UK father with wheelchair-bound son overwhelmed by kind strangers offering to pay pricey Ed Sheeran concert parking

KUALA LUMPUR, June 28 — A father in the UK WAS left overwhelmed after strangers came forward offering to pay for the pricey parking nearest to Wembley Stadium so that his disabled son could watch Ed Sheeran's concert.

Garry Ratcliffe, 49, had to drive his son Haydn, 18, who has cerebral palsy and wheelchair-bound, Daily Mail reported.

Rail strikes over the weekend meant he and many concert-goers would be forced to drive, and the cheapest space Garry could find was to park on someone's driveway, about 10 minutes walk from the stadium which the owner was charging £405 (RM2,186) for.

At his wits end, he turned to Twitter for advice and was flooded with offers from Twitter users wanting to help pay for the parking instead.

“These were just strangers, hundreds of strangers just offering their support. It was one of those stories that caught people's imaginations and it was amazing.” Garry, who has three children with disabilities said Haydn can be quite isolated because he has cerebral palsy and is in a wheelchair.

“So he really likes going to different gigs and big concerts in London,” he said, adding that Haydn had saved up to purchase the tickets.

After buying the tickets, Garry went to the Wembley official parking site to find that every car park was fully booked.

“I then realised that it was the third day of the current rail strike. Everyone would be driving to see Ed Sheeran because nobody would be getting on the train.”

“I panicked slightly and told Haydn that we might not be going because there is no way we can get up there without a car and obviously he was devastated.”

He declined the offer from the Twitter user to pay for parking saying, “I would never have taken the money just to pay for a parking space”.

It was still a happy ending as a staff member of Wembley Stadium eventually gave his spot to Garry as he was not working on that day of the concert.