RNIB has ‘washed its hands’ of braille users after ending free service, says blind campaigner

A disabled campaigner claims the disability charity RNIB has “washed its hands” of those with the most significant levels of visual impairment, after scrapping its long-established free braille transcription service.

Connor Scott-Gardner (pictured), a blind campaigner from Leeds, has accused RNIB of hypocrisy and discrimination after it called on other services earlier this year to do more to provide information in braille, and criticised the government’s cuts to disability benefits, but then removed its own free braille service.

More than 900 people have already signed an open letter which calls on RNIB to reverse its “devastating” decision, as part of a new Save Our Braille campaign.

Blind people were previously entitled to an annual allowance of free transcription into braille, audio, or large print.

But last week, RNIB quietly announced it would now be outsourcing its braille provision, and was scrapping the free braille allowance, although provision of large print would remain free.

In his open letter, Scott-Gardner describes RNIB’s actions as “deeply harmful and discriminatory” as RNIB is now providing a free service for those with higher levels of vision who need large print, but making those who have a higher level of impairment and rely on braille pay for that service.

Only three months ago, RNIB marked World Braille Day and the 200^th anniversary of the development of the tactile reading and writing system by calling for “UK organisations, businesses and services to review and improve their provision of braille in this anniversary year”.

It has also campaigned against government cuts to disability benefits, following the publication of last month’s Pathways to Work green paper.

But it is now cutting its own braille service, which supports about 500 blind people a year, and although it will subsidise the service after it is outsourced, this will only be for “a short period of time to support the transition”.

Scott-Gardner has been passed an internal briefing document – written by the charity’s chief executive, Matt Stringer – by several RNIB staff.

Stringer tells staff in the memo that providing the service was “resource-intensive, and costly to maintain” and “very heavily reliant on volunteers”.

Scott-Gardner told the VI Talk podcast on Sunday that there were “many, many” RNIB staff who were unhappy at the charity’s decision.

And he said he had not ruled out organising a march to London to protest at the charity’s decision, which he said was taken by non-disabled people working for RNIB.

He said at leadership level there had been a “massive almost neglect of the community they should be serving”, and he called for blind people to be “trusted to lead our own community”, which would “resolve many, many of the issues we are seeing”.

He told Disability News Service: “This year, the RNIB has concentrated much of its social media output on two areas: celebrating 200 years of braille through Braille200, and speaking out against proposed cuts to disability benefits, which would disproportionately affect blind and partially-sighted people who face extra daily costs.

“It is deeply hypocritical for the organisation to publicly affirm that braille matters while simultaneously cutting the only free national transcription service available to blind people.

“You cannot claim to champion braille and then close one of the only accessible routes to obtaining it.

“At a time when disabled people are already under threat from government cuts, we need organisations like RNIB to protect the essential services that enable us to live independently and access information on equal terms.”

RNIB did not respond to his claims of hypocrisy and discrimination.

But in a statement, Stringer confirmed the changes to the braille service, which he claimed were part of the charity’s new strategy which was “designed to inspire and drive even more meaningful change for people with sight loss” and aimed to “reach more people and deliver more impact, in a sustainable way”.

He said: “We understand that these changes will be disappointing for people who have enjoyed our personal transcription service over the years.

“The new approach to the bespoke personal transcription service will offer an improved customer experience where people can email or phone our trusted provider with their specific requirements.

“We’re continuing to listen to feedback from blind and partially-sighted people and digesting the comments on the petition to ensure this transition is as seamless as possible.

“We’re taking this very seriously and considering how we can best support the provision of personal braille transcription in the future.

“We’ll continue to advocate, support and campaign for blind and partially sighted people to ensure they receive accessible information in the format they require.”

He said RNIB would continue to provide other braille services, through RNIB Bookshare, which provides educational materials and textbooks; its library collection, which has access to more than 11,000 braille books; RNIB Newsagent, which has braille versions of magazines and newspapers; and its music library, which has one of the largest collections of accessible format music for blind and partially-sighted musicians.

But Scott-Gardner said there were probably only about 20,000 people in the UK who read braille, and this group are more likely than other people with sight loss to be out of work and struggling financially.

He said that being able to call or email the new “bespoke personal transcription service” was no different to the existing service offered by RNIB.

He said: “We aren’t getting a better deal, we’re getting the same deal except now we’ll have to pay commercial prices for it.”

He said RNIB’s statement raised “serious questions about who is representing the needs of those of us who have total or near total, permanent blindness.

“It seems as though they’ve decided that impact should only be measured on the number of people who use the service, rather than the very real barriers that those with the most significant levels of visual impairment face.”

He added: “Effectively, they have washed their hands of us because we are too expensive and difficult to support.”

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