Brad Stewart, who runs Blitz Discos, is now hoping to scoop the top prize worth over £13,000 in the final of the 2008 Barclays Trading Places Awards.

The awards recognise men and women who have overcome various barriers and battled against the odds to positively change their lives by setting up in business.

Brad was only 20 when he was involved in a horrific car crash which claimed the life of one of his best friends and left him paralysed from the waist down.

A builder who had planned one day to take over his father's business, he had to face the fact that his life would never be the same.

Years of unemployment followed until Brad mentioned in a conversation with Fife Council's disability employment co-ordinator that he was interested in starting a mobile disco business.

A 'Training for Work Self-Employment' course put him on track and after six months' training, Blitz Discos was on the road.

But it has not all been plain sailing.

Brad needed specially adapted equipment and has had to employ a roadie to move kit and help him into venues with limited access.

But nothing has deterred him from his goal of independence and Blitz Discos is a healthy business.

There are bookings as far head as 2010 and Brad now takes his music to weddings, birthdays, anniversaries and corporate events all over central Scotland.

Ambitious plans to expand the business include audio visual presentations and, eventually, employing more DJs.

Most of all, the business has given Brad a future he thought he'd lost.

"Your life changes dramatically when you have an accident like mine," he said, "but it doesn't need to stop."

Paul Titterton, Barclays' regional director for local business, said: "I hope Brad's inspiring story will prove to other people in Fife that self-employment can be possible if you've got a dream and the guts and determination to make it work."

Brad will now be invited, along with the nine other regional winners from across the UK, to attend a glittering awards dinner at the Marriott Hotel in London on October 7.