Blind Parent Challenges Channel 4

Tuesday 08 January 08

Laura Slater is working as Eye Matter Administrator at RNIB (Royal National Institute of Blind People). We wanted to ask her some questions about what the RNIB do and how they help visually impaired people. We also had some questions about the documentary "Age 12 and looking after the family", to which she wrote a response and her experiences as a visually impaired parent.

According to the RNIB's website there are around 2 million people in the UK with sight problems, and an astonishing number of 100 people will everyday start to lose their sight.

How does the RNIB help partially sighted and blind people in the UK?
"The RNIB offers a wide range of services like the ECLO (Eye Clinic Liaison Officers) which is a service that helps patients in a wide range of hospitals to get in touch with the social services and help them get the services they need. We have a shop where we sell a selection of products such as liquid-level indicators, talking watches, kitchen scale, magnifiers and other useful products for visually impaired people. We also have an internet café here, a children service which organize events for children, a fund raising department and different trainings like IT training."

You wrote a reply to the documentary "Age 12 and looking after the family" which was aired on Channel 4 in February. The documentary featured a family where the parents where visually impaired and where the children were the carers. What did you think about the documentary?
"I thought it gave a very negative opinion about parents with sight loss. I doubt it would have been aired on TV if it was a normal situation family where the kids were neglected. I also think that the fact that the parents weren't working or doing anything gave a very bad impression of visually impaired people. Working makes you feel better and I really think one of them should be out working, being blind is not an excuse for not working."

The Channel 4's producer Jane Treays said in an interview that "..given that they are blind, which means that they can't see a lot of what is going on. So they can't see the dirt, they can't really see what goes on when the kids change the babies' nappies".
Do you think being blind is on OK excuse for what is going on in that house?
"I don't think it is an OK excuse, they know the dirt is there and they know what is going on in that house in general."

You are yourself a parent of a 13 months old girl, what extra challenges do you experience as a visually impaired parent?
"I think that as a visually impaired parent you have to take extra care for your child and that does make you a better parent. I can't for example wash the dishes in the kitchen while Megan is alone in the living room. I don't think being visually impaired is a problem at all when it comes to parenthood; it is just a matter of your out look at life."

To get more information about what the RNIB do: check out the RNIB web-site, or get more information about Eye Matter here