From Vision Australia. This is talking vision. And now here's your host Sam Colley.
Hello, everyone. It's great to be here with you. And for the next half hour we talk matters of blindness and low vision.
If we step back and recognize that around 20% of Australia's population are people with disability, you might only get a request for one type of inclusion. But if you are able to include people with disability and all people with disability, then you're actually ensuring that 20% of our population has full inclusion in society.
Welcome to the program. This week we speak with Megan Spindler Smith, the deputy CEO of people with Disabilities Australia following the Australian Government's response to the Disability Royal Commission, which came out earlier this month. That conversation is coming up very shortly, so make sure to stick around. Coming up later in the show, for our library lovers out there,
we have a treat in store for you. As Sarah Bloedorn, the manager of the Vision Australia Library, joins me to have a chat about the latest events coming up over the next few weeks and some releases from the library for people to enjoy. I hope you'll enjoy this week's episode of Talking Vision. I started my conversation with Megan by asking her about the Disability Royal Commission, and to give us a bit of an overview of the latest outcomes. Comes.
Absolutely. So the Disability Royal Commission has. I'm hoping many people do know was a very momentous and also horrible at the same time. Time for us, for our community, talking about the situations that we have been in and the abuse and violence that we have been dealing with as a community with regards to general society, the services we've had access to, and being able to make sure that we can be more included in society or more so society can meet us where we need them to
meet us. And so that has been a really momentous moment to have disabled voices being at the forefront of talking about what it is. We need to be fully included in society and to end segregation and to end the abuse and violence of people with disability. That big report came out at the end of last year, and of course, we responded to it with our recommendations of what should be focused on by the government. And then at the end of July, there was a response from
the government. And sadly, it wasn't necessarily exactly what we were all hoping for. There's definitely still some work to do to make sure that inclusion for all people with disability in society is possible, and it's going to be so important for us to be able to work with the government to make sure that all 222 recommendations are considered and actioned in the best way possible for our community.
To put a couple more numbers out there and give a bit of perspective for our listeners. Of those 222 recommendations, there were, I believe, 172, which fell under the government's full or partial responsibility. And of those 172, they've only really accepted 13 of those fully. And, you know, on the face of it, that's quite disappointing. And as you've said, something for the disability community to going forward, advocate strongly for and work together with them to improve that outcome
for the disability community. So what are people with Disability Australia's immediate thoughts or actions or immediate priorities for addressing that situation in the short term?
So for us, our biggest thing is making sure that the government is moving forward with genuine co-design and that people with disability are at the forefront of these. So when we talk about the initial response and we talk about the sadly low numbers that were put forward as accepted. What we do know is those things, we should be seeing action on them now, and we know that there are things like the Disability Discrimination Act, which needs to happen ASAP. That needs to be one of the first
things that happens. And people with disability need to be genuinely not just part of the conversation, but supported to lead how the changes happen. Because we know that currently the DDA doesn't ensure that we have enough equity of access, especially when it comes to employment across the whole of Australia. And it's not always equally done in every single state.
So from our perspective, that's one of our big call outs, is this needs to happen now and it needs to happen ASAP, and that also includes ensuring that Australia is able to implement the CRPD, which is the way we should be, and we've signed on to this as a as a country. We have actually signed on to this,
but it's not currently fully enacted in law. And what that means is that with many different people with disability, we only have kind of a patchwork setup of human rights protections, and the law plays a huge role in our lives. And so the mixture of a DDA and ensuring that the Human Rights Act is able to demonstrate a way to ensure that our rights equal to, but equitable to everyone else in Australia.
And, Megan, you mentioned the CRPD in there. Could you give a bit of an overview of that for our listeners?
Absolutely. So the CRPD and I can sometimes be known for saying acronyms when I shouldn't is the convention on the Rights of Persons with disabilities. So this is something that is linked to the United Nations Convention, and it is ostensibly to promote and protect and ensure the full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms by all persons with disability, and to ensure that we're
able to promote respect for our inherent dignity. So it's actually made up of two different documents, which is one is the convention on the Rights of Persons with disability. And that kind of contains the main aspects around what do we mean by the rights and provisions that can do that. And then the other is the optional protocol. And that is really around some of the additional aspects To help us understand the next steps and how we
can put some of these things into practice. And basically, Australia became a signatory in about August 2008, and you can see some really great information, including an easy read version of information about it on the human rights. Gov.uk. But also we have some fantastic stuff on our website as well. Pwda is website is fantastic for that as well.
Okay. And we'll get those details about the website and other contact details for P.w.d. at the end. Megan. But for the time being, I'm interested to raise the point about how people with disabilities still perhaps aren't seen as a priority by government over the time, but also, I suppose, and this is a bit of a point of you know, how society views us more broadly and overcoming those perceptions. Let's talk a bit about how much that played a
role in this entire situation. I think that's definitely worth covering there. What are your thoughts on that?
From our perspective? Part of the reason, and definitely from my perspective, part of the reason that we are not necessarily yet treated as equitable or necessarily have access to equitable rights. And you might notice, I'm saying equitable over equal, because we've got to get equitable first before we can have equality. So it's really important to recognize that we're not starting at the exact same point as everyone else. So we need the equity to get to the equality.
So when we're thinking about those things, we've got to think about the fact that the current system for education, for many people with disability is through a segregated Lens. And that means that right now, mainstream schools are not. And the mainstream schooling system is not actually fully inclusive.
And so we need to consider that when it comes to employment, when it comes to education, and when it comes to housing opportunities, that segregated model is in place because of the fact that we do not currently have an inclusive society that ensures that if a person with disability was to go into a mainstream school right at this moment, I'm not saying it can't happen. I absolutely
do believe it can. But if they were to right this second, the mainstream system does need to change and it needs to be able to be more inclusive of everyone's needs and learning capacities. And that's the same when it comes to employment and housing. And so those are the kind of things that we need to be conscious of as.
To.
Why we're not necessarily yet fully seen as having all of the same rights, because we're not necessarily set up societies not set up to allow for that equity yet.
Mhm. And Megan, that does tie in with quite a few of the experiences, lived experiences and otherwise of quite a few people I've spoken to over the past weeks, months, even, you know, years on talking vision where we've had stories where people have come back to them and said, oh, this is, you know, just one person that's making this complaint or giving this feedback or that's not enough of
a business case. It's not important enough. You know, we don't need to make X, Y, and Z accessible if there's only one person who is experiencing this problem, we don't need to do anything about it, blah, blah, blah. So addressing that and overcoming that and flipping that around to, you know, have more voices saying, we need this to improve. We need this to be better. We need this to be able to fully take part in society. And that is a huge mountain to climb. So that's definitely something
that's ongoing. So it's very important for us to be speaking today because, you know, we've both experienced these sorts of things over our lives. First and foremost, what are you looking to see long term as a final point for things to improve for the lives of people with disabilities, full.
Inclusion in society in the way that we still have choice and control in how that happens. And we have to remember. Yes, absolutely. I hear that we've only had one person ask this. We've only had one person. But if we step back and recognize that around 20% of Australia's population are people with disability. You might only get a request for one type of inclusion, but if you are able to include people with disability and all people with disability, then you're actually ensuring that 20% of our
population has full inclusion in society. It's not a simple or straightforward process, and it shouldn't be because we need to be able to recognise that we should be allowed to lead that. But in the long run, it's about having the ability to be part of non-segregated living spaces, non-segregated schools and non-segregated employment. Those things are basic 101 things that we should have absolute choice to be able
to do in a way that is absolutely accessible. It means that simple things like being able to have access to easy English.
Or.
Auslan versions of all communications should be available as the first step, not the second or third, or the reminder step afterwards. It should be that all forms of apps that we have to use for our job are fully accessible to screen readers. That should again be just the first step of the conversation, not the third or the patch step of how we're doing things so we can do our jobs in the exact same way that we
need to, to be as effective as possible. Those are the key aspects we need to make sure that there is a genuine partnership with people with disability, with us and the government and our society, so that we can be fully included.
Megan, before we wrap up, if people would love to get in touch with people with disabilities Australia, what is the best way for them to do that. And what sort of things can you offer for people who may be experiencing quite a lot of feelings and concerns following these outcomes?
Absolutely. So we do have a great website that has a lot of really helpful information, as well as some overview of what you can do. So you can go to poody.org. So org.edu. And on our website we've got a lot of different pieces of information. However you can also give us a call. We have got A18 hundred number. And sometimes that's much more accessible for people. So that number is 1800 422 015. Or you can send us an email at poody@poody.org dot a you and we can support you
with multiple things. So obviously as part of it, we do have membership available, free membership available for any person with disability that wants to be kept in the loop on what is happening. We also have advisory groups that you can be part of, and we keep you up to date with the latest news in the disability community. We also have some really great resources around things like language guides, Auslan videos, easy read information, and some great
resources for journalists as well. But also we can provide independent support and advice so we can do individual advocacy support. We can talk to you and support you around housing and accommodation, the NDIS, especially around discrimination, abuse and neglect and we can also support students with disability as well.
That was Megan Spindler Smith, deputy CEO of people with Disabilities Australia. There who joined me today to chat about the Disability Royal Commission and the latest outcomes from the government's response earlier this month. I'm Sam Culley and you're listening to Talking Vision. On Vision Australia Radio, associated Stations
of Reading Radio and the Community Radio Network. If you'd love to listen to a full version of our conversations today, they will be available as interview highlights later this week to enjoy. But if you'd like to listen to the programme in full at another time, you can also do that of course, through the Vision Australia Radio website at VA radio.org that's VA radio.org. Or you can find the program on the podcast app of your choice or through
the Vision Australia library. And speaking of the Vision Australia Library, it's my great pleasure to welcome library manager Sarah Bloedorn to Talking Vision. I started off our conversation today by asking Sarah about some events that are coming up in the Vision Australia library over the next few weeks.
Yeah, absolutely. Always lots happening in the library. We've got some exciting things happening very soon. First of all, we're launching our next series of memoir writing. We hold memoir writing probably twice a year because it's so popular. Every time we advertise those series of memoir writing, we get
booked up with a waitlist. So I encourage you, if you've thought about doing your memoir before, maybe you've heard about our program but haven't had a chance to jump on and be involved yet, please get in touch and get signed up. So this one starts August 30th. So you've still got a few days and we've still got some spots in there And what it is is it's a six week online program, so it doesn't matter where you are across the country listening to this. You can
be part of our program. So we've got an amazing bunch of authors that will help you. Whether you've just started writing your memoir or whether you haven't started or whether you've started and put it down years ago. Wherever you're at, absolutely take a chance and get involved in that program. It's free. All of our programs are free. I probably should mention that for anybody that hasn't heard about our programs before, all of them are free to join.
On the 2nd of October, we have an in conversation with Candice Fox. Candice Fox is an amazing Australian author. She's a crime fiction author, so I haven't read a lot of her work. Sam, maybe you have, I'm not sure, but I know a lot of our listeners and a
lot of our readers love their crime stories. So Candice will be with us on the 2nd of October for around about an hour, and we have the opportunity to chat to her about everything from what inspires her to write these gritty crime novels, to what's her writing process like. And you can ask questions yourself. So once again, this is an online event. So join from wherever you are in the comfort of your home. If you have questions
for Candice, that's wonderful. If you just want to have a listen, that's also wonderful too.
I haven't personally had a read of Candice Fox, but I know quite a few friends and family out there who are big crime buffs. They may have heard of Candice, so I'll be sure to have a chat with them about that. Though I'm big fans of the crime genre going all the way back to, you know, Raymond Chandler back in the 30s and all that sort of thing and all the way through. I love a good Agatha Christie,
all those sort of ones. But, um, yeah. So we'll get back to the details about how people can register and find out more about the library at the end. But in the meantime, Sarah, I'd love to hear about some new releases from the library that members can look forward to having a read or listen to.
Yeah, absolutely. So one that stood out to me in this month list is called The Librarian Next. Hopefully I'm saying that right. I think I just like the title by Patrick DeWitt. So it's about a man called Bob who's a retired librarian passing his days surrounded by books
in his house in Oregon. One morning on his daily walk, he encounters a confused elderly woman lost in a market and returns her to the senior center that is her home, hoping to fill the void he's known since retiring, he begins volunteering at the center, and this is the basis for this story where we get to enjoy learning about this man. The librarian, as he's called it, says it's a melancholy, but also a bright comedy full of bizarre and outsized players, which just sounds great to me. Sounds
like a really nice, feel good book. Probably not a crime novel from the sound of that, but sounds really lovely. And there's another one that has been popular, and along with crime, we often we find our historical fiction is very popular. And there's one called The Scent Keeper, about a woman called Emmeline who lives on a remote island with her father learning all about his experiences and his
understanding of the natural world. As she grows, so does her curiosity, until one day the unforeseen happens and she is vaulted into the real world, a place of love, betrayal, ambition and revenge. To understand her past, Emmeline must unlock the clues to her identity, a quest that challenges the limits of her heart and imagination. So that's another one that has been popular with our readers this month, and
we actually have a whole session about historical books. Whether you like your historical romance or your war novels, with one of our Treat Your Shelf coming up soon. Okay, so our treat yourself, as I'm sure you know, Sam, is an opportunity really to hear from you, our listeners and our readers, about what you enjoy reading. And the theme of our August 27th one is Upending the Hourglass.
So it's all about historical fiction, taking the reader beyond what's available to time traveling between the pages So come along and share your favorite historical fiction reads. It's not all bonnets and lords and ladies. There's a wealth of new release modern historical fiction to enjoy.
All right, that's really cool. And you know, if people would love to sign up to those events, they're listening to this and thinking, oh my God, that's amazing. I'd love to get involved in writing my own memoir, or finding out a bit more about historical fiction, or taking part in all the other events that are in store for people out there. What is the best way for them to get in touch and contact the library and get online and find out more?
Yeah, the quickest way to join is generally online. So Vision Australia. Org slash library. And on there you'll see all of our upcoming events. So anything that I've spoken about today. But there's also things that I haven't had a chance to mention or ones that are coming up
in the future. Generally you just register online, so we just ask for a few details, get you signed up, and that way you're in the system and we'll email you ahead of the program to remind you, hey, you're coming along and keep you in touch with the library. You can also call, though, if you would like to. We're very happy to register you online or do it for you through the phone. So that's 1300 654 656. I'll just repeat that one again. It's 1300 654 656. And you can also
email library at Vision Australia. Org with any questions. So it might be about one of the programs I've mentioned today. Also a book that you're interested in, whether it's one that I spoke about or a book that you just want to see if the library can get. That's always the best email to start the conversation, and we'll make sure we direct you to whoever can help you with your query.
Okay. And, Sarah, I think it's also worth letting our listeners know a little bit more about the formats that they can access their favorite book or audio book, because we haven't really done that for the past little while. So it's always good to refresh people's memory. What sort of formats can people access their favorite books?
Sure.
Well, we we love to set the library that we want to help you read in whatever way you choose. And so for each of us, that might be different. We do specialize as a library in audiobooks, particularly we have over 60,000 titles in audio, which is amazing. They're all human narrated. So it means you're listening to a real person read the book, which is a lovely experience. And we have every genre under the sun. We also have a Braille library. So again, with both audio or braille,
if we don't have something, you can suggest it. And because our library exists for our clients and our readers, we're going to do our very best to get it for you. So when you join the library, you can let us know how you like to read. Some people like to read both ways. They like Braille and audio, and we'll help to support you in that. If you are an audio reader, we have an app that can go onto your smartphone or tablet that a lot of
people make use of. We do also have some other devices that you can access if you're not wanting to use our phone or a tablet. So again, very happy to have that conversation with you at any point and support you to find that with Braille we do have physical braille. So a braille book that will be posted in the mail. But we also have E Braille. So if you use an E Braille device you can access the files. Yeah. So however you like to read we're here to help you.
Perfect. Well if you'd love to find out a little bit more about that and perhaps sign up as a member or find out if your favorite book is available, or just sign up for one of those events, or many more that Sarah has mentioned there. Feel free to
get in touch with the library anytime. I've been speaking today with Vision Australia library manager Sarah Bloedorn about the latest releases available to members at the Vision Australia Library, along with some exciting events coming up over the next few weeks And that's all the time we have for today. You've been listening to Talking Vision. Talking vision is a Vision Australia radio production. Thanks to all involved with putting the show together every week. And remember, we love hearing
from you. So please get in touch any time on our email at Talking Vision. At Vision australia.org. That's talking vision all one word at Vision australia.org. But until next week it's Sam Coley saying bye for now.
You can contact Vision Australia by phoning us anytime during business hours on 1300 847 406. That's 1300 847 406 or by visiting Vision australia.org. That's Vision australia.org.