The first ever blind children's lobby will take place today (28 March 2007) when more than 100 blind and partially sighted children from across the UK descend on Westminster to demand their right to read. The children will be joined by teachers and parents at the lobby organised by the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB) as part of the Right to Read Alliance.
The 24,000 blind and partially sighted children in the UK are losing out at home and in school because they can't always get hold of books in a format they can read such as large print, audio or braille. Nine out of ten fiction books never make it into a format that blind or partially sighted children can read, and very few school text books are produced in accessible formats.
Lobby organiser, RNIB's Julianne Marriott, said: "It's nothing short of a scandal that these children are being denied something as basic as the right to read. Only days ago Education Secretary Alan Johnson stressed how important reading is for the development of children by announcing that 2008 will be the National Year of Reading. Yet despite this commitment the Government is still failing to ensure that children with sight problems have books they can read."
RNIB is calling on the Government to act urgently and set up a nationally co-ordinated system for providing schoolbooks for children with sight problems.
Recent RNIB research reveals that only 12 per cent of maths and 8 per cent of science GCSE textbooks in England are available in large print or braille. Not one of the dictionaries or atlases most widely used by 14 to 16-year-olds is available in a format that blind or partially sighted children can read.
Teachers are reduced to spending hours photocopying, enlarging and retyping pages from textbooks to turn into braille or large print, so that their pupils with sight problems don't go without. Yet despite teachers' best efforts many blind and partially sighted children still get some books later than their sighted classmates. Nine out of ten teachers surveyed by RNIB said this affected pupils both educationally and socially, often leaving them struggling to catch up with sighted classmates and feeling less independent.
Kathryn Reece, 11, from Bramhall, near Stockport, reads giant print. She said: "Very few books are available in giant print, and in most cases I have to wait months or even years before I can get hold of them. Sometimes all my friends are reading a book and getting excited about it and I can't read it - that annoys me and makes me feel left out.
"I'm going to the lobby because I want books to be made available for children like me. My parents spend lots of time trying to find giant print books for me, and none of my school books are readily available in giant print - that makes it hard for me, my teachers and my parents."
Kathryn's mum, Judith said: "Kathryn loves books and, as her parents, we want to support her as much as possible. We spend evenings and weekends trying to locate suitable material but often we end up adapting the material ourselves or asking charities and other groups for help.
"It's unfair that Kathryn is deprived of books she would love to read. How would you feel if your child couldn't get the books they wanted, was unable to browse the shelves in the local library or bookshop and often had to wait for months to see if the latest best-seller would be made available?"
Children's Laureate Jacqueline Wilson is a fervent supporter of the campaign and is speaking at the lobby. She said: "Reading means the world to me and that's why I will also be speaking to my MP - it's vital that the Government does its bit to make more books available to children with sight problems. I want us authors to all work together with the common aim of getting our books out to absolutely everyone who wants to read them."
Julianne Marriott continued: "Publishers have been very positive about working with us to make books more accessible but the Government must take the lead. The Government keeps telling us that 'every child matters' but it doesn't feel like that to parents and teachers of children who are blind or partially sighted."
If you believe that blind and partially sighted children and adults have the right to read the same books at the same time as their sighted peers, please add your name to the Right to Read Declaration at www.rnib.org.uk/righttoread
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For further press information or to interview case studies or spokespeople please contact Christina Nicolaidou, Deirdre Good or Paul McDonald in RNIB's Press Office on 020 7391 2223 (out of hours mobile 07968 482 812). To read comments from blind and partially sighted people from across the country visit www.rnib.org.uk/rtr/experiences.php Ref: 14.
100 children with their parents and teachers will be coming to Parliament to talk to their MPs on Wednesday 28 March from 2pm - 4pm in Westminster Hall. Jacqueline Wilson, some case studies and RNIB/Right to Read spokespeople will be available for interview between 11am and 12 noon on College Green - call the RNIB press office to arrange interviews with case studies from your region. Further interviews can be carried out during the lobby in the Jubilee Room inside the House of Commons between 1.30pm and 4pm.
Notes to editors
1. Every day another 100 people will start to lose their sight. There are around two million people in the UK with sight problems. 24,000 are blind or partially sighted children. RNIB is the leading charity working in the UK offering practical support, advice and information for anyone with sight difficulties. If you, or someone you know, has a sight problem, RNIB can help. Call the RNIB Helpline on 0845 766 9999 or visit www.rnib.org.uk
2. Where's My Book? , November 2006, David Mann, RNIB. For copies of the report, please contact the RNIB Press Office on 0207 391 2223. The report is based on two pieces of research commissioned by RNIB on behalf of the Right to Read Alliance.
Blind and Partially Sighted Children's Right to Read School Textbooks, November 2006, Suzanne Lockyer, Claire Creaser, Library and Information Statistics Unit at Loughborough University.
Blind And Partially Sighted Children's Right To Read School Textbooks, November 2006, Sue Keil, Delyth Parris, Rory Cobb, Angela Edwards and Richard McAllister, Royal National Institute of the Blind.
3. Early Day Motion 1097 tabled March 2007 by Annette Brooke MP (Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Children and Families) calls on the Government to lead in the creation of an action plan with the voluntary, educational and publishing sectors to explore new systems through which educational publishers can make electronic copies of their textbooks available for sale or licensing to specialist teachers and agencies.
4. The Right to Read Campaign was launched in 2002, to tackle the shortage of books available to blind and partially sighted people and those with print reading disabilities. The campaign's aim is for people with sight problems, dyslexia and print reading disabilities to be able to read the same book, at the same time, at the same price as others. Currently, 96 percent of books are never made available in large print, audio or braille. People with sight problems often have to wait months and years for even those few books. Audio books available commercially can be four or five times more expensive than the print. Many commercial audio books are abridged.
The Right to Read Alliance comprises: The Accessible Friends Network, The Blind Centre for Northern Ireland, British Dyslexia Association, Calibre Cassette Library, ClearVision, Confederation of Transcribed Information Services (COTIS), Listening Books, LOOK (the National Federation of Families with Visually Impaired Children), National Association of Local Societies for Visually Impaired People (NALSVI), National Blind Children's Society, National Federation of the Blind, National League of the Blind and Disabled, National Library for the Blind (NLB), Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB), Scottish Braille Press, Scottish National Federation for the Welfare of the Blind, Share the Vision, Talking Newspaper Association of the UK (TNAUK), Torch Trust for the Blind, UK Association of Braille Producers.