Society and people with disabilities
As the European Year of People with Disabilities draws to a close, it
is appropriate for the Journal to look at some of the ways in
which information and communication technologies can help the disabled.
It is really only in the last quarter century that society has seriously
begun to consider how to provide those resources which — particularly in
terms of physical access — might ease the difficulties that some
disabled people encounter. We have happily advanced beyond the point
where the most cogent legislative requirement was to demand that 3% of
the workforce of any large employer should be registered disabled.
Current legislative requirements are far more demanding, and their
effect can slowly be seen: ramps to public buildings to complement
previously daunting flights of stairs are now commonplace, low-loader
buses, taxis and railway carriages are not uncommon. Nor are these
efforts restricted to those with problems of physical mobility: for
example, both the English National Opera, and BBC News 24 regularly
provide performances or bulletins that are signed for the hard of
hearing. Moves such as these are greatly welcome as a sign that society
as a whole is beginning to take initiatives in this field that are not
driven by legislation, but which spring from a slowly growing and
increasingly intelligent understanding of the needs of people with
disabilities.
Where in this process do information and communication technologies
fit? How can they help — and indeed do they help? In his article, Dr
Geoffrey Busby, Advisor on Disability Issues to the British Computer
Society (BCS), describes some of the work in this field being undertaken
both by the BCS, and internationally. A glance at the programmes, both
of the last and the forthcoming International Conferences on Assistive
Technology, demonstrates the wide range of work in this field. Wireless
information services for deaf people on the move, a rehabilitation
device for the severely handicapped that can be operated by any part of
the body, a project to make the Internet more accessible to the
disabled, a project to help, through the provision of ITC equipment and
training, the 2.8m unemployed disabled in the UK to increase their
chances of employment — these are but a few examples of the way
computing and technology can help the disabled.
As Dr Busby points out, however, technology and legislation alone
will not suffice: there have to be positive moves to involve
governments, industry and users in developing agreed ways forward.
In their article, Gill Whitney, Chairperson, and Luc Van den Berghe,
Secretary, of the (European) Design-for-All and Assistive Technology
Standardisation Co-ordination Group, review progress in the Group’s
work. It begins from the premise that standardisation is of benefit both
to older people and disabled people by ensuring that artificial
barriers to access are not built into products and services. (In
passing, there is a resonance here with part three of the UK Disability
Discrimination Act, which provides that from October 2004 it will be an
offence “to refuse to provide, or deliberately not providing, to the
disabled person any service which he provides, or is prepared to provide
to members of the public”). To this end, standards have to be developed,
those for whom the standards are intended have to be made aware of the
needs of disabled and older people, and older and disabled people have
to be made aware of the benefits that standardisation can bring.
Particular stress is being laid on an approach to design activity,
intended to ensure that products are usable by everyone to the greatest
extent possible, without the need for specialised adaptation. For the
future, the Group’s aim is that public procurement — a potent motivator
for industry and suppliers — should ensure that people with disabilities
should be able to make use of the same goods and services as other
members of society.
Our third article on this theme is from Dr John Gill, Chief Scientist
of the Royal National Institute of the Blind. He examines recent
technological developments for the blind, and describes some of the
benefits, both actual and potential, that ICT can offer. Specifically,
however, he highlights the dearth of research into simple aids for daily
living, that are unglamorous in research terms, and not highly
profitable in commercial terms; and calls for a new approach to this
problem.
There can be no doubt that ICT has much more to offer for people with
disabilities. Of itself, however, as in so any other areas of computing,
that is not enough. It requires a positive response from the whole of
society to make sure that the full benefits are obtained. This is of
crucial importance, and is an area that will be explored at the BCS
Disability Group’s International Conference on Assistive Technology to
be held in London on 2–3 December. It is certainly a topic to which the
Journal will return in later issues.
Michael Fairey |
