I'll reach top of Ben Nevis. . in wheelchair

Now he is taking part in the Bowmore Ben Nevis Challenge, which brings together disabled adventurers with able-bodied team members and challenges them to reach the top of the mountain together.

The event is organised by Capability Scotland, who Mr Cooper worked for while running the Barred! campaign. He hopes to raise 5000 for the charity.

Climbing the 4408ft mountain would be a challenge for anyone, but until he started training for the event, Mr Cooper, who lives in Gracemount, had never even been to the top of a hill before, let alone Britain's highest.

He said: "I had left Capability but then I saw the challenge on their website and thought 'Why didn't that happen when I was there?' So I thought I'd give it a go.

"I have not been to the top of a hill before, so I thought I'd start at the top and go down from there!"

He will steer the chair, which has four large wheels, while other team members provide the power by attaching ropes to it and pulling him up.

While he might get a helping hand, Mr Cooper said the return trip would be particularly difficult for him: "Although some of the team will be in front of me, I will basically be able to see all of the way down. It's a kind of mental challenge because I know that I will be perfectly safe, but it's still that feeling of 'I can just see that there's this kind of big drop in front of me'."

And it certainly won't be a smooth ride, he added: "I suppose the physical aspect of the challenge for me is that the chair doesn't have any suspension or shock absorbers."

He first met his team members - known as Captain Cooper's Barmy Army - at a training weekend for the event, and they have bonded well ahead of the big challenge on August 20.

"We tried Arthur's Seat in the rain about three weeks ago and then we went up again on Saturday and got quite a lot of strange looks!

"There are two reasons for me doing it. One is the sense of achievement. Apart from the fact it's the first time I've been up a mountain, it is the achievement of being able to pull it off with a group of people, being able to gel and then go up and down Ben Nevis together."But apart from that I'm most looking forward to a dram or two at the bottom!

"I hope that this challenge will inspire other disabled people to go to the great outdoors and, if people have got a few quid, for them to kindly donate it to a good cause."

To sponsor the team, log on to www.justgiving.com/Investorsinpeoplescotland-bowmorebennevischallenge