Stop seeing red at blue badges

There was a time when fed-up men would stalk off to the pub before returning home to kick the cat, but we are now empowered to share our feelings with the world, whether the world wants to hear them or not.

Twitter, Facebook and message boards, not to mention those remaining comment sections of newspaper websites, are often home to the musings of people who clearly haven’t got the time for anger therapy or counselling.

There are many things which make us lose it, like inept politicians and Brexit, but for me the worst is parking the car.

Parking the motor anywhere in a major city is an exercise in self-control because you have to drive around a multi-storey carbuncle half a dozen times, mouthing “you leaving?” at complete strangers, before parting with the equivalent of a morning’s earnings 
for the privilege.

But despite it becoming increasingly more difficult to dump the wheels, the vast majority of us still play by the rules – most of us would rather share a hot tub with Jacob Rees-Mogg than park in a disabled bay without a blue badge, for example.

While I agree with the sentiment that parking illegally in disabled bays is wrong, I have always held back from tackling alleged transgressors, simply because disability isn’t always recognisable.

In this era of intolerance, people, who have been encouraged by society to speak their mind, sometimes get it wrong when they call out folk who they think are taking liberties.

There are 2.4 million people who are eligible for a blue badge and I think that should be enough for us – those people shouldn’t have to justify their ailments.

It is highly likely this unsavoury trend of disbelieving those less fortunate than ourselves will continue now the Government is, quite rightly, planning to issue badges to more than a million people with ‘hidden’ conditions such as autism and depression.

We need to start minding our own business and stop being so damn angry.