Blue Badge

I see that down in Manchester some cars have been impounded and the owners prosecuted for using fake blue disabled parking badges.(for overseas readers these badges allow parking on yellow lines for up to three hours). From what I see and hear every day on the streets of Barrow you don't need to fake a badge, it seems you get one even if it's your aunt's friend's sister in law that has an ingrown toenail. The town centre is littered with cars badly parked using these badges as an excuse for their laziness and tightfistedness. I have watched them park on yellow lines right next to a pay and display car park, and then stride several hundred yards across the car park to get to the shops, and even on occasion seen them run back for their forgotten walking stick. I had to double park and block traffic for a while today, as I helped my passenger a genuinely disabled lady into a shop. On the way back to the car I noticed that one of the cars blocking access was displaying a blue badge, but it was an estate car filled with the tools and cable used by an electrician. There are obviously genuine users of blue badges but a large proportion are taking the mickey.