Discriminating against the disabled is illegal. Every shop, office and public building is now obliged to make premises accessible. And disability should never stop people taking jobs. The Government funds a service to help.
The "Access-to-Work" scheme helps individuals back to work with grants for everything from transport to specialist equipment.
Read the transcript for the film below:
Suzanne Briggs, Complementary Therapist:
I’m blind. I’ve got no sight at all, not even light and dark. I don’t class it as a disability as such. I’m Suzanne foremost, and I can’t see. That’s it, really.
Patient:
You can feel that, can’t you?
Suzanne Briggs, Complementary Therapist:
Yeah.
I lost it eight years ago over an eight-month period. I never had any eye problems before. It literally, start to finish, eight months, 18 operations, it was gone. When I lost my sight I decided it was an opportunity to change my career and do something maybe that I want to do. So I decided I wanted to become a reflexologist.
Patient:
I love people messing with my feet.
Suzanne Briggs, Complementary Therapist:
I have a big problem with discrimination, because I’ve seen before, it really, I won’t accept it, you know. I don’t class myself as disabled and I don’t see why I should have to suffer because I’m blind, and I was feeling that.
Andrew Skinner, ‘Access to Work’ Advisor:
Suzanne’s difficulties were the fact that she could not use a pen and paper to record her notes, to complete her diary. All the normal things that anybody else would record using a pen and paper Suzanne couldn’t do. So the task was to find a solution that would overcome that difficulty.
Electronic Voice:
A, I, G, H.
Suzanne Briggs, Complementary Therapist:
I’m self-employed and I didn’t think for one minute the scheme would pay for me to be completely rigged up at home.
Suzanne had to provide a basic computer, and then the equipment that she requires, over and above the basic computer, to meet those disability-specific needs, the cost then is met by Access to Work.
Suzanne Briggs, Complementary Therapist:
I think the biggest shame about it is that people do not know it’s there. I don’t think people understand the wide spectrum of it, that it can help so many of us, and I think as long as you’re within working age and you want to work, whether you’re self-employed or whatever you are, phone them. Don’t let other people tell you, "I don’t think it’s for you." Phone the Access to Work advisor and let him or her tell you whether they can help or not. I bet your bottom dollar they can.
Andrew Skinner, ‘Access to Work’ Advisor:
I take the disability out of disability.
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