IN APRIL the full force of the Disability Discrimination Act will be with us and, in principle, I welcome the implications contained in it.

However, just as there will be those representing disability groups who will no doubt take action against those recalcitrant businesses that fail to implement the law on equality of access, etc, I trust that traffic wardens will begin to apply the current highway laws on parking to vehicles displaying disabled stickers and the like.

In other words, wardens will no longer turn a blind eye to such vehicles parking on single yellow lines during the day or on double yellow lines at any time.

The presence of yellow lines is meant to indicate there is a potential congestion problem or, more seriously, a real danger to road users, be it vehicular or pedestrian.

Yet, on any day of the week, cars with disabled stickers can be seen breaking the law with apparent impunity

Too often I have seen vehicles park on yellow lines, the driver place a disabled card behind the windscreen and then leave, able bodied, to wander off.

As a population in general we seem to have allowed ourselves to be shamed by minority groups to the point that we have become stifled and are afraid to make any adverse comment about them for fear of being labelled xenophobic, racist or some other 'ist'.

If the DDA is about treating people as equals then that has to be applauded. But equal also means they should be booked for parking where, for the rest of us, it is and always has been, illegal.

M T Norbury, Goodwood Road, Lancaster.