Thank-you to everyone who has taken the time to register their top three disability-related gripes on the “Lara Masters- Things Have to Change” discussion forum.

It’s really important that I get as many of you to register as possible because I can happily rant on about my own gripes to the press, government ministers etc. but if I am going to do a comprehensive job, I don’t want to assume that everyone else wants to see exactly the same changes as I do.

If you are reading this and you haven’t registered, please do so by clicking here.

I’m printing off and collating all the information you have given me and whilst there are some broad strokes like the lack of social inclusion and disability awareness being far and away the number one complaint, there are many more specific things that I wouldn’t have known to highlight. For instance Dee, who is 17, visually impaired and in mainstream education, finds it “difficult to get books in large font” and wishes teachers had “more training into visual impairments and indeed other disabilities.”

Currently, there is a push for better access to education being made by the Disability Rights Commission’s campaign “Educating for Equality”. I’m going to the launch this week so I’ll have the opportunity to talk to Estelle Morris (Minister for Education) and find out what changes are going to be made to make education inclusive. [Since we published the column, Lara has rung us to say this event has been cancelled - Ed.]

Boringly for the vast majority of you who do get what I’m doing, it seems I have to explain AGAIN to those who refuse to understand what I’m trying to do with the disability “wish list” and why.

OK, I am not, as some of you want to believe, trying to use the disability rights fight to boost my career or get more media attention; you should know by now that this isn’t possible anyway. The media has less than no interest in disability, let alone disability rights, which is why hardly any disabled people make it into prominent positions in the media.

I get press attention because a) I am a TV reporter b) My Mum is Debbie Moore (started Pineapple Dance Studios and made history by being the first woman on the Stock Exchange floor) c) I’m making huge strides towards recovering from “an incurable, degenerative spinal condition” by using Mind Instruction.

I don’t need any more press coverage. In the last couple of months I’ve given a speech at a government initiative, been in 3 national newspapers, on 3 national TV programmes and on 2 live radio shows. This week I’m in “Spirit and Destiny” and “Now” magazine and I’m on “This Morning”. Next month I’m featured in Cosmopolitan magazine, and the list goes on.

My press reaches a combined audience of several million whether I talk about disability rights or not. I figure I may as well try and use the opportunities I get to talk to journalists about myself to also highlight the bigger disability picture. This is not “arrogance”; this is common sense. I’m attempting to use the means at my disposal to spread the word that change is needed whenever and wherever I can. It doesn’t enhance my media position in the slightest, in fact it has quite the opposite effect; I have to be very sly in my introduction of the disability topic because the interviewer’s eyes start to glaze over at the merest hint of drum banging.

What I am doing bears no relation to anyone else’s efforts in the disability arena. It doesn’t mean that because I’m trying to make a difference in my own way, anyone else’s efforts are any less valuable. We should all be coming up with ideas to promote “the cause” even if it’s just a request for a ramp in our local shop or writing a letter when we’ve been discriminated against in some way. EVERYTHING HELPS.

Everyone knows how influential the media is, so whilst they’re promoting the latest fashions and food-fads maybe, just maybe, they could put in the odd line about disability awareness or access to buildings if I dress it up with the right amount of “emotion”! And even if the editor cuts it out because it just isn’t sexy enough, at least that journalist goes away a bit better informed on matters of disability.

I’m not explaining myself on this matter again. If you don’t want to register, it doesn’t matter to me personally, but it does make it clearer why we have such a fight on our hands when it comes to equality for disabled people. The pride, jealousy and petty prejudices of a few vicious disabled people, whose attitudes represents the very worst disabled stereo-type only serve to give the rest of us even more to fight against and for that you should be ashamed. You know who you are.

My Mind Instruction is going brilliantly. I have now learnt how to sit from standing as before my back and legs would spasm so violently that someone had to force my hips back to sit me down. Also, I am just starting to use a walking stick with support from someone on the other side. This is a huge achievement because I tried it a couple of months ago and I couldn’t balance with it at all, even with two people helping.

Every day, I see people with MS, brain injuries, motor neurones disease, tunnel vision and all kinds of spinal injuries and disabilities in the waiting room, going to see Hratch for Mind Instruction and they thank me for publicising it because they are making such phenomenal improvements and their lives have been transformed. (We are explaining more about this on “This Morning”, Wednesday 4th Sept, ITV, 10.30-12).

Unfortunately, Hratch is so inundated that the place where he teaches cannot cope with the amount of people coming to see him, so we’re looking for an accessible building in Central London, preferably W.1, with studio space. If you know of anywhere, please contact Hratch on email info@mindinstructor.com. This is also the address if you want to know more about Mind Instruction.

To add your voice to Lara's forum, click here. For more information on what Lara plans to do with the findings, click here.