Publications Archive

1991/92 RNIB Annual Report

Summary: RNIB annual report for year ending March 31, 1992

• If you lost your sight, how would you…
• Words fail me: the Chairman's introduction
• “I might just manage two lines…”
• “We’d be lost without braille and tapes”
• “I couldn’t do the job without my gadgetry”
• “Why do they think blind people just listen?”
• Access to information
• Funding the future
• Walking the financial tightrope
• Our multi-coloured year

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Royal National Institute for the Blind

If you lost your sight, how would you…

Deal with your morning post? Find out what’s on radio and TV? Read messages and reports at work? Cast your vote in an election? Read your favourite magazine? Check your bank statements? Pick a winner in the 3.30? Find a telephone number? Read the latest Ruth Rendell? Find out about job vacancies? Use a street map? Follow a new recipe? Read your local paper? Do the crossword? Find out about benefits you might be entitled to? Sit an exam? Use a cash dispenser? Read the washing instructions for your new outfit? Find out the latest bus timetables? Fill in a job application form? Use train indicator boards? Choose a holiday? Find out about your local sports fixtures? Follow the instructions on a bottle of tablets? Compare prices in the supermarkets? Read the instruction manual for a new kitchen appliance? Read your address book? Use a computer? Read music? Learn a new language?

• Almost a million people in Britain are blind or partially sighted: one person in sixty.
• The facts and figures in this report are taken from RNIB’s two-volume survey “Blind and partially sighted adults/children in Britain” published by HMSO (1991/1992).
• RNIB is Britain’s leading charity working with and for blind and partially sighted people. Our aim is to improve people’s quality of life, enabling them to gain greater independence and self-determination. We campaign to eliminate discrimination against blind and partially sighted people and work towards the prevention of blindness.
• Like all RNIB publications, the original print of this review was designed to be legible. Mostly printed in a 12pt sans serif typeface, the review is accessible to around 50 per cent of blind and partially sighted people. Braille and tape editions are also available.

Words fail me: the Chairman's introduction

As a lawyer I am all too aware of the possible perils contained in “small print”. Vital information is often found in the barely legible paragraphs at the end of an agreement. And for a person who is blind or partially sighted the frustration of not being able to read the “small print” usually extends to the whole document.

But, as our cover illustrates, it's not just the obvious documents, newspapers and books that cause problems. Print comes in many forms and in dozens of situations - on private letters and price tags, cash dispensers and cans. We live in a visual world in which the common means of communication for most people is print.

How we cope with the challenge of print is the focus of this year's annual review. As our recent survey showed, the majority of visually impaired people can read print if it is clear and well designed. My own solution to the problem is braille but, as this review shows, braille is only a partial answer. I count myself lucky, though, compared to the many who, neither print nor braille readers, have even fewer options.

RNIB believes that blind and partially sighted people have a right to receive information in a form they can use, be it large print, braille, tape or Moon. Throughout the coming year we shall be challenging information providers to ensure that this basic right is enjoyed by every citizen. In the meantime, if you come across a form or a bill or a timetable you cannot read, why not point out to the producers what a difference larger print would make, not just to you but to hundreds of thousands of visually impaired people?
John Wall

At our Torquay Centre I met students learning
to use closed-circuit TV to enlarge print

“I might just manage two lines…”

Mrs Hilda Reedy lost most of her sight two years ago: “There’s just a black blob if I look straight ahead, though I can see a bit at the sides.” Although Mrs Reedy has some sight, reading is very difficult. A widow, living alone, she grapples daily with printed material.

“It's so hard to get the words. With the help of my little spyglass with the light I might manage two lines, but it's terribly exhausting.

“I can read large newspaper headlines but the rest is too small. I might grasp labels if they're very clear but can't read tiny instructions on tins or frozen foods - or on my bottle of pills… so it's lucky I know they're one a day!”

Hilda Reedy would like to see the widespread use of more legible print: "They're not aware of people like me when they print things like bills, forms, instructions, or information from the council. On my Poll Tax bill I thought it said £9.95, not £69.95: the 6 looked just like a 0.” Like many visually impaired people, Mrs Reedy depends on others to help with her mail and read to her. A friend on the same estate reads things and takes her shopping. “I take the local paper across every night and she reads out interesting bits. I sometimes feel I'm a nuisance but I'm so lucky to have her.”

Mrs Reedy's son also helps, checking bank statements and bills and writing out cheques.

But how would Mrs Reedy manage if she didn't have a neighbour or son to help her?

She listens to local radio most days and also enjoys TV - in small doses! “I like watching snooker, even though it's tiring sitting with my nose right up against the screen. But I can't see the listings so don't know when it's on unless someone tells me.”

Mrs Reedy lives on Income Support and, though registered partially sighted, receives no extra money because of her disability. Yet costs quickly mount up: "I use the phone an awful lot to talk to people because of loneliness and to get information,” she says, "much more than before I lost my sight.”

Fact File

• Nearly two-thirds of all blind and partially sighted people are print readers.
• More than a third of them also have a hearing loss. Many people with impaired hearing cannot easily use the telephone, radio, TV and tapes as a substitute for print.
• Most printed information is inaccessible to people with impaired sight because the print is too small, too faint or badly designed.
• A great deal can be done to help this group - and countless others who find print difficult - by paying attention to print legibility. This is both easy and inexpensive.
• RNIB produces a wide range of publications in clear or large print.
• RNIB encourages and helps other organisations to produce material in clear or large print.
• RNIB's new campaign aims to raise awareness of the need for good standards of print legibility,

“We’d be lost without braille and tapes”

Jean and Ron Pipe are both totally blind. Life has not treated them kindly, but they’ve risen to the challenges. They work from home: Jean knits and Ron is a chair caner. For them, braille and tapes are as vital as print, pen and paper to the rest of us.

Jean Pipe learnt braille at RNIB Employment Rehabilitation Centre in Torquay after losing her sight at the age of 26. “I'd be Iost without braille”, she says. “I get knitting patterns transcribed into braille at prisons, which cost £2.25 each, or I transcribe them from tape into braille myself. I'd like to buy patterns in braille but there are few up-to-date ones - and my customers want modern fashions."

“I rely on tapes and the phone”, says Ron. “I never learnt braille. I contact my suppliers and customers by phone, and I use my tape recorder to take notes of orders, phone numbers and so on. I use the phone a lot to get information."

Ron can write, so he writes and signs cheques, and their bank - TSB - sends them braille bank statements. But bills come in print - an inaccessible medium to Jean and Ron.

So how do they deal with their mail? "We don't! We wait for a sighted person to come in to read it for us... sometimes we have to wait for days.” Jean and Ron rely on chance callers to read their letters, bills or printed information.., yet shouldn't such a crucial service be available as a right?

They lack other rights also. “No one came to the door during the election and we didn't know where to go to vote,” said Jean. “We thought: Blimey, if they're not interested in us, why should we bother?

“People can be quite ignorant. Last week someone came round with a petition and I heard a neighbour say “They're blind next door," and they walked right past us. We can't see - but we can sign a petition!”

As Jean has difficulties getting about, Ron does all the shopping. "He writes a shopping list in his fashion and a shop assistant helps him then rings for a taxi. But we can't read labels so have to be careful where we put things in the kitchen. We rely on memory - everything has its place. Sometimes we forget and have to shake the tins or feel the packages!”

Not being able to read print, Jean and Ron enjoy the local talking newspaper and RNIB Talking Books. "It's our lifeline - we listen to Talking Books every day as we work. Sometimes we sit up very late listening… it's hard to turn off a sexy book!"

Fact File

• Around 19,000 blind people depend on braille as their means of reading and writing.
• Many more visually impaired people would like to learn braille but have not been given the opportunity to do so.
• Tapes are used more widely by blind and partially sighted people. Even so, only one third actually own a tape player.
• RNIB is the biggest braille publisher in Europe, providing magazines (like “TV Times”), books and leaflets. We also braille bank statements on behalf of many of the banks.
• RNIB Talking Book Service supplies 70,000 members with a choice of nearly 9,000 novels, biographies and other leisure reading.
• RNIB also records items on request - from textbooks to timetables - and runs a library with over 13,500 titles on tape.

“I couldn’t do the job without my gadgetry”

Colombian-born Guillermo Espejo lost his sight as a mature student. Now he’s a successful freelance Spanish-English translator, highly respected in his field. A braille reader, he relies on a battery of high-tech equipment to do the job.

Mr Espejo's first ambition was to be a lecturer. "Whenever I mentioned my blindness, references were not taken up”, he says. After several years spent “changing nappies and writing political theory” he began translating and, with help from RNIB's Small Business Unit, has built up a successful career.

“But I couldn't do the job without my gadgetry," he says.

This includes:

• a scanner - which reads printed material and feeds it into his computer
• a computer - a braille display enables him to “read” the print on the screen. He then types in the translation using the keyboard
• a voice box - which converts printed material into speech
• a modem - which transfers data from his typist or elsewhere into Guillermo's computer
• a fax
• a laser printer.

"My translations look as good as, if not better, than other people's because the equipment I use is so good," he says.

As Mr Espejo is working he gets some equipment on loan from the Government-funded Disablement Advisory Service. But he's also had to buy a lot himself - and it's cripplingly expensive.

High-tech equipment enables Guillermo to read and write print and have access to information but it's hard work: "A sighted person can quickly scan 25 lines on a screen but if you're blind you can only read one line at a time by means of the braille display," he says.

“Another frustration is not having anything like the same access to dictionaries and encyclopedias as a sighted person.”

Since he's working, Mr Espejo is entitled to a Personal Reader – someone who'll read printed material for him. A Colombian lady who comes twice weekly scans his translations for mistakes and helps him keep track of developments in the software field.

A self-taught braille reader, Guillermo says: "I prefer braille to tape because as I read I give texts twists and inflections that are my own. I'm reading Chekhov's “Uncle Vanya” at the moment but I also enjoy journals I get from RNIB – “Scientific Enquiry”, “Rhetoric” and “Spotlight”.

“I do think braille should be simplified, though. If it was more straightforward more sighted people would learn it and that would mean better communication between blind and sighted people.'

Fact File

• Almost a quarter of blind and partially sighted people in work rely on special equipment to do the job.
• Access to the right equipment and training in its use dramatically increases the likelihood of finding or staying in work.
• Visually impaired people who are in work can get government help to acquire the equipment they need. But the service is not available to unemployed people.
• RNIB's Employment Network advises blind and partially sighted people and employers on appropriate high-tech equipment.
• Training in the use of special equipment is offered at RNIB's colleges and rehabilitation centres.
• RNIB is constantly researching new applications for computer technology. We also advise commercial companies on how to make everyday technology - like cash machines - more user-friendly to blind and partially sighted people.

“Why do they think blind people just listen?”

Eleven-year old Alex James has been blind from birth. By the age of seven he’d mastered braille; now he’s an avid bookworm. But Alex is frustrated. There just aren’t enough children’s books in braille to satisfy his immense intellectual curiosity and his hunger for stories and poetry.

“I love reading” says Alex .”I like adventure stories, history, science, poetry... I like “Roundabout” too” (RNIB's braille magazine for 7-11 year-olds). “Why do they think blind people just listen?

“A lot of braille books are old-fashioned or for grown-ups,” he says. “Many are out of print too - like “Lord of the Rings”. Mum read that aloud but I want to read it myself - it's got exciting, frightening, funny, joyful bits...”

For Alex, braille books are a window on the world. It's sad that so much less is available to him than to a sighted child.

Alex is highly computer literate. At school he uses a talking calculator and a Perkins machine to write braille and do maths. A portable computer enables him to write and print out in braille or print, and it can also store information and read it back aloud.

Alex's parents bought him a BBC microcomputer for home use, at considerable expense, and the local Cubs raised money to buy a printer, a voice synthesiser and a machine that enables him to input in braille. But technology changes fast - and each new development costs money.

Though useful for homework, the computer has limitations. Blindness is an isolating condition, and Alex (an only child) would love to be able to play electronic games with his friends. "Why aren't there computer games I can play with them?” he asks.

It's not just high-tech games either. There are only so many times you can play Ludo and Snakes and Ladders. Blind children need social activity - and this includes a wider range of games and activities they can play with sighted friends.

Fact File

• The needs of blind and partially sighted children are complex. More than half have additional disabilities and many such children cannot use braille or computers because of learning or physical difficulties.
• Many blind and partially sighted children can read print. A reasonable amount of material is available for young children simply because children's books are often produced in large, clear print. But older children have much less to choose from.
• Children who need to use braille are a small minority. This means that producing braille for them is extremely expensive. It costs RNIB £15,000 a year to print “Roundabout” alone.
• RNIB provides braille magazines, books, games and even examination papers for children. We can provide information on other sources too and have found a braille copy of “Lord of the Rings” in the USA. This is now being shipped to Alex!
• RNIB encourages braille teaching. We publish teaching schemes and run courses for teachers. We also advise on computer equipment suitable for children and provide a loan service to schools.

Access to information

Gaining access to printed information is a major challenge facing all blind and partially sighted people. Mrs Reedy, Ron and Jean Pipe, Alex James and Mr Espejo have all found some solutions from RNIB and others, but still face a host of daily frustrations.

It was to help solve this very problem that RNIB was founded almost 125 years ago. Although RNIB now runs nearly.60 services to meet many needs, providing information in accessible medium and training people to use braille, tapes and new technology cuts across everything we do. In the next few pages we describe our work in the last year to show how we've helped blind and partially sighted people to deal with the difficulty of print.

Raising awareness

RNIB is a major publisher of large or clear print, braille and tape and we also encourage and help other organisations to produce information in accessible media. This year our campaigns persuaded:

• the major political parties to produce election manifestos in tape and braille
• the Home Office to withdraw - and reissue in legible print-: a leaflet called “Don't lose your vote”. The original was in tiny faint print on top of a pattern!
• the Government to produce some Citizens' Charters in large print
• British Telecom to introduce large print and braille bills (some other utilities are now following suit).
• We also produced pilot issues of “Big Print” - Britain's first weekly newspaper in large print. Once sufficient funds are raised we hope to run it permanently.

Braille: a vital service

Thousands of people rely on us for braille and we spent a massive £4 million meeting this need alone. This year we:

• transcribed a record amount of material into braille - over 150,000 pages
• computerised many processes and won a Scitex Award for Creative use of New Technology for magazine production
• increased production of materials in Moon - a simpler alternative to braille which older people find easier to learn.

Mrs Nimi Handa helped us to pilot
our Talking Books in Hindi service

Tapes: a key medium

Tapes are essential for many visually impaired people. We record and distribute tapes for a huge audience. This year we:

• provided nearly 30 million hours of pleasure to the 70,000 members of our Talking Book Service
• developed and introduced a new generation portable Talking Book player
• consulted with Asian communities to help launch the Talking Book Service in Hindi in April 1992
• used over 1,000 volunteers to read more than 26,000 hours' worth of printed material onto tape to support people in work, education and daily living
• opened four new recording studios for our audio services in Peterborough.

Employment: giving support, information and training

The right support - high-tech and human - enables people like Mr Espejo to work successfully. RNIB's Employment Network is in the frontline here.

This year we:

• gave information and help to visually impaired people in and out of work, and to employers, including advice about new technology and training opportunities
• trained Jobcentre staff to provide a better service for blind and partially sighted people
• taught skills essential for work and daily living at our Employment Rehabilitation Centres in Torquay and Fife
• with sponsorship from Barclays Bank developed our Small Business Unit into a nationwide service
• provided a range of courses like braille and computing at RNIB Vocational College in Loughborough. Two years after opening, the College attracts more students than it was designed for
• ran outreach services and training on wheels to support students nationwide - helping them master special equipment and supplying study materials in braille, large print and on tape.

Cycle maintenance is one of the skills taught
at RNIB Hethersett College, Redhill

The key to the future: research

RNIB funds research into the prevention of blindness and works at the forefront of new technology. This year we:

• tried new ways of harnessing technology for everything from electronic daily newspapers to making household appliances more user-friendly, through the European “TIDE” programme
• set up the “Audetel” Project to develop “audio description” on TV. This is a separate sound channel which explains to blind listeners what they cannot see
• carried out research into industrial eye injuries to assess ways of prevention.

Education for life

RNIB helps children, young people and mature students in mainstream and special education in many ways. Not least we teach braille and the use of computers in our schools and colleges to all who can benefit from them. This year we:

• opened a new information technology centre at our National Education Centre to advise teachers, parents and children on the equipment that will help them most. The Centre also ran courses for teachers, including ones on braille and mobility
• created an Advocacy Service for parents of visually impaired children to provide information and counselling
• started a new Physiotherapy Support Service offering help to physiotherapy students in mainstream colleges
• opened a unit at RNIB Rushton Hall School where children visit to have their needs assessed. This is one of our five schools for multi-handicapped children
• expanded the number of courses and students at our further education college, RNIB Hethersett College, Redhill
• provided assistance and grants towards computers and other equipment to students at college andl university.

Meeting personal needs...

RNIB also helps to meet the financial, accommodation and personal needs of blind and partially sighted people. This year we:

• helped over 5,000 people who contacted our Benefit Rights Office to claim all the financial help they're entitled to
• ensured that more blind and partially sighted people are eligible to claim two new benefits, Disability Living Allowance and Disability Working Allowance, introduced from April 1992
• provided housing advice, flatlets and short-stay accommodation at RNIB Garrow House in London
• ran four residential care homes for elderly people, some of whom are deaf and blind. We began a review of the homes and of the needs of more than 150,000 visually impaired people in other residential homes in Britain
• provided subsidised holidays at our four seaside hotels to thousands of mainly elderly people
• ran a mail order service and three Resource Centres in Belfast, Stirling and London providing products to help with everyday living, from white canes to talking clocks, kitchen equipment and games.

…and professional ones

Support for professionals who work with blind and partially sighted people has always been a key task. This year we:

• set up a Mobility Unit to encourage improvements to the built environment
• helped NHS staff to improve ophthalmology and other services through our Health Services Unit
• trained rehabilitation workers at RNIB NMC, our Birmingham training centre
• helped local societies for blind people through our Voluntary Agencies Link Unit
• provided information and training for staff working with adults and children with multiple disabilities
• loaned over 4,000 books and journals from our Reference Library and answered requests for information
• helped social services departments to review their services, including those for deaf-blind people, for whom accessing information is an enormous problem.

A drop in the ocean

Despite all we provide to help blind and partially sighted people to read, write and gain access to information, it is still just a drop in the ocean. Why should people like Jean and Ron Pipe have to wait days to have their letters and bills read? Shouldn't reading support be available as a right? Shouldn't all visually impaired people at least be offered essential information in a medium they can use?

And while science provides answers in the form of, say, machines which turn printed words into speech, new technology's cost leaves it tantalisingly out of reach for most people. The most basic computer with a speech pack costs £1,200. Even “low-tech" solutions - like tapes or the telephone - are pricey compared to pens and paper. Yet visually impaired people's incomes are far lower than the average.

No solution answers all the need. There will always be less material in large print, braille and on tape than in ordinary print. No one has devised a solution which tells you that you have a tin of chicken soup in your hand if you can't see. But RNIB will continue to do all it can to provide accessible information, encourage others to do so, and campaign for better services and higher incomes for blind and partially sighted people.

For this we need your help. Sight loss affects one person in sixty and the proportion is growing. The demands on RNIB are increasing at a time when our funds are harder than ever to raise.

Funding the future

Many of us will look back on 1991 and 1992 and remember little but financial gloom. Like so many others RNIB has been badly affected by the recession. For the blind and partially sighted people we help, this has meant delays in setting up much needed new services and even cuts in some established ones.

Leaner but fitter

In such an economic climate it is vitally important for our fundraising to be as efficient as possible. An extensive review of our fundraising activities led us to reorganise them, reducing the number of offices and making increasing use of volunteer fundraising supporters. The result is that our fundraising team is now geared up to benefit from economic recovery when it comes.

Super supporters

Now we are hoping to recruit many hundreds more supporters to reinforce our professional teams. Fundraising supporters come from many walks of life: we have retired people, housewives and students among others. Mrs Terri Bush from Essex is enthusiastic about helping us. “My support for RNIB started when I was manageress of a shop, and we would support fun days for RNIB. Because I enjoyed fundraising so much, I decided to continue after having my baby, Jessica. I enjoy putting my skills to good use by organising events.”

Our supporters help to organise all kinds of activities from jumble sales to carnivals, from coffee mornings to discos Above all, they have fun, as well as knowing they play an important part in raising funds.

If you would like to team up with us as a supporter, or to volunteer in other ways, please contact us to find out how.

Above: A volunteer reader at work in one of our new Peterborough studios Right: A Cub Scout learns how difficult it is to write with a visual impairment

Looking Glass Appeal

Our major appeal for funds to develop our services - the Looking Glass Appeal - is nearing its target. To date a staggering £7.2 million has been pledged. Not only have we successfully raised funds, but we've also forged vital links with companies such as ASDA, Littlewoods, London and Edinburgh Trust and ICl, all of whom have generously supported us.

• RNIB, together with Macmillan Cancer Relief Fund and MENCAP, benefited from British Telecom's Swimathon in March 1992. RNIB will receive over £400,000
• Cub Scouts adopted RNIB as their special charity for their 75th Anniversary Year - and raised £120,000!
• David S Smith Holdings raised a marvellous £250,000 from fewer than 5,000 employees
• Generous support from a number of trusts and foundations has helped us to carry out development at our RNIB Sunshine House School at Northwood and at our Peterborough centre.

But we must reach our full target - £10.6 million - by the end of 1992 if we are to fulfil all our plans.

Will power

An increasingly important source of funds is legacies. In 1991/92, generous donors willed us over £17 million, almost half our income. RNIB has a free Wills and Legacies Advisory Service to answer any queries about will-making. We have an easy-to-use booklet available in print, large print, braille and tape which explains why making a will is so important and how to set about it. One recipient wrote to say the booklet gave him “just the incentive I needed to make my will”. Others have been delighted that someone is on hand to answer questions. “I was so worried my money would not go to my friend; your help has really put my mind at rest,” said one lady.

Thanks from a million

No words can adequately thank all the companies, individuals, trusts, celebrities and Cub Scouts who have supported us through a difficult year. We can only say that almost a million blind and partially sighted people stand to benefit from your generosity,

Walking the financial tightrope

This has indeed been a tough year for RNIB. We began it by taking £4.7 million from our reserves to fund last year's deficit. And we predicted that, because of the recession, our income would not cover our costs. We had no option but to cut our budgets and manage our overheads carefully. We succeeded - we reduced our administration costs so that for every £1 spent less than 2p went on central administration.

So when, at the end of the year, we received a number of unexpected legacies we were both relieved and delighted. Legacies have always been a major source of income but this year we did exceptionally well. Thanks to the generosity of all our supporters we not only covered our costs but also replenished our reserves by a small amount.

Over the last few years our reserves have dwindled as we've ploughed funds into new services and up-dated equipment and buildings. Our aim has always been to keep in reserve enough money to run our services for 20 or so weeks should all our sources of income dry up. In other words, this year's small transfer has enabled us to repair a hole in the safety net!

As the summary below shows, we spent £38.9 million this year, a sum that provided almost 60 different services for blind and partially sighted people. The breakdown shows just how seriously we take information and communication needs.

Because of our financial worries we invested comparatively little in new services. However with generous help from companies and trusts supporting our Appeal, we began work on new classrooms at RNIB Sunshine House School Northwood and, at our Peterborough site, on an extension to house the Braille Library.

We also paid tax of £1.2 million in the form of irrecoverable VAT. For more than a decade RNIB has led a campaign for charities to be exempt from this costly tax, with little success. Now, however, we've secured the Government's support on a crucial piece of European tax legislation. This means that we won't be liable for VAT on services such as braille and Talking Books until 1997. After that we may be faced with a VAT bill three times its present value.

Thank you all for your support in the past year - but please keep on supporting us. This year's modest success needs to be improved upon to enable us to tackle the job of providing better services for more blind and partially sighted people.
Jack Dunn, Honorary Treasurer

Expenditure in 1991/92

Access to information	Braille, Moon and print publications, Talking Book Service, audio services	£9.3 million
Education and training	Three Sunshine House Schools, Rushton Hall School, Condover Hall School, New College Worcester, Hethersett College, Student Support Service, North London School of Physiotherapy and Physiotherapy Support Service, information and advisory services for parents and teachers	£12.8 million
Employment services	Vocational College, Employment Network, Employment Rehabilitation Centres	£5.4 million
Social and residential services, products and shops	Social services including Benefit Rights Office, four residential care homes, Garrow House, four holiday hotels, subsidised equipment, Resource Centres, advisory services	£6.9 million
Services for the public and professionals	Information and training services on multiple disabilities, Health Services Unit, training for rehabilitation workers, Social Services Consultancy, research into blindness, information services	£3.8 million
Central administration	Committee and central administration costs to support our service provision	£0.7 million
Total expenditure		£38.9 million

Income in 1991/92

Donations, legacies and investment income		£22.0 million
Fees, grants and sales	Local and central government grants and fees, and contributions from blind and partially sighted people towards services, equipment and publications	£18.5 million
Total Income		£40.5 million
Transfer to reserves		£1.6 million

A copy of the full audited accounts is available on request from the Director of Finance and Administration. The above figures give a summary.

Our multi-coloured year

5 June 1991

A special preview of the hit musical “Joseph and the amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” raised £90,000. After the show pupils from RNIB New College Worcester met its star, Jason Donovan.

24-31 July 1991

Thirteen-year-old Carolann Hedges learned to sub-aqua dive on an RNIB vacation scheme for blind and partially sighted youngsters.

15-16 September 1991

Teams of blind golfers from the UK and USA met at Wentworth's famous course for the first-ever RNIB international tournament. HRH the Duke of York presented the "RNIB Rainbow Cup" to the victorious UK team.

22 September 1991

The start of RNIB’s “Rainbow Week” was marked by a family fun day at Battersea Park. Our President, the Duke of Westminster, released hundreds of balloons to provide a festive lift-off.

23 September 1991

Our first mobile Resource Centre took to the roads to serve outlying communities in Northern Ireland.

24 September 1991

Housing Minister Sir George Young officially opened RNIB Garrow House, which provides flatlets and a housing advice service. Funded from the Appeal, the refurbished complex won a prestigious award from the Institute of Housing.

15 October 1991

We published “Blind and partially sighted adults in Britain”, the first comprehensive national survey ever undertaken. The report, published by HMSO, has been widely welcomed by the Government and other policy makers and will help shape RNIB and national policy for at least the next decade.

16 October 1991

New classrooms and facilities, like this light room, at Rushton Hall School were officially opened by the Education Secretary, Kenneth Clarke. The project was funded from the Appeal.

25-26 January 1992

A BBC “Masterchef Competition” at RNIB New College Worcester proved that sight problems are no bar to cooking and enjoying good food! The competition attracted over 100 pupils and was judged by experts Loyd Grossman and Michael Barry.

5 March 1992

Her Majesty The Queen, our patron, attended a reception at St James’s Palace held to thank some of the companies, individuals, volunteers, celebrities, trusts and foundations who have so generously supported our Appeal.

Content author: library@rnib.org.uk

Last updated: 20/11/2008 11:13