A 10-year-old Hartlepool boy with cerebral palsy is learning to do some of the things he has never been able to manage before, like riding a bike, after major surgery. Mitchell's parents thought they had exhausted all the options for treating their son but then stumbled across a procedure called selective dorsal rhizotomy to treat spasticity in people with cerebral palsy.
A man from Redcar has set up a new organisation with the hope of changing discriminatory attitudes towards disabled people. Andrew Clark from Redcar is autistic and has set up a non-profit organisation to educate public bodies and private companies about disability. The newly-formed National Society for the Equal Rights to the Disabled plans to hold a series of events in 2011. Andrew believes education is the key to changing people's opinions.
Please excuse the dramatic language, but the new bus services we are providing across Bedford and Kempston are at the very least a radical improvement for buses on Sunday, if not a full-blown revolution! With a one-off contribution of £48,000, we are enabling the full network of services which run from Monday to Saturday across the urban and suburban area to run on a Sunday. They will run, as a minimum, at least hourly. This is less frequent than Monday to Saturday to begin with, but it will be a major boost for bus users who tell me that the current two-hourly (at most) services, on routes which no-one seems to know and for which there is little information at shelters or elsewhere, are a major barrier to bus use on a Sunday.
A week of BBC features looking at the issues facing people with disabilities - Access All Areas - is getting under way. Disability affairs correspondent Peter White looks at how much more needs to be done to end discrimination, 40 years after the first Disability Act.
Registration is now open for spring federal conference 2011 and members can enjoy a couple of great early bird offers.
A by-election was held last week in the Ollersett Ward of New Mills Town Council brought about by the untimely death of by Liberal Democrat Councillor Glynn Jennings.