CEDAW Conference and Women Resource Centre

I went in my capacity as steering group member of the Women Policy Forum at W.A.I.T.S (Women Acting In Todays Society) to the Women’s Resource Centre and Equality and Human Rights Commission launch of reportNot Just Bread but Roses Too: Funding to the Women’s Voluntary and Community Sector in England. at Westminster. There were four of us from the group but Anita Shervington and I represented WAITS.

Well, I was quite late because I couldn’t figure out how to get into the building and the man at the end of the buzzer gave me wrong instructions but in the end I got on the the platform lift which was hidden under the steps at One Great George Street. It was obviously designed so that it was in keeping with the front of the building architecture but not designate wheelchair users to some back entrance. I missed quite a bit of the speeches.

retreating stairs which transforms into platform lift

platform lift

After that launch on my way to my hotel I bumped into some of the delegates from Northern Ireland on the way to dinner in Chinatown, they wanted me to join them and I took them to the Wong Kei as the nearest accessible restaurant (we were on Wardour Street). I feel a bit guilty because they could have gone to a swankier restaurant which might not have been accessible but they didn’t seem to mind too much. I hope they didn’t.

late dinner at the Wong Kei

The next day, we were all well occupied with workshops and presentations at the Seizing the opportunities of CEDAW: Developing a women’s sector strategy for 2011. I must confess when I first started I wasn’t too sure what CEDAW (Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women) meant but later I saw the cross overs and how similar it was to the Convention on Rights of Disabled Persons (CRDP). I can now see its relevance as a tool for W.A.I.T.S work. I am not convinced that it will affect the day to day running of the work in progress. To wield it as an instrument/weapon, one has to exhaust the legal structure of the originating country. But it can be used to strengthen a case and failure to honour signed protocols can be used to embarrass the government – this is what I understood unless I got it all wrong. I need to study and digest its implications fuller to understand it better. (Links to WRC blog and photos)

I went to this workshop -

Making the European connections
National Alliance of Women’s Organisations
The European Union has led on many international milestones for women (e.g. women in politics), and has a powerful voice on the international stage. NAWO is the coordinating body for the European Women’s Lobby in England. Come to this workshop to find out about current efforts to mainstream gender equality in
Europe, how to monitor the UK government on its implementation of EU directives on women’s equality, and how to lobby MEPs on women’s rights issues.

We didn’t have enough time to give the discussion justice. I think the passion, the energy of the people involved energised and gave me strength. Vivienne Hayes, the Chief Executive, is inspiring in her untiring work for women and the centre and yet she is very down to earth and always have time for people. I’ve met many people who get puffed up by their own importance, or perception of their importance, and are always too busy to say hello but not Vivienne.

To a certain extent, if I digress a bit, I saw where this feeds back to Connect Culture and what I am trying to do with it. Women is very much part of the constituency that I want to work with. I think there are certain concerns that women travelers have which differs from a man – and that includes the need to feel safe and secure from harassment and violence. There are certain things men sometimes take for granted that women have to consider – just on the very basic need for toilets, for example. And this is more so for the disabled woman than the man.

‘thank you for organising such an interest trip’ : connect culture’s first review!

From Judy -

Zara in front of Notre Dame

Many thanks for organising such an interesting trip to Paris for us -
and for laying on such nice weather. We were a bit apprehensive about
taking a wheelchair to a foreign city we hadn’t visited before and it
was good to know that there was someone at the end of a phone whom we
could call on at any time if an emergency arose – and that it was
someone who had personal experience of traveling with a wheelchair in Paris and some useful contacts on the ground.

Thanks to your advice we knew exactly what to expect from Eurostar,
both at home and abroad, and of course we we were royally treated on
board.

The hotel was excellent, with plenty of space in our room to move
around in. It was nice that it was within easy walking distance of the
Gare du Nord where we arrived as it would have been a bit daunting to
have had to look for bus stops straight away. Unlike some so-called
accessible rooms, ours did have a bathroom with doors wide enough to
accommodate a wheelchair. Again, it was useful that all this had been
road-tested by someone else using a wheelchair.

We got to all the places we wanted to without having to spend hours
pouring over bus maps and timetables as all the work had been done for
us beforehand. We also had good advice on how to use buses and which
ones were accessible. Thanks to your advice we also managed to get to
some places we might not otherwise have considered and enjoyed some
lovely meals in spectacular surroundings.

I would highly commend Sainte Chapelle to anyone else’s itinerary. I
was quite blown away by the beauty of it when I first went to Paris
about forty years ago – in fact it’s about the only thing I can
remember from that trip, particularly because I had never heard of it
before I visited. Unlike Notre-Dame it is amazingly accessible to
wheelchair-users considering its great age and small size – in fact we
saw bits that able-bodied people didn’t.

I’m sorry we didn’t go up the Eiffel Tower, which was entirely Zara’s
choice. Although I suffer from vertigo I’m alright as long as I can’t
throw myself over and I guess you are pretty contained up the top.
There were awfully big crowds, which I suppose is what put Zara off,
and hopefully things would be easier on a weekday rather than the sunny
Saturday we chose.

I expect Zara told you that as far as we could see all the many
falafel places in Rue des Rosiers had a step up into them. The
vegetarian Indian restaurant (Krishna-Bhavan) we found gave us our best
meal if not the most glamorous surroundings – and it was almost
certainly the cheapest – but you probably won’t get any more
vegetarians to complicate things yet further.

As regards costs, we are pleasantly surprised that a short break in Paris can be done on a low budget. People traveling on Eurostar with a wheelchair are upgraded, which means you get some nice champagne and a topnotch light meal. The journey flies past in no time at all and you can go straight into sightseeing mode once you have signed in at your hotel. It’s great that you don’t have to pay high prices to get a reasonably central and fully accessible hotel. Getting around Paris was cheap and easy on buses, of which there are many accessible ones, and it is a fairly compact city anyway.

You obviously have lots of experience which will be invaluable to other
wheelchair-users in the future. Thanks again. Judy

AccessCity for London

I ve been waiting for AccessCity’s new website. Dominic Campbell reassured me that it will be worth the wait and now its been launched for a few days!

While some organisations have previously created some interesting views on accessibility in London, including Transport for London’s admirable efforts through their own route planner, this information is often created from an ‘expert’ perspective with little input from Londoners, the people who live in and travel around the city all day every day.

Its our hope that these organisations will also benefit from a users perspective of London, getting a rich and diverse view of the challenges people face getting around London and help these organisations to target improvements in line with the wants and needs of Londoners.

It is always best to involve users and get their perspectives. I like this from the inclusive design perspective, everybody has challenges when it comes to negotiating London, young, old, disabled, able bodied, men, women, people with children, drivers, taxi drivers, pedestrians, cyclists, and passengers of public transport. Most of my friends navigate London using the tube and they orientate places using directions from the nearest tube station/underground. For wheelchair users like myself, it was a no go area. My cognitive sense of directions in London are dictated mostly by (accessible) bus routes. And now there is a guide to level access underground stations but still they do not indicate that there are still about 4 to 8 cms step up from the platform. And on the buses we have this tug of space with people with buggies who do not always make space for you.

But what I notice is that older people have difficulties when they do not always get seats and slow walkers have problems accessing buses. I do not want to go on but every capital city have congestion problems and challenges. I am conscious that I have a daughter who cycles everywhere in London and I fear for her. I know taxi drivers who frequently complain to me about all sorts and yet, they are the people who knows the in and outs of the roads in London.

Certainly I look forward to having a space where users in London can exchange their stories as well as suggest solutions. A forum where they can advice each other must be good. I certainly hope that at some point, the responses will be gathered to prepare for a better transport system especially in preparation for those visitors in 2012. I also hope that strategy will be planned for those unexpected contingencies. London almost stopped when we just had some snow.

As in the case of engaging users, I would like to see how they get enough responses and the variety and diversity of users? I shall be very interested in seeing how AccessCity are going to get the interaction going. I assume this will necessarily only involve those who engages in forums like these.

I wish them all the luck and will be interested to see some outcomes and applaud the idea.

DBA Inclusive Design Challenge 2009

I went to the DBA Inclusive Design Challenge 2009 (from the Royal College of Art Helen Hamlyn Centre) on impulse.

DBA Inclusive Design Challenge

The DBA Inclusive Design Challenge – innovation through inclusive design – is an annual design competition with a difference. It illustrates the key role design can play in enhancing the quality of life for older and disabled people and all of us.

A collaboration between the Design Business Association (DBA) and the Helen Hamlyn Centre, it was launched in 2000 as a creative response to the poor level of design endemic to the disability aids and equipment sector.
How does it work?

DBA member consultancies from all design disciplines are invited to respond to a design challenge: to create a mainstream product, service, environment or communication, which can be enjoyed equally by consumers of all abilities.

The shortlisted teams work with the centre, disabled users and other experts to ensure that all aspects of inclusivity are considered. The centre mentors the teams throughout the design process.

The aim is to develop innovative scenarios for a new generation of inclusive products, services, environments and communications – ones that meet the needs of the widest range of consumers. In short, inclusive design at the cutting edge of innovation.

I wonder if this is a good difference with the innovation challenge (see below) on Monday might. I did not really know what I was to expect but there was a short speech from Dominic Campbell on behalf of Denise Stephens for Enabled by Design. and the user’s forum.

It is good to have the awards – I like the sound of the cushion which was the winning entry – and this engaged with users. I have mixed feelings, I think I thought I would see entries from disabled designers or at least co-designing. Are there no disabled designers? I met a few of the people from the user’s forum and I was asked if I would like to be in one next time round. I think I want to be part of a design team!

One great note is that I got the number 10 bus to and fro without problems – good to know for future excursions to the Royal Albert Hall.

when should ‘inclusive design’ be included in discussion about innovation

I went to a discussion on Beyond the Crisis: Debating the role of Innovation at the Hub Kings Cross with mostly designers in the group. I found it very interesting, if not for anything else, for the comparison and difference from the other discussions that I am currently attending – mostly on diversity and equality and disability and gender. (The last two conferences/workshops were on pan equalities and discussion on diversity in the civil service). Are they two completely different worlds or do they cross over?

How did we get into our present crisis, how far is government responsible, can innovation get us out of our crisis? these were the questions. And when I piped up to say they should’nt forget to be inclusive when seeking innovative solutions – that there are human rights and equalities at stake/in the equation too – it felt like I am singing off key in a choir. Actually it is the government stance on equalities, for me to be seen to be at odds with this discussion on innovation – is it like adding albatrosses round a sailor’s neck by asking people to remember inclusive design principles. These regulations and obligations are strangling innovation? Innovation is about new ideas – would that not be holding back the bright and beautiful? I do not know. There are strong arguments that the government is not doing enough to ensure against discrimination. But designers have their repercussions on the wider public, just as bankers had their flights of buying and we are paying for the consequences now maybe my little reminder isn’t so unrelated.

With Connect Culture I hope to build a bridge between the different cultures – which includes the different players in our world. In my world which engages mostly on equality (disability and gender especially) and human rights issues, it is a very much the awareness of the need to bridge the digital divide and looking out of the given box. I am conscious for example, that the printing revolution had this benefit to women as one of its results – the proliferation of women voices in the 18th century such as Wollstonecraft’s (leading to suffragettes movement), the internet also allowed a freedom to everybody including women and disabled people the tools to learn, communicate and to have a voice and the mobile phone, to organise groundswell demonstrations as well as fast communication(such as seen in China and other places). However wouldn’t it be a shame if a great portion of the community (such as disabled people for example) cannot have access to the tools that everybody else takes for granted…. And leaving out a significant portion of the community has its own economic and social cost.

Its getting very late here, …time to give it a rest.