The Right to Read Alliance campaigns to ensure that everyone can read the "same book, the same time, the same price."
It is estimated that one in eight of us in the UK can't enjoy standard print, because we have sight problems, dyslexia, or disability that makes it difficult for us to hold a book or turn a page. And the education of over 20,000 blind and partially sighted children is being affected, by not getting textbooks in a format they can read.
The digital revolution is opening a new chapter in the world of books. Ebooks can give the reader the flexibility to adjust the format to their individual requirements, and ebook reading devices are becoming more sophisticated, with enhanced accessibility features.
Many of us are already finding it easier to read the books that we want, in a format that we want, at the same time as everyone else. But there are still technical and procedural barriers across the supply chain.
We are a coalition of 21 organisations, working in partnership with publishers, developers, device manufacturers, retailers, librarians and others to overcome the barriers and realise the potential of digital publishing. If everyone plays a part, we can succeed.
Latest news
10th Anniversary of the Right to Read Alliance
A small evening event held with key members of the publishing industries, marked the 10th Anniversary of the Right to Read Alliance. A good range of people from different sectors came along, including the key trade bodies.
Richard Mollet of the Publishers Association made a very supportive speech, placing accessibility of books firmly in one of their key strategic aims on literacy.
The Publishers Association blog mentions the event.
Joint recommendation to enable text to speech on ebooks
The Publishers Association, The Society of Authors, The Association of Authors' Agents and The Right to Read Alliance have recommended that publishers routinely enable text to speech on all ebooks, at least where there is no audiobook edition commercially available.
This is a fantastic recommendation to get, improving the number of titles that are accessible to the estimated one in eight people in the UK with a print impairment.
Find out more about the
ebook recommendations and what it means for publishers
Authors back Books without Borders
Jaqueline Wilson, Michael Palin, Fredrick Forsyth and many more bestselling authors have put their name behind the
Books without Borders campaign.
Charities working in five different English speaking countries had to produce five identical braille master files for the same Harry Potter book. This is because copyright law stops us from sharing files internationally, costing charities valuable time and money.
If organisations like RNIB were able to share files, we could provide far more books for blind and partially sighted people. Therefore we're lobbying the World Intellectual Property Organisation to break down the copyright law.
Read more about the
Books without Borders campaign
Campaign history
Children's Lobby of Parliament
On 28 March 2007 over 250 blind, partially sighted and dyslexic children and their parents and teachers descended on Westminster to lobby their MP with the children's author Jacqueline Wilson to demand for more children's books in audio, large print and Braille. This event significantly contributed to the accessible textbooks trial being launched in September 2009.
Find out more on the page for
Children's Lobby of Parliament.
Further information
View the Right to Read Campaign Reports in full.
For further information about the Right to Read alliance please contact campaigns@rnib.org.uk or 02073912123.