A wheelchair user who was unable to get into a festival after being left stranded miles away in a field, told the BBC she is “really, really upset” and “disappointed”.
Jayney Gage, from Wellington, Somerset, said she was “stuck” in a camping field two miles away from the Festival on the Hills with no provision to get her to the main event site.
The BBC reported that organisers of the three-day event said they are “devastated for letting people down” but they had a “larger number of campers” then expected and have since refunded Ms Gage her money.
Ms Gage, said: “I literally look at the same four walls 52 weeks a year – it ruined something I’d been looking forward to for a year.”
Festival on the Hills is a not-for-profit event which was set up five years ago, with all money raised going to the local community and charity. This year’s festival took place between 29 and 31 May and was moved to Taunton Racecourse at short notice.
Ms Gage, who has functional neurological disorder (FND), said she had to save up and “live very frugally” to pay for the festival tickets.
She told the BBC: “We turned up and we got directed to a field – down a single track lane – where we were told we could camp. I don’t know how far it was but it seemed about two miles away.”
Ms Gage explained that not only was her wheelchair unable to “cope with the field” but the minibus used to shuttle festival goers to the festival site was too small to accommodate her wheelchair.
She said: “It was just impossible. They didn’t take into account that somebody who was being put in that field was disabled. For me to go out, it really is quite exhausting. My conditions mean that I have to pace myself. It is upsetting.”
In a statement, organisers responded that had Ms Gage contacted them directly with her concerns rather than posting on social media they would have “addressed these immediately”.
They said: “We sadly couldn’t monitor all socials comments whilst running the festival.”
They added that they had “expected to fit everyone in” but a “larger number of campers than anticipated” had occupied a larger area with their camping set ups than they had been prepared for.
They said: “We acknowledge that we should have set size restrictions to prevent this and are devastated for letting people down. We take on board the feedback and will of course use these learnings if we decide to bring the event back next year.”