Replies to “SCI Travel Confidence Project”
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Is there any funding available for me to have necessary physiotherapy equipment to carry out at home.? I suffer from serious spinal issues including arthritis of the back and multiple bulging discs along with cervical spinal disc deterioration. Standing up and putting weight on my left hand side hip hip creates immediate acute pain which radiates throughout the spine and left hip. The pelvic floor muscles are very weak and therefore Incontinence devil is frequently throughout the day and night. More prevalent when I’m standing up release of urine. Uncontrollable and unavoidable, along with the kids from the anal passage. Cannot hold in. I am seeing Physiotherapist at Sandwell Hospital, but the appointments are far apart and I would like to have a regime where I can carry out Physiotherapy exercises at home. I walking machine would be advantageous where I could hold onto the handles and walk a day, save pace pace along with any other suggested physiotherapy related machines, which would Be of benefit to me.
Hello Puramjit
You can do some research on the disability grants website, and see whether there is any grant that you could apply for: disability-grants.org (external link will open in a new browser tab or window). I hope you find something suitable.
Best wishes,
Frances