BCA President, and Lifetime Achievement Award

Program theme song 0:00

New Horizons. It's up to you and me to shine a guiding light and lead the way. United by our cause, we have power to pursue what we believe, we'll achieve the realisation of our dreams...

Vaughn Bennison 0:30

Hello and welcome to this episode of New Horizons. I'm Vaughn Bennison. Thanks for your company. This is a slightly bittersweet moment for me, because after more than nine years, this will be our last episode as host of New Horizons. It's been a bit of a journey since October 2015 when I took over the program. And episode number 428 was the first program I recorded. This is episode number 886 I will be back again throughout the coming years as president of Blind Citizens Australia. And also, we might find that there's one or two interviews which I've recorded, which haven't yet been used, but will be used in the future. 

But in the meantime, I wanted to thank all of the people who have worked with me and have assisted and contributed to New Horizons over the years. Of course, there's all the people I've interviewed, and there must be hundreds of them. I'd hate to think how many interviews I've actually recorded, but also there are the people who've contributed by providing information to me, providing story ideas, coming up with lists of questions, helping me record the program, doing on the spot interviews, and just generally, supporting new horizons and the work that I've done as the editor, producer and presenter of the program over the last nine years and roughly two months. Thank you all very much for your support and thank you for your involvement with the program. 

And I know that New Horizons will continue to go from strength to strength. I just won't be at the helm this week. The interview is conducted by John Simpson.

John Simpson 1:59

It's been a busy time for both Emma and Vaughn Bennison, and it's a pleasure to have you both in the program this week. In recent days, Vaughn's confirmation as President of Blind Citizens Australia has been confirmed at their Annual General Meeting, and Emma was honoured on International Day of People with Disabilities with the Leslie Hall Lifetime Achievement Award. 

We'll come to you first, Vaughn - you might like to take us through the major outcomes of that meeting.

Vaughn Bennison 2:29

We heard a little bit about what had been happening with BCA throughout the year. We heard a fairly comprehensive financial report from Andrew Webster, who is the head of the finance, audit and risk management committee, or the farm, as it's termed in BCA. We heard who the new directors were, and we've spoken to them on this program. And of course, I was, as you said, confirmed as president, and we had many thank yous from the President and from the board for people who've been involved in BCA and its work over the last year or so.

I gave a small presentation at the end talking about the importance of the role of President, and my acknowledgement of the fact that as the President, you are nominally the leader of an organisation, but really what your role is is to support other people to do their work. It was really a role of facilitation and leadership in terms of making sure that everybody has the resources that they need to do their job. I also talked about the fact that as the President, the buck stops with you, and that you know you are the final port of call for any issues or any anything that happens within the organisation during your term as president. 

And we also heard about the Jeffrey Blythe Foundation and the state of its current finances. And also we found out how much it was going to be awarding to Blind Citizens Australia this financial year, we're going to be meeting in the next week or so to talk about what the plans will be over the next 12 months, what the meeting cadences will be, who's responsible for which portfolios and how all that will be managed. I'd really like to think that we would start planning our first face to face meeting for early in the new year. 

It's slightly difficult, John, because I haven't been on the board prior to coming in as President, so I sort of feel a little bit like an interloper, and whilst I know many of the board members personally, many of them I've never met, and many of them I haven't had the opportunity to work with, so it would be a really good opportunity to meet face to face and get to know each of them what their strengths are and where I can best fit in to provide them with the level of support that they need in order to be able to do their jobs. 

You know, one of the key aspects I think I'll be looking at over the next little while, is is really what the BCA culture is all about, and whether or not there needs to be any changes in order to assist BCA to best meet its its purpose and mission. 

John Simpson

What are the big ticket items for you? 

Vaughn Bennison

I think the key aspects that we need to be thinking about very seriously at the moment of the reform. That are coming through the recommendations from the disability Royal Commission and the NDIS. But it's not all about those two things. It's really about making sure that BCA is actually in touch with what its members want and what its members expect. 

And you know, speaking of being in touch, it's about getting the word out to the members and making sure that there is bi directional feedback and bi directional communication between Blind Citizens Australia and its members. And of course, through BCA communication between the members and other stakeholders, such as government, other bodies, peak bodies, and, you know, other key organisations. 

John Simpson 5:39

And of course, 2025 is a particularly big year for Blind Citizens Australia, as it celebrates its 50th anniversary, I imagine that plans are already well underway for that major celebration. 

Vaughn Bennison 5:52

They certainly are, John - the convention is happening in June of next year, and we'll be looking forward to seeing what the committee which is organising the actual sessions that the convention has for us, and what other sort of celebrations will be happening throughout 2025 as BCA, as you say, celebrates its 50th year, and I celebrate my 50th anniversary as well. 

John Simpson 6:14

And speaking of celebrations, Emma Bennison is also with us - and Emma, congratulations on your recent award of the Leslie Hall Lifetime Achievement Award. We might delve into a little bit of the history. Who was Leslie Hall and why is the award named for her?

Emma Bennison 6:33

Leslie was a real trail trailblazer when it came to visibility advocacy. She was a very, very staunch supporter of the right of women with disability. Someone described her very kindly to me the other day as feisty, and I think that's a very accurate description. I was really fortunate to work with her quite closely. She was very passionate about arts and disability sector. She was the chair of Arts Access Victoria for quite some time - and as such, was representing Arts Access or representing Victoria on the Arts Access Australia board when I was the chair, and so she was an excellent support and mentor to me during that time, and I learned a lot from her, which makes receiving this award particularly special for me.

John Simpson 7:35

The Disability Leadership Institute, of course, is the host of the awards, and their online blurb says, and I quote, The Leslie Hall Award for Lifetime Achievement is awarded to an individual who has shown commitment to the disability rights movement and worked over time to achieve significant outcomes for disabled persons. Let's go back and ask you, when did your advocacy journey begin?

Emma Bennison 8:02

Informally, a very long time ago. I would say my first real kind of foray into advocacy would have been when I was, you know, at high school particularly, and having to advocate for information and accessible formats and those sorts of things. And you know, because I went to a mainstream school, there wasn't, wasn't always anybody else to do it. And so while at times that was difficult, I think it's was one of the opportunities for me to learn how to be an advocate. So I guess I'm grateful for it in hindsight.

John Simpson 8:42

The award citation refers to your leadership across, and I quote, disability, from the arts to advocacy to service delivery. Give us a brief snapshot of the various roles that you've undertaken over those years.

Emma Bennison 8:58

Yeah, I suppose the key ones in the arts would be, I was first an executive officer of Access Arts in Queensland. That's the peak body for arts and disability in Queensland... then the CEO of Arts Access Australia, and, of course, more recently, most people would know me as the former CEO of Blind Citizens Australia, and President before that, and then currently Chief Innovation Officer at Life Without Barriers, which is one of Australia's largest providers of human services. As a member of Life Without Barriers executive, my main focus is around ensuring that the the perspectives of lived experience are embedded into everything we do, so not just in the disability area, but across all of the services that we deliver, that lived experience is actually seen as. An asset and something that we really value in the organisation, and that really informs everything that we do.

John Simpson 10:08

The citation for your reward goes on and says... She reformed and modernised organisations like Blind Citizens Australia to benefit the members, and she has challenged power in large service provider organisations like Vision Australia... Emma now supports others to do the same. Many of our listeners, of course, Emma, will know your work, as you say, with Blind Citizens Australia. But where does Vision Australia fit in? 

Emma Bennison 10:34

Most recently, I think Vision Australia fits in because of my work with United Blind Leaders as one of the founders of that entity. And you know, I think what we have worked to do is to ensure that blind leadership is a priority for service providers. And Vision Australia just happens to be one of those service providers and Vision Australia, you know, was was going down the path of recruiting for a new CEO internally, rather than opening it up to the market externally. And what that meant was that effectively, there was going to be far less likelihood that a blind person would be appointed, and so, you know, a number of us pushed back on that decision. 

Over 1400 people fortunately agreed with us and signed a petition, and as such, Vision Australia has thankfully changed course and will be going to market for the appointment as their CEO. But our work has never, never been purely directed at Vision Australia, or we are talking to a range of different service providers, and, you know, make trying to make sure that blind leadership is is seen as a priority and that blind people are given opportunities to lead the organisations at service, which is as it should be. 

John Simpson 12:09

Can you tell us a little bit more about your commitment to leadership and to ensuring the leadership opportunities of others? 

Emma Bennison 12:18

I think my passion for it comes in part from what I was just talking about, in terms of making sure that blind people and people with disability more generally have the opportunity to lead and to bring our perspectives to the table. And I have, for many, many years now, just really been driven by a desire to make sure that, you know, I'm I'm not alone in gaining these opportunities. I've had a number of firsts in my leadership career, so one of them being that I was the first person with disability to lead Arts Access Australia. And you know, that precipitated a whole lot of discussion among people, and a whole lot of, I guess, speculation about whether, you know, person with disability could really do the job. 

And I don't want leaders to have to experience that in the future. I want leaders with disability to be seen as competent and to be seen as a safe pair of hands, and so you know that's what gets me out of bed in the morning.

John Simpson 13:26

Well, as often happens, time's beaten us for this program, but I take the opportunity then Emma, on behalf of our many listeners and your friends and supporters within Blind Citizens Australia and beyond, to congratulate you on your recent award... and to you, Vaughn, of course, this marks the end of an era where you have hosted and and produced Blind Citizens Australia's New Horizons program. So I think it's only fitting that I leave it to you to sign off in the usual way. 

Vaughn Bennison 13:57

Thank you, John. And for the final time, let me remind you, if you'd like to get in touch with Blind Citizens Australia, you can call 1 800 033 660... 1 800 033 660 ... and recall that BCA office will be closing down from the 20th of December until the sixth of January. So if you're wanting to get in touch, do so before that time, or you'll have to wait till after the sixth of January. If you'd like to email Blind Citizens Australia, the email address is bca@bca.org.au... bca@bca.org.au I'm Vaughn Benison. I won't talk to you again next week.

Program theme song 14:36

We'll achieve the realisation of our dreams..... dreams, of our dreams...