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This week Scope, the charity for people with cerebral palsy, launched a new book to mark its 50th anniversary charting the history of the organisation and the changing image of disability.

Scope started as the National Spastics Society, set up by three parents and a social worker with just five pounds. Today it has a £70 million turnover and employs more than 3,500 staff.

But its book is not a conventional corporate history, and instead offers users the chance to express their views, and while there is praise for the organisation's achievements, there is criticism too.

Author Chris Davies, who has had a lifelong relationship with Scope, says: "Not even its severest critics would claim that Scope has done more harm than good. But it must be said that it has done some harmful things, even though the harm is only clear in retrospect. Scope valued segregation for too long. Countless people have been isolated through education, accommodation and employment."

Criticism from users includes claims that in the past the charity has encouraged negative attitudes towards disabled people and that it is dominated by the parents of disabled people rather than those with disabilities themselves.

Davies concludes: "If disabled people are increasingly considered equal in our society then part of that equality must include recognition of our capability to control our own affairs."

'Changing Society: a personal history of Scope', more detail from www.scope.org.uk