Vision Australia today congratulated Minister Fifield for his stewardship of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) over the past two years and his promotion to Cabinet and Minister for Communications.
The Minister was a champion of the Scheme and of people with a disability and he took a keen interest in the issues faced by people who are blind or have low vision.
The Minister now has the opportunity to continue his advocacy for people with a disability by finally putting audio description on Australian TV and quickly ratifying the Marrakesh Treaty.
Audio description is a verbal commentary, through narration, which explains what is happening in a television program during the natural pauses in the audio. This can include describing entire scenes where there is no dialogue, conveying facial expressions, a person's actions and emotions, costumes, scenery and abrupt scene changes.
The Marrakesh Treaty will significantly expand the choice of books to read for people who are blind or have low vision. It will allow organisations to share books directly with individuals who are blind or have other print disabilities around the world, as well as enable the international exchange of books between relevant organisations and prevent the need to duplicate production in different countries.
The Joint Standing Committee on Treaties recently recommended expedient ratification of the Treaty and Australia has fallen behind the rest of the English speaking world when it comes to audio description on television.
Vision Australia is supporting a recently created change.org petition calling on the Minister for Communications to, “help people who are blind or have low vision to get Audio Description on Australian free to air TV.”
The petition has been created by Stephen Jolley, who has been blind since birth. In his petition he notes that this has given him a first-hand appreciation of the power of words in story-telling.
“You get a more complete idea of what’s going on in a program and it’s so nice not to have to ask my wife about what’s happening or ‘what’s on the screen?’” he said.
“Audio description really feeds the imagination and enriches the experience of television.”
“Fortunately, there are laws that require TV stations to caption shows for people who are deaf, but that’s not going far enough.”
“I’d like Minister Fifield to lead the way in changing the law and provide the same access to television programming for the blindness and low vision community,” Stephen said.
Maryanne Diamond AO, Vision Australia’s General Manager of Advocacy and Engagement welcomed the support of the more than 1,000 people who have signed the petition so far.
“Audio description has been available on US television since the late 1980s. Since then it has been introduced in many European countries and in New Zealand in 2012.”
“Without audio description on television, the 350,000 Australians who are blind or have low vision miss out on important news and current affairs, entertainment and other information.”
“They’re unable to take part in a very basic and ubiquitous recreational activity with their family and friends and can’t talk to their own children about what they’re watching.”
“It is frustrating, isolating and discriminatory,” Ms Diamond said.