Seeing Oasis play together again was the only miracle that fan Mark Chapman had expected to see this month – then the wheelchair users next to him stood up.
The 32–year–old, who has been unable to walk since the age of nine, has described the ‘biblical’ scenes at Manchester’s Heaton Park as other fans in the accessible area abandoned their crutches when the Gallagher brothers took to the stage.
He suspects fans desperate to secure briefs for the band’s reunion tour are to blame – after snapping them up from resellers who bought tickets meant for those with genuine disabilities.
Accessible area tickets for the show were on secondary resale site Viagogo for £634 each, and were sold in pairs, reports suggest – despite companion tickets being added free of charge when booked officially.
Viagogo is understood to maintain that only one wheelchair user ticket was sold though its platform for July 12, the date Mr Chapman attended. Other tickets may have been sold on other platforms.
Videos and images Mr Chapman shared online showed crutches and wheelchairs ditched in the raised seating area, which is intended for those unable to stand. Around him, dozens of people were on their feet.
The music superfan believes lax checks allowed those who had snapped up the resold ballots to enter while appearing to pretend they had a disability – before seemingly abandoning all pretence to boogie with the brothers.
He himself struggled to get tickets for the accessible area and ultimately had to buy standard tickets for himself and carer Sam Priest, who would normally be given a free ticket in order to accompany him.
The Oasis fan was later able to get a refund for Sam’s ticket after he contacted organisers to explain the situation – and had to join a waiting list to enter the raised accessible area on the day itself.
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Fans at an Oasis show earlier this month appeared to make miraculous recoveries from their disabilities, ditching wheelchairs and crutches
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Music superfan Mark Chapman, who has Duchenne muscular dystrophy, has accused gig-goers of faking their disabilities to get into the prized Oasis shows
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He suspects people snapped up tickets for the accessible area via resale sites. Some were listed on Viagogo for £634 each – despite the fact carers go free with official vendors
Accessible area tickets for the show were on secondary resale site Viagogo for £634 each, and were sold in pairs, reports suggest – despite companion tickets being added free of charge when booked officially.
Viagogo is understood to maintain that only one wheelchair user ticket was sold though its platform for July 12, the date Mr Chapman attended. Other tickets may have been sold on other platforms.
Videos and images Mr Chapman shared online showed crutches and wheelchairs ditched in the raised seating area, which is intended for those unable to stand. Around him, dozens of people were on their feet.
The music superfan believes lax checks allowed those who had snapped up the resold ballots to enter while appearing to pretend they had a disability – before seemingly abandoning all pretence to boogie with the brothers.
He himself struggled to get tickets for the accessible area and ultimately had to buy standard tickets for himself and carer Sam Priest, who would normally be given a free ticket in order to accompany him.
The Oasis fan was later able to get a refund for Sam’s ticket after he contacted organisers to explain the situation – and had to join a waiting list to enter the raised accessible area on the day itself.
Have you struggled to get disabled seats for concerts because of resellers? Email: jon.brady@mailonline.co.uk
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Fans at an Oasis show earlier this month appeared to make miraculous recoveries from their disabilities, ditching wheelchairs and crutches
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View gallery
Music superfan Mark Chapman, who has Duchenne muscular dystrophy, has accused gig-goers of faking their disabilities to get into the prized Oasis shows
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View gallery
He suspects people snapped up tickets for the accessible area via resale sites. Some were listed on Viagogo for £634 each – despite the fact carers go free with official vendors
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He said: ‘There were loads of people in wheelchairs and with crutches, but when Oasis came on they all jumped out their wheelchairs and dropped their crutches and stood up for the whole gig for two hours.
‘Me being quite severely disabled, I know that standing up for two hours is very, very unlikely.’
Carer Sam added: ‘We were joking Jesus Christ must have been on the platforms, there were so many miracles performed that night.’
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Mark was diagnosed with life–shortening Duchenne muscular dystrophy when he was five years old.
The music podcaster, who went to over 100 gigs last year, has been an Oasis fan for 25 years and has seen Liam Gallagher perform live solo eight times.
So, when the band announced they were reuniting Mark, from Wilmslow in Cheshire, was ecstatic.
But he has since labelled the behaviour of those who appeared to feign disability ‘appalling’ and said their behaviour was tantamount to ‘abuse’.
‘The behavior of some attendees was unacceptable as they clearly weren’t disabled,’ he later said in a social media post.
He later said: ‘They were literally just standing for the whole time, they kept leaving the platform and joining their friends in front of the platform and leaving their wheelchairs behind and crutches behind, and when they went to the toilet.
‘It’s really frustrating. I could see people in front of the platform who were clearly struggling who had to stand there without a seat, and there were people on the platform who didn’t need to be there.
‘A lot of my friends applied who were also disabled and they didn’t get any tickets whatsoever.
‘It was frustrating knowing that there’s people who needed to be there who couldn’t.’
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Mr Chapman watching the gig – as one of the few people with genuine disabilities that appeared to be at the show
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Oasis gig-goers on July 12 – wit crutches dumped and a wheelchair seemingly abandoned by bucket hat-wearing fans
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Liam and Noel Gallagher taking to the stage at Heaton Park on July 11 – the night before Mr Chapman went to see them perform
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Tickets for the sold-out shows went for obscene amounts on resale sites despite Ticketmaster vowing that those who bought second-hand briefs would not get in
Tickets for the accessible section at Heaton Park were available in pairs for £634 each on Viagogo, according to the SWNS news agency.
But Viagogo is understood to hold the position that it sold only one wheelchair accessible ticket on its platform for the day Mr Chapman attended.
A spokesperson told MailOnline that any tickets for accessible areas require users to provide valid proof of their disability.
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They said: ‘Viagogo takes the integrity of event access very seriously and all listings have to adhere to our rules and regulations.
‘When sellers list tickets with accessibility designations, such as a wheelchair user, they are required to clearly state this on the listing.
‘Any buyer purchasing one of these tickets will have to provide valid proof of disability before the transaction is able to be completed.
‘If the buyer is unable to provide proof then the transaction is cancelled by viagogo.
‘This is part of our ongoing efforts to ensure tickets intended for fans with disabilities are used appropriately and fairly.’
Similarly, a man with cerebral palsy who went viral earlier earlier this month after he was held aloft by fans to see the gig on Friday July 11 had been unable to get access to the accessible seating area.
Daniel Tester, 37, was held up by fellow Britpop fans to see the show after his sister Jemma was unable to get hold of the tickets meant for those with disabilities.
BBC News reported that Jemma had been ‘unable to secure access’ to the area for her brother, who uses a wheelchair.
Both fans say the gig was life–changing all the same – but questions remain over why fans with disabilities struggled to access the area meant for them while those who were seemingly not disabled could carry on with impunity.
Adam Webb, campaign manager at anti-tout body the FanFair Alliance, said: ‘Over the years, viagogo has been mired in controversies and legal actions around the world.
‘But this really takes the biscuit. It’s absolutely disgraceful that the platform’s operators appear to be allowing touts to exploit accessible ticket allocations in this way – effectively treating them like 2 for 1 offers.
‘Our campaign continues to uncover evidence of endemic anti-consumer and illegal practices taking place on these under-regulated, offshore ticket resale websites.
‘That’s why we fully support the Government’s manifesto commitment to introduce additional protection measures – including a resale price cap – to prevent British audiences being ripped off. Those measures cannot come soon enough.’
The Oasis tour is continuing through the end of July and August in the UK and Ireland before heading across to North America. The Gallaghers then return to Wembley for further shows in September.
Accessible tickets for September shows at Edinburgh’s Murrayfield Stadium are listed on Viagogo for up to £789, MailOnline found today.
The tickets are listed as being for the ‘West Accessible’ zone of the rugby stadium. They only appear on the ‘global’ version of the site, viagogo.com, and do not appear on viagogo.co.uk.
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Tickets for the accessible area of Oasis shows at Murrayfield are on the ‘global’ version Viagogo for £695 each – with others listed for more. They do not appear on the UK-facing site
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A disabled Oasis fan was lifted into the air so he could see the Gallagher brothers perform this month – as his sister told the BBC she could not get accessible area tickets
In the months ahead of the tour, Ticketmaster had vowed to cancel thousands of tickets that it believed had been listed for resale. It says it verifies ‘all’ accessible bookings made via its platform.
Briefs were being offered for amounts in excess of £7,000 after seemingly being snapped up by professional touts.
The Government is currently mulling over how to tackle the problem of professional touting following a consultation earlier this year, and has proposed capping the prices at which tickets can be resold to disincentivise touting.
A Ticketmaster spokesperson said: ‘To make sure accessible tickets only go to those who need them, we verify all accessible bookings made on Ticketmaster.
‘After purchasing, fans have three weeks to submit their accessibility requirements via their Ticketmaster account or app. If they are unable to do so, those tickets are cancelled.
‘The unauthorised resale of accessible tickets for profit on these websites is yet another reason we fully support the Government’s proposed industry-wide resale cap.
‘As well as protecting fans from inflated prices by removing the incentive for touts, it would help ensure that accessible tickets are reserved for those who genuinely need them.’
Some fans have opted not to even buy tickets for Oasis at all – instead climbing huge metal fences or even disguising themselves as litter pickers in order to see the shows.
