Airline pays out £170,000 compensation
A DISABLED woman has told how she won £170,000 after being 'humiliated' by airline staff who tired to 'force her' into a plane seat.
Lin Berwick, 55, of Sudbury, Suffolk, said she had suffered serious damage to her back, legs, and shoulders as a result of the way she was treated on a Go flight from Edinburgh to Stansted four years ago.
She said Go's insurers had agreed to pay her £130,000 to cover the costs of the care she needed for her injuries plus &poound;40,000 as compensation for the 'suffering, trauma and public humiliation' she endured in an out of court settlement.
Dr Berwick - who campaigns for the disabled and holds an honorary civil law doctorate - said the law should be changed so that disability legislation applied to aircraft and train carriages.
'I would never want another disabled person or an elderly person to suffer the agony and humiliation I suffered,' said Dr Berwick, who runs a trust which builds holiday homes for disabled people. I had to have treatment for post traumatic stress. It has ruined my life.'
Wheelchair-bound Dr Berwick, who suffers from cerebral palsy, is blind and has difficulty bending her legs, said she had pre-booked seats with extra leg room for her journey from Scotland to Essex in September 2001.
But when she reached the flight she was told that she would have to sit in a standard seat.'My husband, Ralph, who is 72 and has Parkinson's Disease, told the cabin crew that I would not be able to get in the seat they were giving because there was not enough room,' said Dr Berwick.
'They said, 'Yes she will'. Then they started to manoeuvre me and try to push me to get into the seat. I got wedged. My knee buckled. In the end I was dragged out into the aisle. Other passengers were trying to help me.'
She said she was asked to take a flight four hours later but when she reached that aircraft she encountered the same problem. 'They still wanted me to sit in a seat that was too small. I got wedged again. I was screaming in agony,' she said.
Go has since been sold by British Airways to easyJet, which said it has different procedures in place for looking after disabled passengers.
