Membership

Details of the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee (DPTAC) members.

What DPTAC membership involves

Members of the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee (DPTAC) are mostly, but not exclusively disabled people.

They are public appointees recruited to serve for about 3 years.

DPTAC members require a high level of understanding of the transport needs of disabled people.

They are required to work with others to constructively and pragmatically increase opportunities for disabled people to travel independently and safely. DPTAC members do this by working with:

  • Department for Transport (DfT) officials
  • representatives of the transport sector
  • organisations representing disabled people

How DPTAC members are recruited

DfT ministers appoint the DPTAC Chair and committee members.

The Commissioner for Public Appointments regulates these appointments in accordance with the Governance Code on Public Appointments.

DPTAC Chair

DPTAC members

DPTAC member biographies

Will Bee, Lead of the Local Travel Working Group

Will Bee has held senior posts in both the public and private sector as well as running his own consultancy business. From 2001 to 2007 he was Wales Director of the Disability Rights Commission where he also led their work on transport, managing the publication of a code of practice and various modal guides to the new duties on operators introduced in the Disability Discrimination Act 2005. A wheelchair user himself Will joined DPTAC in 2008 after the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) was merged into the Equality and Human Rights Commission. He currently chairs the Local Transport Working Group covering buses and taxis.

Helen Dolphin MBE, Lead of the Personal Mobility Working Group

Helen has been a DPTAC member since 2008 and has brought her experience as a physically disabled driver, bus user, train traveller and frequent flier to the committee. Helen currently works for Fry Law as a consultant paralegal as well as running her own businesses Helen Dolphin Consultancy and People’s Parking. Helen is a member of the Civil Aviation Authority Consumer Panel, Chair of the Joint Committee on Mobility for Disabled People (JCMD) and Chair of her local mobility assessment centre East Anglia Driveability (EAD). Helen also has an assistance dog from the charity Canine Partners.

Professor Roger Mackett, Lead of the Research and Evidence Working Group

Roger Mackett has been a member of DPTAC since April 2014 and chairs the DPTAC Research and Evidence Group. He is Emeritus Professor of Transport Studies at University College London. He also chairs the Transport Working Group of the Age Action Alliance and is a member of the Standing Committee on Accessible Transportation and Mobility of the US Transportation Research Board in Washington DC.

Mike Brace CBE DL

Born in Hackney in 1950 Mike was blinded aged 10, by a firework concealed in a bottle. Mike has had 2 parallel careers: he represented his country at cross-country skiing in the Paralympics and he we was part of the London 2012 Olympic Committee. Outside of sport Mike has worked as a social worker and manager in 4 London Boroughs. Mike later set up VISION 2020 UK (an umbrella charity in the sight loss sector) and served as its CEO for 11 years. Having retired in 2012, Mike now undertakes speaking engagements to challenge perceptions of disability, and to raise funds for his many charities.

Sharon Brennan

Sharon Brennan is an established health and disability journalist with a focus on care quality and accessibility concerns. She currently works for the Health Service Journal and in the past has seen her work published in various national newspapers and magazines. She was also the news editor for Royal College of Occupational Therapist’s magazine. In 2017 she was reappointed to DPTAC after a completing her first successful 3 year tenure. Sharon uses her own personal experiences of living with a hidden disability to inform her work with DPTAC.

Niki Glazier

Niki has worked for many years as co-ordinator of the Mental Health Action Group, a user-led group which has worked extensively for greater recognition and understanding of the travel needs of people living with a mental health condition. She organised the first Mental Health and Transport Summit, sponsored by DfT, in February 2016. Prior to her appointment as a committee member Niki attended DPTAC as an observer for several years.

Bryan Matthews

Bryan Matthews is a lecturer in the Institute for Transport Studies at the University of Leeds. His research expertise is in transport policy analysis and economics – particularly in relation to disability and ageing, travel technologies and the links between transport and health. He leads and contributes to several aspects of the institute’s student education portfolio, including lecturing on air transport, on understanding travel behaviour and on transport, disability, ageing and health. Beyond the Institute, Bryan is an active member of the university’s Centre for Disability Studies and of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport’s Accessibility and Inclusion Forum, and is the Chair of the Intelligent Transport Systems UK’s Inclusive Mobility Interest Group. Bryan has been blind since age 17, and joined DPTAC in October 2017.

Dave Partington MBE

David has worked in field of disability since 1999 and in Transport Accessibility since 2005, most recently at Transport for Greater Manchester where he held the Accessibility Co-ordinator role within the organisation. He became a DPTAC member in 2014, and is currently Chair of the DPTAC Rail Working Group.

Sue Sharp

Sue Sharp is the Director of Services at the Royal Society for Blind Children (RSBC), a national charity supporting vision impaired children, young people and their families. Before joining the third sector in 2006, Sue was a civil servant where she worked in the field of transport and disability both domestically and internationally for almost 20 years.

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