00:04
S1 (Speaker 1)
This is Studio One on Vision Australia Radio.
S2
You know, this is Sam, and you're listening to Studio One, your weekly look at life from a low vision and blind point of view here on Vision Australia Radio. On this week's show, we find out what blind citizens Australia is and does from their president, Fiona Woods.
As we always say at this point, please do get in touch with the show. Whether you have experience of any of the issues covered in this episode of Studio One, or if you think there is something we should be talking about, you never know. Your story and your insight may help somebody else who is dealing with something similar. You can email us Studio one at Vision Australia. Org that's studio one at Vision australia.org.
Darwin circa the early 1990s. Several workers who had a vision impairment received a notice from the tax department, saying they had claimed an allowance twice. As it turned out, anyone who was paid district allowance in their pension should not claim the remote area allowance in their tax forms. The trouble is, no one ever told us this. Some had tax bills in the thousands as this was a problem only affecting vision impaired and blind workers.
There was only one group who could help what was then called the National Foundation of Blind Citizens, now known as Blind Citizens Australia. I'm joined by Fiona Woods, who's the president of VCA. Now you're listening. Some of you may not know what those letters mean. I looked it up on the internet. It's the Business Council of Australia. I got that right, Fiona.
S3
No. It's blunt. Well, there may well be that, but I'm the president of Blind Citizens Australia, which is the real BCA, of course. The first thing I did was actually jump onto the website and go BCmA. And of course that came to the Business Council of Australia. So what we need is talk and then you'll find us.
S2
So you hear in the media, well, in our media anyway, your organisation mentioned quite a lot and my colleague Peter Greco will talk to quite a few of you guys. But what we often don't hear is exactly who BCA are, where they came from, and what exactly do you guys do?
S3
Well, hope settle in for a long listen. Citizens Australia is a representative organisation of people who are blind or vision impaired. So unlike other organisations which provide services, we are an organisation made up of members who are blind or visually impaired. So everyone who's a member is a person who's blind or visually impaired. We do have associate members who are people who identify with our aims and like what we do, but have vision. And our mission or our purpose is to inform, connect and empower people who are blind or visually impaired and the wider community.
So that means a range of different things. That includes peer support. And I'll go through these and talk a bit more about what they are. But there's peer support, individual advocacy, systemic advocacy and campaigns and information. So I suppose fundamentally the organization started in 1975. So we're looking forward to planning our 50th anniversary soon. And it was got together by a group of people who are blind or visually impaired, who thought that there wasn't a voice for those people. There were a few different organisations of professional blind people and musicians and various people like that. But I guess coming out of the international experience that they wanted a national organisation that would represent people and speak for blind people on behalf of ourselves. I wasn't there, but on behalf of themselves.
So rather than other people speaking for us and based on a human rights approach, that people had rights and should be able to speak for themselves rather than just receiving whatever charity services were available at that time, it was very much still a charity model of here's a service, you can have it, take it or leave it kind of, and we'll take care of you because we're the people to do that. Well, people who are blind, abusing peer didn't really think that that was respecting their human dignity. And so they got together in this organization. There were a few state based organizations that had a similar philosophy, but we wanted a national one where we could speak for all of Australia.
So things have moved on, obviously, in that 50 years. And, you know, we have all sorts of government schemes and service providers have changed the way they approach things as well. Largely, I think partly because of the activities of groups like BCA and, you know, changes in the world philosophy. But a lot of the things that people still want are still the same. So one of the main things we offer is peer support.
So for people who are blind or vision impaired, can come together and share ideas. And that might be about all sorts of things. We actually run a series of peer connect groups, and some of them are about ones about acquired vision loss. So that's what people who are going through the process of losing their sight. There's ones about travel, employment. I think there's one about studying. There's all sorts of official groups. But what we find just generally we come together in branches and at meetings. Generally people just want to talk about how they do things. So a lot of us will share information about, you know, how you use your phone or I'm in the women's branch and I've quite often had conversations about, oh, how do you go about sweeping the floor? Like very fundamental things that really matter to people.
But out of that sometimes comes much more deeper and systemic issues are like, so we all might talk about, oh gosh, it was really annoying. I was on the train and I had no idea where I was going. And you know, how do you know when to get off? So over the years, that's led to campaigns for things like audible announcements on trains, and now it's on almost well where I live. It's quite noticeable if there isn't an audible announcement. But 50 years ago, obviously that never happened.
And going further than that, if the audible announcements don't happen, we now have, you know, we have the Disability Discrimination Act so that we might decide to take action to enforce that to happen. So from that really basic peer support, all sorts of other things lead on. But guess fundamentally it's about us coming together to support each other and work together for the things that will further our participation in society.
06:25
S2
So one of the things I've noticed over the years, I mean, there been quite a few CEOs and presidents, but you all are actually legally blind. Is there is that a requirement as far as membership of the board or the structure of the leadership?
S3
Yeah, I think it's quite unique. One of the requirements to be a board member, you have to be blind or visually impaired. We have recently changed our constitution. So being totally blind means you have little or no usable vision. And being vision impaired means that you have a vision loss that affects the way you undertake activities of daily life. So we used to have a very medical idea that, you know, you had to reach a certain level of blindness to be eligible. But we recognise that for many people that's a challenging thing. And it's really about whether you identify as being blind or visually impaired.
But yeah, all our board are blind or visually impaired and we have a range. You know, some of us have been totally blind for a long time, and other people have been through sort of a loss of vision over their lifetime. And other people have acquired their vision loss quite suddenly. So think that perspective is really important, that we don't all have the same experience or attitude or even beliefs about about disability, I suppose, except that we all believe that, you know, we're as good as anyone else.
And we, of course, also aim for other types of diversity. We have people with diverse cultural backgrounds and and Aboriginal person and different gender or sexual orientation, all of those other sorts of things that really are representative of the society we live in.
S2
Well, I mean, that's something I've constantly said about blind or visually impaired people is that when you think of the average blind or visually impaired person, there is no such thing.
S3
No, that's that's right. And so I guess one of the I haven't gone on to talk about all the other things does, but one of the other things we do is we have a staff and the staff is all around Australia, and a lot of the staff does is advocating for our needs to governments and organisations and all sorts of places. But when, when doing that, it's really important that we advocate for the breadth of our community. So it's no good me saying, well, I really like, you know, this type of tactile ground surface indicator. So that's what I want, what I need to know is what the majority of people want, and even beyond the majority, what will meet everyone's needs.
So when we're advocating, it's important that we're not just advocating for what an individual person wants, but for what the range of people want. And so when we do come up with submissions or when we put a policy forward, consultation is really important to us. So we make sure that we try and speak to members in all different areas of the country and all different types of experiences. We aim for all different ages and backgrounds. And, you know, obviously it's a big thing to meet. You know, it's a lot of things to try and consult with people, but we really do try and consult as broadly as possible. And we also try to speak for people who aren't our members.
So we have a few thousand members, but there's probably 500,000 people in Australia who've got some, some form of vision impairment. So we're going citizens. Australia isn't there just to speak for our members. We're speaking for for all people. So we try and make sure that we take into account different perspectives. And that includes people with multiple disabilities and, you know, a whole range of diversity that needs to be included.
S2
I'm glad you brought that up, because I've known a few people over the years who don't quite fall into that classification as legally blind, but they are severely vision impaired, but still can't drive a car, for example, and still have all the inconveniences without the benefits really, of the pension or anything like that.
S3
Well, I sometimes think the biggest disability is not being able to drive a car because it does a whole lot of other things, both in that and living in a house with no drivers. It does make a big impact on your life. And if you don't have access to sort of travel concessions or pensioner concessions or any of the other things as well, it can be quite challenging. But I understand that's why, you know, a lot of service providers talk more about low, low vision, whereas we talk about vision impairment. And I suppose philosophically, we would think there's a point where the vision impairment is the thing that makes the difference to our participation in society. So that's why we've stayed with that focus.
But and I also understand that for people to decide to join an organisation that speaks for blind people is a big a big step. Perhaps if you're losing vision to actually say, these are the people I now identify with, and that's why we've gone away from the very strict medical definition of of when you're a person with vision impairment, because I think that's something you have to identify yourself. But yeah, obviously the needs of people as they may be losing vision or not, because you can be low vision and it might never change, but you obviously have a different range of things that need to be taken into account.
And so when we're producing publications and things like that, it's obviously important for us to include not just Braille, but audio and large print. And the same way we're advocating for those things from the government, it's important that all of those things can be available to people. And when we're talking about things being accessible, they need to be accessible, not just for people using screen readers like myself, but they need to be able to people who are using magnification, or they might be using all sorts of other. Speaking things. And similarly, you know, these people who are deafblind, who need tactile things. So it's really a very diverse range of people we need to take into account.
11:48
S2
You mentioned multiple disabilities. I mean, are there many people within your organisation or that you deal with that do, for example, have a hearing impairment as well or with physical disabilities? In my Paralympic years, I did come across quite a few people with cerebral palsy, for example, who also were classifiable as legally blind.
S3
Yeah, that would be right. And of course, there'll be, you know, a large number of people who are neurodiverse as well, whether or not, you know, we know about that. But I guess the important well, not the important thing, but we know that blindness is very much something that happens with aging and quite often that very often that goes hand in hand with some sort of hearing loss as well. So it's very common, I think.
Plus there's a few conditions. I think usher syndrome, there's a few conditions that are connected with the two things loss of hearing and and sight. But of course, there's also people who are deaf blind, who have deaf, blind organization, but they're very much part of people we need to take into account and think about.
S2
Let's talk about you for a little while. So when did you get started with BCA?
S3
I have been blind since early childhood, and I went to a blind school, and then I went to a I was integrated into a normal school. I decided school was very normal. It was actually a girls school, private girls school. So I don't think it was particularly though. And then I travelled overseas and while I was overseas, I suppose I really started to think about what being blind meant, because, you know, it was something I'd always been. And so I never thought about it. But as a young adult, I suppose, in a foreign country, it really occurred to me that it actually had a bit more of an impact on me, that it might, if I could just see and hop on the train and go wherever.
So I got very involved and interested in reading about blindness history, I suppose I started to find what is there any history of blind people and what sort of organisations are there? So I read a lot about the National Federation of Blind People in America, which had been a very active organisation and had some fairly strong views about lots of things. And when I came back to Australia, I started to sort of think, well, this is actually something that aligns really with what I think that that people who are blind do have human rights and we should be able to advocate for ourselves.
And so I contacted what was called National Federation of Blind Citizens of Australia at that time. I contacted them and they said, oh, actually, we're having a convention in Canberra this week. Would you like to come along? And I was in Melbourne, so I was unemployed at that point. So I hopped on a bus and went to the convention in Canberra and got very quickly involved and actually joined the governing body. At that point, I think they were very excited to have someone who was young and interested, so they got me on their board and I worked on that for a few years.
But then I started to, you know, I started a family and it all became a bit much doing all the voluntary work. So I went away from that time from the board. But obviously stayed as a member and stayed very interested and, you know, followed the work of what was happening. And then as my children grew up and had a bit more voluntary time, I came back to the board in 2017 to to really get back involved in the work that I was doing.
And I think that is one of the things about BCA. Hopefully it's been here 50 years and hopefully always will be. So it's one of those things that I think as people change and things happen, people have have more or less interest or need. But certainly for me as a young mother, it was really great to have some members who were parents who I could talk to about some of the challenges of parenting. And, you know, as has gone by, you know, technologies change. So I need to talk with people about that. And now, as a sort of older single woman, there's also lots of things to talk about. So BCA can can, I think, meet people's needs at a whole different range of times. And I mean.
15:35
S2
That's the thing, even if we managed to solve every issue that was out there, and I thoroughly doubt that we would, it still is handy to actually know that there's somebody out there also that is has similar as a similar disability that you can relate to, isn't it.
S3
Yeah, I think that's right. We've often talked about, you know, in an ideal world, in 30 years time, what would we be doing? And I think we would still think that they'd still be things where even if everything was equal, you know, we could go wherever we want to do whatever we want, have whatever job we what they'd still be things we would find it helpful to talk to other people who are blind about. And that's the value of it. But in the meantime, we've got plenty of work to be doing. You know, moving out those barriers and really making sure people can get the jobs that they want to get and the training that they need and the education they're entitled to.
S1
This is Studio One on Vision Australia Radio.
S2
Thank you for listening to Studio One as we continue our chat with BCA President Fiona Woods. What are some of the issues at the moment that I don't know, inspire Fiona Woods?
S3
Oh, well, there's there's so many. Audio description has been a really big one that we've worked on a lot over the years. And I suppose that one sort of inspires me because we've got some games in that one, even though it's taken 20 years, you know, there's now audio description on ABC and SBS on some programs, free to air. And then excitingly, this year that was launched on iview and I believe it's it's quietly launched on SBS On Demand as well. We really want to see that that is part of legislation that it's mandated, because at the moment it's a question of the ABC's budget, and it's budgeted for at the moment, but it's not compulsory that that continues. And we would like to say that on free to air television and on all sorts of other things as well.
So that's one thing I'm particularly interested in more accessible financial products as well, and services, because I think a lot of frustrations for a lot of people are trying to do things like banking and superannuation and getting information about various products, energy providers. There's been a lot of discussion this year about, you know, everyone should go and choose the best energy plan and save themselves some money. And that's quite a complicated thing to do if you're trying to use a screen reader or magnification. So those are the things I think we still need to be working on.
Accessible voting is something that is very different in all the different states and federally. So how people get to vote is very inconsistent in this country. And that's a big area that lots of work needs to be done in as well. And of course, as I say, over the 50 years that we've nearly existed, some issues haven't changed. And accessible transport, public transport is still a big one. Lots of people are still being refused taxis or Ubers because of their dog guides. There's some issues that just seem to be not intractable, but they just seem to require constant, constant effort. And even the basic things like walking around your streets safely, you know, do do people put hazards in your way? Obviously, e-scooters has been a huge issue for many people.
S2
Yes. They're fun.
S3
Yeah, yeah. So where I live, we don't have them because we don't have enough footpaths really. But and silent vehicles, electric vehicles, all these, these things, there's so many issues that we have to keep working on. And sometimes it's trying to work out our priorities and working out where to put our resources. And part of that is working often with the service organisations. So working with people like Pigeon Australia and Guide dogs to make sure that when we're advocating for things we are, we're going to have more success if we can consistently and sort of be working out what it is we want to say and then say together, so that that's really an important part of our work as well.
S2
Something that has come about recently, as in in the last decade or so is the NDIS, and it has been said that that was the one time where all the disability organisations worked together. I mean, the one thing I noticed is it's now supplanted Centrelink as the thing that most of us tend to complain about the most. Any any thoughts on where things are going at the moment?
S3
Well, firstly, I should say the ones who get to complain about it, a sort of the lucky ones in a sense, because as we know, there's huge numbers of people who are not eligible for the NDIS, including, of course, anyone who's over 65 when it rolled out in the area. And for those people, I think my aged care system really doesn't meet the needs of people with disability. And that's a big area.
20:05
S2
Oh no, no, that's...
S3
A big area that we also need to remember. So when we talk about the NDIS, we always try to remember that, but think the NDIS is an interesting thing because we all love to complain about it and there's very good reasons why we do, but also for sometimes I think it's really important to remember what it has actually made possible for us, because I know that some people hearing all the complaints and thinking about the complexities have decided not to actually access it. And I think that's unfortunate if they're able to, because certainly for me, it's really enabled me to do a whole lot of things that I never could do.
So, you know, apart from having someone actually maintain my, my garden and make sure my gutters are cleaned of things before bushfire season, you know, I can I can decide to go and go to an event somewhere that I probably would have thought of. That's really difficult. It's a bit complicated. And I might stay home or I might, you know, I can go shopping without having to ask my kids or family or friends or any of those people to come with me. So I think that when we're talking about the NDIS, I think it's important to remember what it has offered us as well as what what the challenges are.
But obviously the challenges are making sure that people can can actually access the service in the first place. And some of the registration processes are difficult. And obviously there's just been a huge review, and one of the BCA was funded to do some reviews of that and to consult all our members. So we held consultations, a lot of them online, but all around the country about what people. Thought about the ice and how it was working, how it could be better.
And I guess some of the main areas are problems with the plan process, you know, difficulty making sure that people actually were funded for the services that they needed. And that can be difficult because often you hear about somebody else who's got something that you didn't get, and it's meant to be an individualized system, but we need to make sure that that system reflects the actual individual needs rather than the person's ability to advocate for themselves. So you might get different things, but that should be because you need different things, and not because you weren't as good at speaking up for yourself or getting the reports you needed.
So I think some of those things are fundamental. Yeah, there's quite a serious report coming out, and I think we're all waiting to see what that will say. But I think it's important that it doesn't doesn't limit anyone's access and that the access that we have can be fair, particularly for people in remote areas. You know, there's lots of problems if there's people might have access to a service and they might be funded for a service, but if there's no one to provide it, then that's not it's not going to happen. And we also know that people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds have much less likelihood of accessing the service successfully.
And of course, it just unfortunately really isn't meeting the needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people particularly well. So they're all areas we need to work on or the government needs to work on. And but, you know, I'm hoping there is a will for that. And it'll be really interesting to see what comes out of the review.
S2
Indeed, one of the most basic things I spotted when I first applied myself was that you need to get another medical to qualify, which I'm. I don't know about you, but I've been on a on this blind pension since I was 16. And so in theory, everything that says that I'm blind is already on file. And instead of actually getting that, they could have just been a tick box to say yes, I agree for all my information to come across, but I'm not sure what I know. I'd probably don't know much about these things.
S3
Yeah, I think when I joined there was a rollover system. But yes, it's always funny when you're actually asked for something from your ophthalmologist, for example. And you know, obviously if you don't have any, any functioning eyes, you don't have one. So that's always a challenge.
S2
I'm in the same boat here because my eyesight stabilised when I was six. So if I see an ophthalmologist they say, why are you seeing me? So, you know, an optometrist knows more about what I'm doing, and even they don't know how your disability affects you. That's the incredible thing. Yeah.
S3
And I think that's one of the stories people have, whether it's NDIS or anything to do with disability. I think people really just don't want to have to always tell their story. I think having to tell your GP when you want a companion card or when you want an NDIS review, or any of the things that you might be eligible for, is having to go through your story, what's happened to you, but also having to tell somebody all the time, all the things that means you can't do.
And I know this because, yeah, if you ever do this with your children or yourself, it's very hard to have to say all the things you're not good at because, you know, and I think for people going for aged care packages or friendly packages part of the time, the reason people probably don't get as many as much as some other people is that particularly as blind people, we spent most of our lives trying to prove that we can do things. It's really hard to actually put yourself around and say, oh, can you dress yourself? Well, of course I can dress myself. I'm sick of people asking me that question. But actually what I want to be saying is, well, I can dress myself, but I actually find it difficult to choose clothes at the shops, and I find that sometimes difficult to, you know, be sure that they're clean enough or to mend them or to iron them.
There can be all sorts of nuances with those questions, but we've spent a lot of our time trying to prove that we are completely independent. So it's very hard to bring yourself to having to answer those questions in a way that will get you the services that you need.
25:33
S2
Fiona, thank you very much for helping us to find out. Well, exactly what these three letters BCA mean. If someone is out there and thinks, you know what, I want to get involved with this, or I just want to turn up to meetings or whatever, what do you need to do to get involved if you're not already a member?
S3
Well, firstly, anyone who's gone to was impaired can be a member who lives in Australia and it's free to join, so there's no barriers there. You can call 1800 033 660 and they will help you with a membership form. Or you can go to BCA, org dot AEW and you can sign up as a member. And we have lots of different mailing lists. We have announcements lists and we have a couple we have local branches. So you could maybe join your local branch. We have the women's special interest branch. If you're a woman you can join that. And each of those branches have their own events and mailing lists.
But importantly you can also come to any of our events. There must be online. You can come to them without being a member. So if you're interested just go to the website bbc.co.uk and. Lined up about the different events we have coming up. Or you can call that phone number 1800 033 660. And there's actually recordings on there of different events that we have coming up. So we have one coming up on November the 9th in the evening, 730, which is about the disability Royal Commission and the findings from that, and kind of the ones that are particularly relevant to us. So that will be an interesting thing coming up.
S2
That was a topic I was going to bring up, but we ran out of time. I think that would be an interesting show in itself. So thank you again, Fiona. We'll look forward to talking to you again.
S3
Thanks. We'll look forward to it.
S2
The heads of both the tax department and Centrelink to fix all this up, and none of us ended up having to pay a cent next week in the build up to Melbourne's Disability Expo, which at to blindness and legless themselves. Ben Pettengill and Mike Rowles. Between now and then, please do get in touch with the show. Whether you have experience with any of the issues covered in this episode of Studio One, or if you think there's something we should be talking about, you never know. Your story and your insight may help somebody else who is dealing with something similar. Our email address is studio one at Vision Australia. Org, that's studio one at Vision Australia-dot-org. Bye for now.
27:55
S1
Vision Australia Radio gratefully acknowledges the support of the Community Broadcasting Foundation for Studio One.
