Tess McManus

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Disability Equality Trainingfor Museum of London

• Tess McManus

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Working Together

• Our space is
• confidential
• a safe space to speak
• free of mobile phones
• comfortable

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Todays Aims

• By the end of the training, you will have
• an understanding of the wider diversity of
  disabled people
• an understanding of disability from a removal of
  barriers perspective
• knowledge of a range of things that you can do to
  make the museum and the activities you run
• More accessible to disabled visitors
• More accessible for disabled volunteers
• confidence and competence in your communication
  with disabled people

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But

• Who are you ?
• What do you do?
• What are you expecting ?
• Are you bringing any particular issues or
  questions?

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Facts Figures Quiz

• Small group exercise
• Answer True or False to each of these
  statements
• Most disabled people are born with their
  impairments - True of False?
• Most people have a disabled family member or
  friend - True or False?
• Disabled people are as likely to be employed as
  non disabled people - True or False?
• Most disabled people are wheelchair users - True
  or False?

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Facts Figures Quiz - Answers

• Most disabled people are born with their
  impairmentsFalse
• www.equalityhumanrights.com

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Facts Figures Quiz - Answers

• 2. Most people have a disabled family member or
  friendTrue
• The 2001 census states that there are 11 million
  disabled people in the UK. That equates to around
  15 of the adult population.
• www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/census2001.asp

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Facts Figures Quiz - Answers

3. Disabled people are as likely to be employed
as non disabled peopleFalse In 2006, there
were 2.5 million disabled men and women in the UK
without work. The number of disabled people
claiming benefits has increased threefold since
1970. DWP The employment rates of disabled
people 2006
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Facts Figures Quiz - Answers

4. Most disabled people are wheelchair users
False www.equalityhumanrights.com
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Londons Disabled Population

• More than 1.4 million Londoners are disabled.
• National Statistics Online, Census 2001,
  www.statistics.gov.uk/census
• One in every 4 Londoners has a family member or
  close friend who is disabled.
• www.londonfirst.co.uk/improving_london/disability.
  asp?L219
• The likelihood of becoming disabled increases
  with age 8 per cent of Londoners between 16 and
  24 are disabled, compared with 23 per cent of
  those between 55 and retirement.
• Disabled people and the Labour Market in London
  Key Fact, Analysis of the 2005 Annual Population
  Survey by Lorna Spence(2007) in DMAG Briefing
  2007 - -5, Greater London Authority.

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Traditional (Medical) Model
Confined to a wheelchair
Needs a Doctor
Cant climb stairs
Cant see or hear
Is sick
Cant talk
Needs help
Cant walk
Has a bitter attitude
Cant use hands
Needs a cure
Needs Institutional care
Is housebound
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Social Model
Badly designed buildings
Inaccessible transport
Hypocrisy
No lifts
No parking spaces
Isolated families
Poverty low income
Prejudiced attitudes
Lack of PAs
Segregated Education
Poor job prospects
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Social Modelin an ideal world
Accessible transport
Good building design
Part of the community
Support workers
Parking spaces
Lifts
Inclusive attitudes
Good income
Good job prospects
Inclusive Education
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Example Medical Social Models
Social Model Packaging needs re-designing
Medical Model Weak hands so cannot open jar
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Impairment Disability

• Impairment an injury, illness or congenital
  condition that causes or is likely to cause a
  long-term effect on physiological or
  psychological functions.
• Disability the loss or limitation of
  opportunities to take part in society on an equal
  level with others due to social and environmental
  barriers.

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Types of Discrimination/Barriers

• Physical
• Informational / Communication
• Attitudinal

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Impairment Disability

• Jane has an impairment. She has ME and gets tired
  after a couple of hours. She needs to sit with
  her feet slightly propped up. She has issues with
  short term memory once she becomes tired and gets
  headaches if she has to look at small print for
  any length of time.
• As part of her PhD research she and would like to
  volunteer on the information desk at your museum.
• What could be done to ensure that she is not
  disabled within that setting?

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Impairment Groups

• Mobility impairments
• Learning difficulties
• Mental health issues
• Visual impairments
• Hearing impairments
• Hidden impairments / long term health conditions

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Equality Act 2010

• Cross-cutting legislative framework to safeguard
  the rights of individuals from protected
  characteristic groups.
• Updates, simplifies and, in some areas,
  strengthens previous equalities legislation.
• Provides a single framework of discrimination law
  to protect individuals from unfair treatment.

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What / who the Equality Act covers

• The protected characteristics are
• Age
• Disability
• Gender reassignment
• Marriage and civil partnership
• Race
• Religion or belief
• Sex
• Sexual orientation

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Goods and Services

• Discrimination is said to occur if
• an individual receives no service or a lesser
  service for reasons relating to their disability
  (for example, a visually impaired person received
  less or no information about an exhibit then a
  non disabled person)
• a service is unreasonably difficult or impossible
  for a disabled person to use (for example, a
  short film clip about an exhibition has no
  subtitles and cannot be understood by a Deaf
  person)

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Reasonable Adjustments

• Making a reasonable adjustment means doing things
  another way
• In the previous exercise, we identified a range
  of barriers which might impact on disabled people
  from different impairment groups
• Now we are going to look at solutions

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Where Language Takes Us
Exercise Language impacts on how people
understand and interact with disabled people.

• Working in teams we would like you to list all
  the offensive terms you have ever seen and heard
  to describe disabled people e.g. in the media.
• You will not be asked to call them out if you
  feel uncomfortable doing so we would just like
  you to discuss and list them.

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Where Language Takes Us Feedback
Handicap the root of this word comes from
cap-i-hand and relates to begging. Cripple
originates from the word creep and also relates
to places where disabled people were allowed to
beg, Cripplegate. Invalid relates to the
validity of wants and views of an
individual. Neb (Yiddish) Amathon (Gaelic) both
mean fool or idiot and show us that many
cultures have a negative response to disability.