A disabled teenager from Leeds is celebrating after being shortlisted for a national award for becoming a positive role model.
Nathan Popple, 14, has cerebral palsy and uses a special communication aid on his wheelchair to speak.
The teenager will attend a glittering awards ceremony tonight after being shortlisted for the National Diversity Award.
The campaigning teenager won praise for setting up a website to name and shame businesses in Leeds that aren’t wheelchair friendly.
The website also offers advice about facilities and accessibility to shops and entertainment venues around the city to help other wheelchair users.
Nathan, who lives in Adel, also successfully challenged Leeds City Council to review its viewing facilities for the disabled and their families at public events.
Proud mum Beryl Sanderson said: “We’re delighted that Nathan has made it this far.
“The work he has done is incredible and he really deserves this. “Nathan is absolutely beside himself and he is so happy.
“He’s really proud and he was saying he feels the work he is doing is making a difference to all disabled people.”
“He hopes that by being a finalist it will draw more attention to his campaign to help make Leeds more accessible for everyone.”
Nathan is one of three successful candidates who have been nominated for the accolade for the Positive Role Model for Age category after being selected from thousands of entries from across the country.
The awards, which aim to recognise and reward positive role models in the community, will be hosted by television celebrity Brian Dowling at Manchester’s Midland Hotel tonight.
Nathan’s family still face an agonizing wait to find out if they could be stripped of their £5.5m compensation to help pay for a lifetime of care after complications at his birth left him with severe disabilities.
A High Court judge last year ruled that Nathan’s catastrophic disabilities and cerebral palsy were caused by a “combination of failures” by medics to monitor his mother’s labour adequately.
Lawyers for the Birmingham Women’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust are fighting to overturn the judge’s ruling.