Mr Cameron, I'd like to take the opportunity…

 

I thought, "Did he really say that?"

A few days later I checked on the transcript. Yes, you did, Mr Cameron. Here it is in black and white:

"Opportunity […] doesn’t mean much to a disabled person prevented from doing what they’re good at because of who they are."

Just run that past me again, will you? Okay: "Opportunity […] doesn’t mean much to a disabled person prevented from doing what they’re good at because of who they are."

Here we are, slap bang back in the medical model of disability where the obstacle is perceived as the person with the impairment themselves. Most of us with any connection with the subject have moved into a more rational perception with the social model of disability, with many engaging in interesting discussion beyond it.

No, not because of who we are

Please understand: the lack of opportunity comes about not from who we are, but from the misconceptions about and/or hatred of us, attitudes which are upheld by those responsible for the continued existence of the barriers.

People in positions of power, authority and influence continue to send out mixed messages. We have all kinds of initiatives - far too many to mention - which, I wouldn't mind betting, frequently work only where people with real understanding make decisions and take action probably beyond their pay grade.

What is still lacking is a change in perception and attitude by decision makers. 

Over twenty years ago I was so delighted - and astonished - at the enlightened attitude expressed in the British Gas appointments advert below that it lived on my pin-board for a decade. Sadly it seems to have been a rarity, as it still has the power to surprise, even given the introduction of the Disability Discrimination Act the following year, and the subsequent Equalities Act. When it comes down to it, legislation, however well worded, merely allows the person discriminated against to take out a private prosecution; something for which the majority of people with impairments simply do not have the resources, financial, physical, emotional or psychological.

The enduring part of the advert is:
"Our diversity is our strength […] It's simply good business sense. If you have a disability and a good degree, you're likely to have developed lateral thinking, planning and problem-solving skills long before your contemporaries. What's more, you bring an alternative viewpoint to project and team work. As an organisation committed to quality in its thinking and its workforce, we're prepared to invest a great deal in these skills."

Access to Work* remains one of government's best kept secrets, but has the potential to change not only the lives of individuals, but in the light of the above, to transform industry as a whole - to strengthen its problem-solving capability, to increase flexibility and co-operation, and through genuine inclusion, tapping into the hidden talents of the entire workforce, not just graduates, to be a real driver of creative, economic stability.

It does take leadership though, and retrograde pronouncements don't help. It's an old saying, but true: if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

They say wisdom comes with age, so I guess your birthday is a good time get on side, Mr Cameron.

From just one of the 19% of the UK population who live with impairments, and who are disabled by the attitudes of some people, and by some of the constructed environment. *Find other useful video links - and add your own - on www.showmetheaccess.co.uk

Now is the time, so seize the day!

The sun may not be shining as much as we'd like, but the principle of making hay still applies - time to take some video to promote your venue, while you have a range of visitors who can show off your premises and services to great advantage.

It doesn't have to be Hollywood production to be really helpful.

This short piece of hand-held video shows well enough what the terrain is like on one of the trails in Thetford Forest

and this one shows the user's perspective getting to the arena at the Download Festival

while panoramic views put together as video work remarkably well for the Braithwaite Fold campsite.

Enlist the help of a wheelchair-using visitor too, or a parent with a pushchair, or someone who uses sticks to help them get around. If they are willing to appear in your video it will enable future visitors to see what the access is like far more immediately than even the most thorough of access audits, which are really more useful for detailed study, especially by your manager.

Spoken feedback from them would be advantageous too. And what a lot of people forget is that even captions on video are not accessible to Braille output devices - though if you know different we'd be delighted to hear. So, for the benefit of some astonishingly intrepid deaf/blind people out there, it's handy to include text of any commentary as well as some brief text description into the 'content' box of our submission form… You'll find some more tips on the help page of our site.

Upload your links to showmetheaccess.co.uk and the news will get tweeted far and wide. Cameras: roll!

Granny’s ginger jar

My grandmother was a very modern woman; stylish in her own way though not a great beauty. She didn’t have a lot of money, but she earned enough to be able to afford the occasional thing that pleased her. Now with the shed-decluttering season under way I’m looking forward to re-finding a ginger jar that has come down to me; not an antique, but she liked it and so do I. When I packed it away last time I moved house the lid got broken. I shall mend it, maybe in the time-honoured way the Japanese do, with gold foil to accentuate the breakage, reminding us that there is beauty in things which have been repaired.
 

Valerie McGlinchey [CC BY-SA 2.0 uk (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/uk/deed.en)], via Wikimedia Commons
 
She was 27 when she got the right to vote. I took her for granted of course, but looking back she was quite a remarkable woman. Her skills in needlework: dressmaking, pattern cutting, tailoring; and leatherwork in partnership with my grandfather; and her confident entrepreneurship made a huge difference to the family's life, particularly since my grandfather returned from the 1914-18 war minus one leg, and died too young, even for the early 1950s.
 
Many of my generation, born in the decade following World War II, grew up in a charmed countryside, or an equivalent magical townscape. Like Adam Young, a central character in “Good Omens” by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, we could wander where we liked and get into benign mischief our parents knew little about - though I dare say they suspected. Childcare was informal, and part of the social framework: at the age of three or four I was regularly at an elderly neighbour’s house to watch her small prized television while my mother had half an hour to herself. Milk - and orange juice - was still delivered by time-honoured horse and cart but babies were delivered by the still new NHS.
 
Growing up we were not unduly restricted but allowed to be children with the risks and responsibilities appropriate to our age and development. I’m certain that part of this was down to our parents’ refusal to allow the fear and uncertainty that had threatened their own wartime youth to dominate the rest of their lives. It formed a good pattern for us to follow.
 
The school teachers I had taught us not just to read and write but also to think, to question and to explore the world for ourselves. This reflects their freedom to teach in line with their enthusiasm, moral code and wisdom gained through life experience rather than by some hidebound bureaucratic formula. Public libraries were enchanted treasure-houses that rewarded the explorer with priceless riches - all free. Grants to cover tuition fees and living costs were mandatory in those golden years for students fortunate enough to gain access to further education. This was all of a piece with our prospects for work, which held out the opportunity to contribute to society. Luckily by the time we were told there was no such thing we had already proved to ourselves that there could be if only we believed in it.
 
Of the contemporary friends I’m still in touch with most seem to be growing old pretty self reliant and resilient on the whole. This is saying quite a lot since a number of my friendships have been formed among disabled people, particularly as my own ‘progressive’ impairment, inherited through that same grandfather, has left me more isolated, at the mercy of inaccessible ‘mainstream’ society.
 
We fear that the NHS that helped us with as little trauma as possible into the world will see us out of it in very different fashion, and before we’ve been as much use as we can be. We fear for the children, too many of whom we see deprived of the freedoms and emotional security which formed our characters. And we fear for their older siblings and their parents who seem bowed down with debt which can never be paid off, and economically stifled by zero hours contracts or part time jobs at breadline wages.
 
Among the disabled bunch I detect a familiar but understandable reluctance to acknowledge fear; I know it’s there, as despite government protestations we are too well acquainted with discrimination and lack of joined up services to be anything better than deeply uncertain about our future care. Every now and then I hear my grandmother’s voice telling me “worse things happen at sea.”  

Her store of wise old saws comes in handy; there was one for just about any occasion. An observation that the food was too hot was greeted with “it’s come from a hot place” and if it was noticed that someone’s legs were particularly long, “yes, they go all the way up to his b-t-m.”
 
We’ve had yet another go at putting a cross on another piece of paper to try to influence our future, and there’s a widespread sense that many things that ordinary people depend on are now broken. To any political types who might happen to read this I’d like to pass on another of my grandmother’s sayings. In my family the sound of alarmingly loud clattering of crockery would elicit the cry, "Save the pieces, we like the pattern!"
 

See showmetheaccess website for video links to practical ideas around impairment

The Chocolate Teapot and the Guillemot Egg

Musings on some fundamental principles of design

Recently I received a gift of some gorgeous planet-friendly shower gel that smells good enough to eat. Like the great majority of such eco products, it came packed in a nice recyclable cylindrical plastic bottle. I'm canny by now at this stage in the game and so I carefully decanted it into my now empty bottle from the supermarket-bought "mainstream" gel.



When I'm out on the road and pick up a small bottle of mineral water people might think I'm picky, searching through the different brands on offer. I am not even fussed whether it's still or fizzy, I'm just looking for a square bottle.

Most of you will know what I'm on about by now: the hazards and frustration that ensue when something rolls on the floor.

As always, it is no bad idea to look at what nature does. The guillemot's egg is something the parent wants to keep close to it, especially since they tend to lay their eggs on bare cliffs. The precise shape of the guillemot's egg above all others prevents it rolling long distances but instead keeps it moving in a tight circle.




On the other hand, it's reasonable to surmise that apples and oranges have the capacity to roll away from the parent tree, so aiding the process of dispersing the seeds. Which is precisely why it is a good idea to keep your grocery shopping well restrained heading home by car – the last thing you need is a piece of fruit jammed under your brake pedal!

Universal design is a noble goal, and one of the basic parameters is safety. Being mindful of the hazards of things that roll being used by people with obstructed or impaired vision or balance should be towards the top of that safety list. Someone who could devise hexagonal AA and AAA batteries to fit existing devices would be doing us all a favour, just like the nameless heroes who introduced holes into the design of caps of felt tip pens. Unlike chocolate, they don't melt in the mouth, and this clever modification reduces the danger of children choking on them.

So when you're looking at the primary use of whatever you are buying or designing, don't ignore the inherent qualities - use them to best advantage! For more clever ideas to help improve safety why not check out www.showmetheaccess.co.uk? We offer a free platform where anyone - including suppliers - can share video links of use and interest to disabled people, whatever their impairment.

And remember - someone else already did the experimentation with the teapot. So you'll be able to just sit back and enjoy the chocolate egg instead.

Responsible business messages

My customary trawl for helpful, positive video showing the accessibility of products, places, activities and services takes me round the globe via the internet. I search out items to augment those submitted by enlightened businesses, charities, community groups, government departments and individuals. Recently I found myself on the website of a business organisation I had encountered some years ago and thought of them as an essentially supportive body.

However the video I found contained a message which is undoubtedly not intended, but actually portrays a subliminal eugenic bias: it clearly depicts the idea that with the removal of disabled people both society and business are better off.

You might say, this doesn't matter because this was not the intended message. You could say the organisation is a charity and doesn't have the money for checking and amending this kind of thing in a timely fashion.

But the really creepy thing about this is that these people are seen by themselves and others as the good guys, and yes, they genuinely are. So if this is the message unconsciously being put out by the good guys, and they haven't noticed after it being online for a year, what does that say about society as a whole? From where I am this aspect feels very scary.

If you're sitting there thinking, this couldn't possibly be the organisation I belong to, please go to your website and check. Just in case. If I were a member of this organisation I would be saying "not in my name".

If you'd like to let disabled people know that you are positive about inclusion, please take a look at my website as well: showmetheaccess.co.uk and see if you would like to participate in some way or other. It's not only good for diversity, it's good for business too.

Time to kiss and make up

As we are all aware, being self-employed is a notoriously isolating and exhausting option; the more so for someone with an impairment, but for many of us there is little alternative. Add to this other changing circumstances in life and the path becomes even more rocky. Not for the first time in my working life, I hit a period of not being in the right frame of mind to do my best work, and mercifully the phone stopped ringing.

I said, this has happened before. There's usually a period of rest and regrouping, then I pick myself up, dust myself down, and off I go again. But something is different this time…

A field that lies fallow can find itself invaded by all manner of wind-blown weeds of course, but if the timing is right it can throw up something as spectacular as a sea of poppies. Despite unavoidable distractions by way of injury, bureaucratic complications and responsibilities to others, I began to find a new focus presenting itself.

I don't recall precisely the moment that the idea of showmetheaccess occurred to me, but it was the result of years of experience. In researching solutions to the problems encountered by family and friends as well as myself in our attempts to do more than just survive an unfriendly environment I had inadvertently become something of an expert. When that expertise coalesced with my training as a problem solver and my family culture of skilled survival and determination it should not have been too surprising to find something creative emerging from hard times.

Two ways of working have been significant in this process: firstly the KISS principle – "Keep It Simple Stupid", associated with engineer Kelly Johnson. It is worth seeking out his 14 Rules of Management, the flesh on the bones behind this fundamental maxim - and worth learning from the 15th one too.

The second approach consists of simply allowing the thing to be itself, and giving it room for movement to become what it will, something which I absorbed many years ago from reading about Carl Jung's work; involving the unconscious, the dreamer in me, and allowing those elements to come into play as well. This is not to abandon the project to some random fate - far from it. It is more a process of constantly keeping watch and observing how the thing wants to develop. Analogous to the way a sailor takes note of the wind and tide and steers the course accordingly, some enterprises benefit from this way of working rather than being constrained in a standard framework, business plan et al.

In the best possible sense, I am making it up as I go along.

A Salutary Gift

Although my impairment has been referred to laughingly (by those who get the joke) as progressive, its extent still takes me by surprise. My formative years were spent without it so old habits of the expectation of a "normal" life (whatever that is!) cling on, however irrational that may seem.

When in the 1980s as the self employed designer on an R & D team, I would be sat with men in suits round a table in the outer reaches of a European Commission sub-department, I would invariably find myself the only woman in the room apart from the young lady who brought us coffee. Roll on 30 increasingly isolated years, and at a boiler-room event with a 54 hour timespan over two and a half days I still managed to hold my own, with appropriate assistance and equipment to enable me to survive such a punishing schedule. Nevertheless I was shocked to find, among over 100 participants, I was not only one of very few women, I was also the only participant with a discernible impairment. Over a third participating were either university undergraduates or post graduate students. In an industry which is easily adaptable to disabled workers, and inherently gender neutral, these are not impressive statistics.

I have the feeling that I'm going to be saying this an awful lot in the next weeks and months. 2015 marks the 20th anniversary of the arrival on the statute book of the Disability Discrimination Act, the 45th anniversary Chronically Sick & Disabled Persons Act and the 40th anniversary of the Sex Discrimination Act, and there are times when I still wonder how far we actually have come in terms of society’s attitude and awareness. A new generation of women seems to have no notion of what hard-won ground they are in danger of losing. Regarding disability, a number of well-meaning initiatives have backfired in my view, notably the ubiquitous wheelchair symbol which gives the impression that so long as “we’ve got a ramp” then everything’s hunky dory for everyone, including those with visual or cognitive or hearing impairment… and so on across the diverse 20% of humanity who find themselves disabled by the environment in which they have to operate.

Another mistaken notion is for non-disabled people to “see the person, not the disability”. No. We need you to acknowledge both. Both the person, unique as everyone, every one, is unique; and also the disability – imposed on us by barriers in the environment, and especially by perceptions of us.

What wiped me out for a week after this exciting event was not the long hours – I’m used to them. It takes the expenditure of a great deal of time and energy to live the life I have, not just my time and energy either. No, what really floored me, emotionally and psychologically – was when people started to “get it”. As my contribution to the event I had thrown down a challenge: to answer the question “What are the barriers that prevent non-disabled people from engaging with the access needs of disabled people?” Through observing and listening closely during that event, a couple of people in particular began to understand just how debilitating is the process for someone like me to do the most trivial of physical things that we all (thank goodness!) take for granted - until we come face to face with impairment.

It was the look in their eyes that hit me hardest: the glimpse for them of what life is like for me, and by extension, what it might be like for other people of their acquaintance; what it might have been like for me in other circumstances.

Perhaps one day I shall manage to enable them to see beyond that too; to help them see me as I see myself. Perhaps it will be something that they feel able to tell others about. Other people may have similar encounters, maybe it will become contagious, go viral… and just maybe (you never know) some more of the barriers that prevent disabled people – and women too – from fulfilling their potential might get dismantled.

“To see ourselves as others see us is a most salutary gift. Hardly less important is the capacity to see others as they see themselves.” Aldous Huxley, The Doors of Perception.