On Monday 4th December, the Disability Equality Duty came into force. It means that public bodies have to ensure the involvement of disabled people in many aspects of their work, and this will be codified in their Disability Equality Schemes. Civil Servants and Local Government Officers have spent much of this year preparing for this landmark date, and there is widespread goodwill towards the measure.

Few, however, would pretend that our institutions have been consistently good at engaging effectively with all disabled people. True, some have done better than others, but progressive critics have surely been right to bring this hit-and-miss approach to an end. In many ways, legislation was inevitable, and has been generally welcomed.