Profoundly deaf Woodford Green runner smashes his 2011 time

A profoundly deaf runner from Woodford Green knocked more than an hour off his time in last year’s London Marathon Writes Alastair Kleerbauer for the Ilford Recorder (24/04/12)

Martin Pampel, 28, of Lambs Meadow, took part in his second race on Sunday to help other deaf people by raising funds for charity Action On Hearing Loss.

Cheers from the crowd pushed Martin, who benefits from a cochlear implant to improve his hearing, to a finish of three hours 38 minutes.

He said: “It is always great to hear the words ‘come on Martin’ from complete strangers in the street.”

Martin was born profoundly deaf and used hearing aids until he was 17 when a sudden illness meant he lost “the little hearing that remained”.

He opted for the implant aged 18 which has made his hearing better than ever but said Action on Hearing Loss provided support in the “difficult and distressing time” after losing his remaining hearing.

He said: “I don’t think being deaf has an effect on my running but I have the choice of hearing or silence, just by switching off my cochlear implant.

“If I wanted to really concentrate, I could simply switch it off and carry on.

“I was still able to lip read many members of the crowds calling my name.”

He joked that he would struggle to better this year’s time without performance-enhancing drugs or the use of wheels, but is keen to run it again.

He has raised £1,600 so far and donations can be made on his Virgin Money Giving page.

Read more about Redbridge’s London Marathon runners who raised thousands for charity in this Thursday’s Recorder.

Judges hail deaf writer from Leicestershire who tells of living in silent world

Lando Hilton was just five years old when he lost his hearing – and now he is gradually losing his sight reports the Leicester Mercury (27/04/12)

Although the 23-year-old, from Rothley, became deaf at such a tender age, after contracting a flu-like illness, he learned to live with it and has since had an implant fitted to help him hear.

But the biggest blow, he says, has been the deterioration of his eyesight following a diagnosis of retinitis pigmentosa three years ago.

The disease, which damages the eyes' retinas, could rob him of his sight altogether.

Despite this, Lando is studying for a psychology degree at the University of Leicester and hopes to become a health psychologist or researcher.

Lando penned what it was like to live a day in his shoes for a national writing competition.

So moved were the judges by his prose, which told them of his daily struggles to walk around campus, how bright sunlight hurts his eyes and how he wakes up to silence every day, that they awarded him second prize out of hundreds of entries.

In his dreams, however, life is different. He does not squint, there is no tunnel vision and he can see everything that lies before him.

He sprints across sands with boundless energy and it is there that he forgets what it is like to have no hearing or sight.

Lando captures this in his tale entitled "To all the lovely people who still have their hearing and vision".

He said: "I have no natural hearing but I've had a cochlear implant since I was eight which pretty well resembles normal hearing.

"I'm totally deaf when I take off the outer part of my implant, but I just took my hearing loss on board when I was five and didn't question it.

"It wasn't until my teens that I started to get upset about it because it affected my social life so much.

"At that age, people don't give much consideration to deaf people and they're always talking over each other, or choosing to sit in noisy places.

"But being diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa was a massive blow. I'm still very hopeful about future treatments and I have some sight, but it's pretty poor."

Lando's aim was not to make people feel sorry for him, but to give others an understanding of what it is like for people living with his conditions.

The competition, by deafblind charity Senses, hopes to empower those who do not normally have a voice.

Once he started writing, Lando said he found it difficult to stop.

"I've got a lot to say when it comes to disabilities the words just flowed. The article took a couple of hours to write and I did it during breaks from making revision notes for my psychology exams."

He said just getting around the university campus was a challenge for him, but he allows extra time to get to lectures as he walks slowly.

"The university's AccessAbility Centre helps a lot by providing note-takers and my computer is set up for a visually-impaired user."

Lando entered the competition on the suggestion of his mum, Annette, who subscribes to the Senses magazine and spotted the opportunity.

He is "chuffed to bits" at coming second and hopes other people with sight and hearing loss will realise they are not alone.

At a ceremony in London, actress Rebecca Front, best known for The Thick Of It and Grandma's House, presented Lando with a certificate. She said: "I was compelled by the stirring power of these words that have so much joy and pain, life and living and the real spirit of deafblind people's experiences at their very heart. They were very powerful words."

Deaf man complains of lack of interpreter at job fair

An unemployed man who is profoundly deaf is campaigning for better facilities to help people like him get work reports Get Reading (26/04/12)

Piyush Bharania, 41, was keen to attend a job fair at pentahotel last September. He emailed the office of Reading East MP Rob Wilson, who co-organised the event, beforehand asking for a deaf interpreter but was told there was no budget available.

He went to the fair and communicated using pen and paper.

Mr Bharania, of Linden Road, Whitley, who has been deaf since birth, said: “I find it hard to believe the event did not have a budget.

“I feel incredibly let down and upset by what has happened. I’m sure you will appreciate that without an interpreter I would not be able to communicate.”

Mr Bharania complained to the Equality and Human Rights Commission but was advised the commission could not comment on allegations of discrimination which would have to be decided through the courts. In his formal response to the commission, Mr Wilson wrote: “Reading Job Fair is co-ordinated by my office in partnership with Jobcentre Plus and Reading UK CIC. It is a completely free event to attend for both exhibitors and job seekers and everything needed is donated by local companies.”

He said his assistant had suggested Mr Bharania could take a friend to interpret and had also offered to be on hand at the fair.

But Councillor Peter Ruhemann, who chairs the access and disabilities working group on Reading Borough Council, said although the duty to make “reasonable adjustments” for profoundly deaf people was subject to financial constraints, “that does beg the question as to why no budget was identified to deal with issues like this or other contingencies”.

Mr Wilson said on Tuesday: “Reading Job Fair makes every effort to accommodate the needs of those who wish to attend. In this particular case, we were unable, with a day’s notice and with no recourse to funds, to organise a translator for Mr Bharania at our September Job Fair. However, we did offer Mr Bharania alternative suggestions, including providing a member of staff to aid him in communicating with employers.

“As we have had more notice, for tomorrow's Job Fair we have been able to arrange a translator for Mr Bharania through a third party organisation, as well as making deaf loops available at the venue.

“We are totally committed, with the minimal resources at our disposal, to giving everybody an equal chance of getting a job. It would be very sad indeed to see Reading Labour Party jumping on another bandwagon to try to destroy a very successful event.”

Disabled rights campaigner Lord Ashley dies

The Labour peer Lord Ashley of Stoke, the first deaf MP, has died at the age of 89, after a short battle with pneumonia writes Laura Donnelly for The Telegraph (21/04/12).

Tributes to the peer, who as Jack Ashley was elected as MP for Stoke on Trent South in 1966, poured in as news of his death was announced.

The tributes were led by his daughter Jackie Ashley, a journalist and broadcaster, who described her father as "wonderful, brave and adored."

Her husband, BBC presenter Andrew Marr, said Lord Ashley died on Friday night after a short illness.

Labour leader Ed Miliband said: "I am very sad to hear of the death of Jack Ashley. He was an outstanding servant of the Labour party and an extraordinary campaigner for equal rights for people with disabilities.

"Jack Ashley turned his own tragic experience of losing his hearing into a mission of courage and determination for deaf and disabled people. He was a pioneer as the first deaf MP to sit in Parliament, but he did much more than that.

"There are many millions of men and women with disabilities who will have better lives thanks to Jack Ashley. He succeeded in changing the law and in changing attitudes.

"Anti-discrimination legislation for people with disabilities would not have happened when it did without his tenacity, his campaigning and his support.

"Jack Ashley will be missed by his family, his friends and his colleagues in the House of Lords. He led an amazing life and will be remembered with deep affection, profound respect and great admiration."

David Cameron described Lord Ashley as a "tireless" campaigner for disabled people who had a huge impact not just through his charity work, and legislation, but also in changing attitudes.

The prime minister said: "It takes characters like Jack, with his extraordinary tenacity, to push for that kind of positive change. He will be sorely missed and my thoughts and prayers are with his family."

Lord Morris of Manchester, a fellow Labour peer of Lord Ashley's, who collaborated with him when campaigning for disability rights, also paid tribute to his colleague and long-standing friend.

"Jack and I lived in close fellowship for over five decades. We campaigned and legislated together on improving the wellbeing of disabled people and others in special need," Lord Morris said.

"His passing will be mourned by everyone who had the privilege of knowing him. He was a very fine parliamentarian."

Prime Minister David Cameron said: "He was a tireless campaigner for disabled people and had a huge impact, not just through his charity work and pushing for legislation in Parliament, but also in changing attitudes.

"It takes characters like Jack, with his extraordinary tenacity, to push for that kind of positive change. He will be sorely missed and my thoughts and prayers are with his family."

Former Home Secretary David Blunkett, who is blind, said: "Jack Ashley was a pioneer who set aside his disability and by doing so forged a path which others, including me, have been able to follow.

"By sheer tenacity and latterly the use of technology, he was able to demonstrate that not only could he work on equal terms but achieve a great deal more than most of us in politics are able to boast about."

Former-prime minister Gordon Brown added: "Jack Ashley was the greatest champion Britain's disabled have had.

"He was compassionate, direct, forceful and radical. The man who, speaking with the authority of personal experience, took the cause of disabled men and women into the chambers of Parliament and to the heart of government.

"He leaves behind a contribution in legislation and policy progress for the cause of tackling disability that will not easily be surpassed."

In his autobiography, Lord Ashley recalled that the last voice he heard was that of the late rugby commentator Eddie Waring.

He became profoundly deaf a year after his election to parliament at the age of 45 following an operation to correct mild hearing loss.

After initially fearing he would be forced to give up politics, the MP learned to lip-read.

Other politicians, including political foes such as Prime Minister Edward Heath, turned towards him during Commons debates so he could get a clear view of their mouths.

Lord Ashley also worked hard to modulate his speaking voice, which he could no longer hear.

However, his deafness never affected his combative attitude.

“Early on when I first lost my hearing, I think people were a little fearful about attacking me. But as I re-established my confidence, that soon fell away,” he said.In the years that followed, he campaigned for the rights of those with disability, in particular for the deaf and blind.

In 1986, the MP and his wife founded the charity Defeating Deafness, now known as Deafness Research UK.

Together the couple had three daughters.

After retiring from the Commons in 1992, Jack Ashley was made a life peer, Baron Ashley of Stoke.

Two years later he received a cochlear implant which restored much of his hearing.

Lord Ashley took a leading role campaigning on behalf of victims of Thalidomide, which was given to mothers to treat morning sickness during the 1950s and 1960, and against violence and rape.

In 2003 he secured changes to improve the provision of subtitles on television. In 2006, he championed a bill to strengthen the rights of the elderly and disabled.

Until his death, Lord Ashley was President of Action on Hearing Loss, formerly the Royal National Institute for the Deaf.

He was also Vice-President of the National Deaf Children’s Society with whom he worked for many years to champion the rights of deaf children.

Susan Daniels, the charity's chief executive, said: “Lord Ashley was a passionate advocate for deaf and disabled people, securing important victories for them in parliament and working tirelessly to ensure that they had a voice at the highest levels."

Lord Ashley worked in a factory after leaving school at 14, becoming a shop steward and a local councillor.

He studied at Oxford and Cambridge on scholarships, and worked as a producer for the BBC before entering parliament.

Sensory gloves: Communication, translation for the deaf-blind

For people born deaf-blind, standard forms of communication fall short. However, if your senses are limited, then others become more sensitive in order to compensate writes Charlie Osborne for Smart Planet (18/04/12).

When I worked with deaf-blind children briefly as a teaching assistant, I found it could be very difficult to interpret the actions or behavior of a deaf-blind child — if the condition was inherent at birth, then the issue was magnified. All of the behavioral cues that we learn in early stages of development — from a smile to hand gestures — fell short.

It seemed often that limited communication and fragmented information became the catalyst for isolation in these children. Learning language and being able to establish effective communication is the way deaf-blind maintain a connection to others in a silent and dark world — so we’d often use objects, routines and repetitiveness sequences to establish this and make them feel comfortable and secure.

While touch is simply one of our senses — a useful tool — for these children, without it, they would be completely cut off from everything.

That’s why a new, prototype communication device for the deaf-blind caught my attention. TheDesign Research Lab, based in Germany, has developed the Mobile Lorm Glove — a glove that uses tactile and sensory pads to facilitate communication using technology such as texting or email.

Pressure points and sensors on the palm of the prototype glove take the place of visual or spoken language. The glove translates the hand-touch alphabet “Lorm”, a commonly-utilized form of communication to translate touching, sweeping and pressure into letters of the alphabet.

The user composes their own text-based messages using these sensory pads. Once complete, a Bluetooth connection forwards on the message to the intended recipient’s mobile device — generally sent in the form of an SMS.

Naturally, communication has to work both ways. If the wearer of the glove receives a message in return, then the SMS is sent from their handheld device to the glove — tiny, vibrating motors fixed to the back of the glove alerting the user to an incoming message.

The thin strands of communication that the deaf-blind cling to — simple, tactile points of pressure — may seem incomprehensible to those without limited sight or hearing, but a means of establishing a sensor-based language more effectively, I think it could result in improving the quality of life in many deaf-blind people.

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Bristol's Elmfield School for the deaf will remain open

A Bristol school for children with hearing problems, which faced a threat of closure, is to continue operating report the BBC (09/03/12).

Continue reading the main story

Bristol City Council has announced that Elmfield School for the Deaf will continue to provide education for deaf or hearing impaired children

In 2010 the authority proposed to close the school after recommendations were made by an independent review.

A petition was then started against the plans and within two months had gained more than 4,000 signatures.

The school's chair of governors the Reverend Canon Gill Behenna said: "We have constantly maintained that Elmfield School provides excellent educational opportunities for deaf and hearing impaired children.

"We now look forward to working with Bristol City Council and colleagues in the field of deaf education, on developing the school as a regional provision."

'Financially viable'

The council said the key to its future operation was a revision to planned pupil places and a commitment to serve children with additional needs.

From September, the school will be funded to have an admission number of 30 places.

It currently has 24 children on roll aged between three and 15, many of whom live outside Bristol

Councillor Clare Campion-Smith, from the Liberal Democrat-led authority, said: "In order for Elmfield School to continue, it is important that it is financially viable and can serve children who may have additional learning or behaviour needs.

"We will continue to keep all services under review and respond to how parents make choices for their children's education."

NZ first Deaf MP welcomes decision to fund notetaker

Deaf MP Mojo Mathers is welcoming a decision to provide her with fully funded support in the House as a "significant step forward for the disability community in New Zealand" reports TVNZ (09/03/12). 

Speaker Lockwood Smith this morning announced he had directed Parliamentary Services, which funds support for all MPs to do their jobs, to provide the legal authority to fund electronic note-takers for Mathers.

"This support will be in addition to that to which she is already entitled, to ensure she may fulfil her role as a member of Parliament," Smith said.
 
"The cost of these services will be met from the Parliamentary Service's baseline and is additional to the funding provided to support all members."

The decision appears to be a victory for Mathers, who had previously claimed that Smith had asked her to find funding for note-takers out of her Green Party's existing allowances.

"This decision means that aspiring MPs with a disability or hearing impairment will be able to run for parliament confident that they will get the support they need," Mathers said.

"It means that parties don't have to put people with disabilities low on their list or on unelectable positions for fear that they will have to cover the full cost of their participation."
 
The Greens obtained a legal opinion from Chapman Tripp which suggested the additional funding could be legally provided by a new allocation from Parliamentary Services, rather than taken out of existing allowances for individual members.

The advice was taken to a meeting of the Parliamentary Service Commission, which met on Wednesday night.

Smith said the commission had proposed a mechanism whereby the Speaker would have "the flexibility" to fund "the needs of any disabled or impaired members" out of the allocation he had to support all MPs.

"I am disappointed that we have not been able to find a solution that gave me that flexibility," he said.

After finding no resolution on Wednesday night, Smith had decided to find a way for Parliamentary Services to legally provide funding.

Smith said his office had been funding support for Mathers in the interim, but that could not continue. The new funding from Parliamentary Services would provide the permanent solution.

Separately, Smith said he wanted to develop a captioning service to make proceedings of the House more accessible to the hearing-impaired.

"I intend working with the Office of the Clerk to develop this service and will raise this with the Standing Orders Committee which deals with such matters," he said.

Rare reprieve for Haiti's disabled slated to end

When doctors amputated her right arm that was crushed by jagged rubble during Haiti's 2010 earthquake, Marjorie Benoit joined the ranks of Haiti's outcasts: the blind, the deaf and those missing limbs writes Trenton Daniels for Associated Press (05/03/12).

But then something unexpected happened for the 33-year-old mother of four as she faced personal and economic devastation. She found a welcoming home.

While the 1.3 million people displaced by the quake ended up in post-apocalyptic-like tent cities, a sliver of the homeless disabled population, including Benoit, landed in the closest thing to a model community. They moved into neat plywood shelters along tidy gravel lanes in a settlement designed to house them. They formed a close-knit colony of sorts with ramps for their wheelchairs made out of discarded pool furniture and solar-powered lights to help the deaf communicate with sign language.

The rare respite for the estimated 500-plus people living here, however, will soon end as the government moves to reclaim the land, and, like Haiti's piecemeal reconstruction effort, there isn't much of a plan to house them once they leave — maybe some money for rent and a little extra cash. An alternative site for some of the settlement's deaf residents is not yet completed.

"I have strength by living with other people who are handicapped," said Benoit, who said she's still learning how to use her left hand so she can resume work as a street merchant. "I want everyone to move together wherever we go."

Life has never been easy for the disabled in one of the world's poorest countries. The blind and deaf and amputated have long shouldered a social stigma, their disabilities dismissed as the product of a hex, and few have access to physical therapy or social services. It's no accident that Haiti's disabled make up the poorest part of its population.

Inside the settlement's enclosing chain-linked fence, the residents say they no longer endure the long stares for losing their vision, hearing or a limb.

Claudius Joseph, a blind 25-year-old student, says his teachers believe he can't learn because he can't see. Children, he says, are afraid to touch him.
"I feel normal here because there are other people who are handicapped just like me," Joseph said one evening as his cane tapped the gravel in front of him.

The camp, near Port-au-Prince's international airport, is called "La Piste" because of an abandoned military airstrip across the street. It was set up by the International Federation for the Red Cross, which built 368 shelters for the hearing and speech impaired and others with disabilities. The first families moved in Jan. 7, 2011, days before the anniversary of the earthquake, and each received $150 to help settle in.

Its current residents are a mix of people disabled by traumas or infections caused by the quake and those whose conditions preceded it.

The Red Cross says it signed an agreement with the previous administration of President Rene Preval to use the land until January 2013. Officials with President Michel Martelly's government say they want the land back and the residents need to leave.

"The land is not theirs and the owner wants it back," said Gerald Oriol Jr., Secretary of State for the Integration of Persons with Disabilities. He declined to say who owned the land and referred questions to a foreign charity worker helping the deaf residents. "Within six to nine months they should move out."

When two Associated Press journalists spoke to roughly a dozen La Piste residents about what they would do if they were forced to leave the settlement, some had not heard the news and a few began to shriek.Alix Baptiste, a slender 37-year-old mute man, pulled the lone sign interpreter by the arm and approached the reporters.
He had the interpreter say: "We'll protest because we have no place else to go."

Two U.S. religious groups are building a new site about 18 miles (30 kilometers) northwest Port-au-Prince to house some of La Piste's residents, but a good portion will be left behind and many don't want to leave the camp.
Mission of Hope of Fort Myers, Florida, and 410 Bridge, Inc., of Alpharetta, Georgia, are building 500 houses over the next two years in the town of Leveque. A hundred and sixty of those homes are reserved for deaf families in La Piste, said Austin Holmes of Mission of Hope Haiti. Fifty families have already moved in.
But the fate of those left behind remains uncertain.
"That is the big question mark," said Kyle Reschke, Haiti's project director for 410 Bridge. "We're trying our best to take away that question mark."
And even for those at La Piste who have housing promised them, many ask where will they go if they are evicted in the coming months before their new homes are completed?
Some at La Piste, like 58-year-old Fecilia Joseph, will "go with the wind" if it takes them to Leveque.

But others don't want to leave. That's because they sew clothes in a factory down the street or take classes in downtown Port-au-Prince. Their social networks are in Haiti's capital.
Red Cross shelter coordinator James Bellamy said that if the government seizes the land before January the residents would be eligible for a rental subsidy for $500 for one year and another $500 to help out. They can also enroll in courses to learn skills in carpentry, sewing and masonry.

"We'll be talking to the government and households down there to see if we can advocate for any long-term solutions," Bellamy said. "There's no plan for them to go anywhere."
The Martelly administration and foreign aid groups have cleared out several camps in recent months and moved the residents into homes by paying their rent for a year. But that's only 5 percent of the half million people stuck in the gloomy, flood-prone camps.
On a recent afternoon at La Piste, quake amputees on crutches kicked around a soccer ball on a dusty field.

Residents say they're grateful for the site despite fears that it will close.
"Thank God we live well; we're not fighting," said Mason Egene, a 63-year-old who's paralyzed in the right leg. "We have all kinds of problems but we don't get wet in the rain."

Blind and deaf Carlisle man left alone at home

A blind and deaf Carlisle man was left home alone after his elderly mother was taken into hospital writes Phil Coleman for News & Star (13/02/12).

The brother of Alan Foley, who is unable to speak, see or hear, has hit out at social services, saying he needs proper support and should never have been left alone overnight after his mother went into hospital.

His only protection is a Careline alarm – but as he cannot talk, his brother David, 58, believes it is of little use.

Their mother Lorna, 82, who Alan has lived with in the family home in Peel Street all his life, was hospitalised on Monday after she broke her hip in a fall.
Mr David said she was not expected to make a recovery for at least 14 weeks, leaving Alan, 56, at home with some support from carers.

Officials from Cumbria County Council’s Adult Social Care Department have agreed to spread out the 22 hours of home support he gets from Cumbria Deaf Vision. He will also spend several hours with the Glenmore Trust on Thursdays.

But David, who is offering his brother support whenever he can, said Alan now needs a higher level of support, given the severity of his disability. He said: “Our father died a couple of years ago, and since then my brother had depended on our mother. My biggest fear has always been that there should be a contingency plan if anything such as this happened, and I was assured that something would swing into place if ever our mother was taken ill. When I was on my way to see our mother in hospital I was shocked to later learn that Alan had been left on his own for the first time in 56 years in the house that night. It’s been that way since Monday".
“On Monday, I phoned social services and they offered to have the police break down the door but I did not want to further traumatise my brother. He’s in a state of shock.”
He said his brother’s only protection while at home was now a Careline alarm, but as Alan cannot talk it would be of little immediate use.
He added: “I’d like to see Alan in to some kind of sheltered accommodation because he is clearly vulnerable.”

David said he had written to Cumbria County Council, suggesting that his brother, who is among the most vulnerable people in the community, had been let down.

A county council spokesman said: “After meeting his family earlier this week, this client’s care arrangements were altered to better suit his needs following the change in circumstances.
“We have also reassured him and his family that we are looking at what the best care arrangements will be for him in the long-term.
“As we would do in any situation like this we will meet with the client and their family after a week to examine how the new arrangement is working to see what, if anything, needs to be changed.”

Liverpool's DaDaFest wins prestigious prize

The DaDaFest in Liverpool has won this year's prestigious £10,000 Lever Prize reports the Guardian (30/01/12).

Just over a year after I wrote about fears over the festival's future funding due to Arts Council cuts, the UK's largest disability and deaf arts festival, which attracts international artists was chosen by senior representatives of the 30 largest companies in the north west to receive the prize.

In 2011, DaDaFest celebrated its 10th anniversary, having begun in 2001 as a community arts event. Over the last decade, it has attracted 100,000 visitors.
When it started, there were a handful of performers; last year the number of artists has swelled to 313, with a total of 1,200 participants and visitor numbers expected to reach at least 11,000.

The festival's aims are simple – to inspire and celebrate talent and excellence in disability and deaf arts. The performances took part in mainstream venues – Liverpool's theatres, art spaces and galleries, so the festival was accessible to all audiences.
At the time, festival's artistic director, Garry Robson, explained its ethos. He said: "DaDaFest is here to present the work of deaf and disabled artists, whose work is on a par with mainstream artists.

"Disabled and deaf people are not simply passive consumers of a tragic destiny but active participants in all areas of life, with a unique and valuable cultural perspective that we plan to share during the festival."

In 2011, there was an international feel to the festival with performances from north and south America, Europe and Australia, as well as the UK. American writer and director Christine Bruno is performing Screw You Jimmy Choo, a play "about a woman obsessed with men she can't have and shoes she can't wear."

Ugandan hip-hop artist Rockin Ronnie, who is involved with Krip Hop Nation, a collective of musicians based in Berkeley, California, wrote and performed a festival theme song.
The festival's CEO, Ruth Gould, said that research undertaken to evaluate the festival shows that 75% of participants have gone on to get employment in the creative arts sector.
"At DaDaFest we know that the arts give us a voice; give us a hope in a world where we feel excluded, forgotten and ignored," she says.

Previous winners of the Lever Prize, named in honour of 19th soap magnate and philanthropist William Lever, include Liverpool Biennial, Tate Liverpool and Manchester International Festival.

Each year the prize is judged by the North West Business Leadership Team (NWBLT) in partnership with Arts & Business North. Arts groups, buildings, events, festivals, libraries and archives are all eligible and in addition to the £10,000 cash prize the award opens the door to collaboration with the region's top businesses. Last year's winner of the Lever Prize was the Whitworth Gallery in Manchester.

Gould said: "We're delighted the NWBLT have acknowledged the unique work DaDaFest does in representing disability and deaf culture in the north west and internationally.
"The award and resulting creative collaborations with NWBLT members will allow us to present an even more relevant and enticing festival later this year."
Geoffrey Piper, chief executive of NWBLT said: "DaDa's success in landing the 2012 Lever Prize is a truly outstanding achievement having seen off an extremely impressive range of the north west's other well-known arts organisations to win this major accolade."

This year's DaDaFest takes place from July 13 to September 2 2012.

Police 'killed deaf cyclist with stun gun after he failed to obey instructions to stop'

A police officer killed an elderly, deaf and mentally disabled man riding his bicycle by shooting him with a Taser stun gun after he failed to obey instructions to stop writes Daniel Miller for the Daily Mail (24/11/11).

Roger Anthony, 61, was killed as he made his way home in Scotland Neck, South Carolina, after officers responded to a 911 call about a man who had fallen off his bicycle in a car park.
The caller told dispatchers that the man appeared drunk and that it looked like he had hurt himself.

Officers said they repeatedly told Mr Anthony to get off his bike, but when he didn't respond, they shocked him. The state Office of the Medical Examiner hasn't yet determined a cause of death.

Family members claim Mr Anthony had hearing problems and suffered from seizures. Now they're considering whether to file a lawsuit against the town.

His brother Michael said: 'What did they tase him for? It's hurting me. It's really hurting me.'

Scotland Neck Mayor James Mills said he wouldn't blame the family for suing.

'There has been no information that this man was a threat to anybody,' he said.
'If I was a family member, I'm sure I'd be thinking the same way.'

Mills said he has tried to get information from the police department about what happened to Mr Anthony, but they have turned him away.

Police Chief Joe Williams says the officer is on administrative leave while the SBI conducts its investigation.
He declined to comment further. Anthony's family said they hope the case is resolved soon.

Mr Anthony's niece, Porsha Anthony said: 'I'm sad. I lost an uncle.

'Hopefully it will be rectified so that not another family in Scotland Neck has to go through this'.

The State Bureau of Investigation in South Carolina said they are looking into Mr Anthony's death.

Innovative Solution To Improve Access To Theatre for Deaf

1 in 6 people are left out of the arts! Innovative solution to improve access to theatre for deaf, deafened and hard of hearing comes to the Isle of Man writes Paul Watson, Manx.net (07/10/11).

As part of Disability Awareness Week (31 October – 5 November) the Manx Deaf Society is delighted to announce that captioning (subtitling) equipment has been purchased for permanent use in the Isle of Man, greatly improving access to theatre entertainment for deaf, deafened and hard of hearing people.

Judith Ley, on behalf of the Manx Deaf Society, said “Due to the generosity of a private family trust, the Isle of Man now has portable professional equipment that enables the spoken word to be converted into visible text that provides deaf, deafened and hard of hearing people with access to live theatre performances – and because the captioning unit is portable, it can be used in venues around the Island to benefit the maximum number of people”

Hon David Cretney MHK, Minister for Community, Culture and Leisure said, “Improving access to leisure activities is a key policy of the Department. The sign-language interpreted performances of shows has proved to be extremely popular and I am delighted that, in addition to these, a captioning facility is now available. I know that it will greatly improve the experience of visiting the theatre for people with hearing difficulties as well as attracting for the first time those who have never been able to comfortably follow a show at the theatre.”

To demonstrate how the captioning equipment works, there will be a showcase event at the Gaiety Theatre on Tuesday 1 November at 8pm. The general public is invited to attend and entry is free.

As an introduction to how the system works, the Legion Players will be performing a 10-minute preview of their upcoming play – RC Sherriff’s WWI classic ‘Journey’s End’ (the play is on at the Gaiety Theatre from 17-19 November, tickets on sale now priced £10). The Legion Players will also be the first to use the equipment during a fully captioned performance of Journey’s End at 2.30pm on 19 November.

Stephanie Gray, Chairman of the Legion Players, said “The Society is absolutely delighted to support the launch of the new captioning equipment, and to put it to full use in its forthcoming production. Communicating fully the text of a play or musical is vital. This new equipment will enable drama and music groups throughout the Island to engage with those who have previously been discouraged from attending productions and shows. Our sincere thanks to the Manx Deaf Society for making this possible.”