A group of Swindon mothers are on a mission to make Swindon’s green spaces and parks accessible to everyone and held an event at Lydiard Park over the weekend that saw a fully accessible mobile Changing Place facility, provided by Mobiloo, park up there for five hours on Saturday.

The 6 ‘MOAMs’ from Mums on a Mission are Anna Bird, Abi Bell, Bron Edwards, Jess Franco-Franklin, Louise Ward and Sarah Gillam. The group all have children (aged between 6 and 12) with special educational needs and disabilities, so their cause is deeply personal to them.

A Changing Space facility is a facility that fully caters for the needs of people with disabilities, as a lot of standard disabled toilets don’t. The Mobiloo toilet that was at Lydiard had a tail lift for ease of entry, a changing bench and a hoist.

Anna explained the reason why Changing Places facilities were important and crucial to make places fully accessible, stating that families with children living with disabilities were often limited in where they could take them.

“When we visit somewhere that doesn’t have a Changing Places, and our children need to be changed, our only options are to cut short our visit and go home early, or to lie them on the floor of a standard disabled toilet.

“These toilet floors can be dirty. It’s not safe or hygienic to change our children on the floor and it’s terrible for us carers too – it’s damaging to our backs having to life our children onto and off the floor. It really effects our mental health and our children hate it too.”

The six women initially started Mums on a Mission in 2019 to campaign for a Changing Spaces facility to be built at Great Western Hospital, a campaign that is still ongoing. But they’ve also expanded their efforts towards Swindon’s Designer Outlet and the Town’s green spaces.

“We had a truly fantastic day at Lydiard Park yesterday! The Mobiloo we hired was used 26 times in the space of just over 5 hours and we had around 60 supporters turn up. SBC Deputy Leader Gary Sumner and Councillor Curtis Flux also came to see us and we showed them the Mobiloo and explained why we’d love to see permanent Changing Places facilities installed at the major parks like Lydiard and Coate Water.”

The group are also trying to get inclusive play parks in the Town.