February 4, 2025 • 34 mins
Lizzie Eastham and Sam Rickard present Studio 1 - Vision Australia Radio’s weekly look at life from a low vision and blind point of view.
On this week’s show
"Lars Bosselmann {European Blind Union)"
Lizzie and Sam talk to Lars Bosselmann, Executive Director for the European Blind Union. Lars talks about his own thoughts on access and inclusion; and the slow progress that the EBU has overseen in its 40 years of existence.
They also examine Donald Trumps statement regarding Diversity Equity and Inclusion, made Friday 31st January after the American Airlines/Black Hawk collision.
Studio 1 welcomes any input from our listeners. If you have any experience or thoughts about issues covered in this episode or believe there is something we should be talking about.
EMAIL: studio1@visionaustralia.org or leave comment on the station’s facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/VARadioNetwork
Thank you to Lars and the European Union for agreeing to to the interview and providing such interesting insight.
For more information on the EBU co to: https://www.euroblind.org/
Vision Australia gratefully acknowledges the support of the Community Broadcasting Foundation for Studio 1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:05):
This is studio one on Vision Australia radio.
S2 (00:12):
Hello, I'm Sam.
S3 (00:13):
And I'm Lizzie.
S2 (00:15):
And this is studio One, your weekly look at life
from a low vision and blind point of view. Here
on Vision Australia Radio.
S3 (00:20):
On this week's show, we turn our attention overseas. Lars Bosselmann,
the executive director of the European Blind Union, is our guest.
S2 (00:29):
We also have a couple of things to say about
a certain white House press conference held last week.
S3 (00:35):
As we always say at this point, please do get
in touch with the show. Whether you have experience of
any of the issues covered on this week's episode of
Studio One, or if you think there's something we should
be talking about. You never know. Your story and insight
may help someone who's dealing with something similar.
S2 (00:51):
You can email us Studio One at Vision Australia. That's
studio number one at Vision Australia.
S3 (00:57):
Or of course you can search us up on Facebook.
Just go to facebook.com, slash VA Radio Network.
S2 (01:04):
Hello, Lizzie. How are we going on this fine, but
somewhat hot day.
S3 (01:09):
Very good. Sam. Very good. Although, as we were about
to discuss very shortly, there's been some interesting developments over
the weekend in terms of, uh, disability inclusion and equity
in the United States, hasn't there?
S2 (01:24):
Well, we've kind of been tracking this story for a
little while, but some things kind of changed, uh, on Friday. Now,
I remember a comment that you'd said, um, when we
were first talking about this on on Tuesday and you
said surely things affecting, uh, people with a disability is
(01:45):
just sort of collateral damage.
S3 (01:46):
Because we were commenting on the Dei initiatives. And for
anyone that's not in the loop, Dei is diversity, equity
and inclusion. And basically these initiatives that were enacted years
ago were to make it fair and accessible for Americans
with a disability or any accessibility issues, to be able
(02:10):
to work in civil service jobs. And the reason that
this conversation had come up in the beginning was because
I was I'm actually following a few, uh, blind and
low vision content creators in America, and a lot of
them have been commenting about the scrapping of these Dei initiatives.
And they've been saying, look, as a person who's totally
blind or has vision loss, I can't serve in the
(02:33):
military and therefore a civil service job is the only
way that I'm able to serve my country. And now
you're basically telling me that you're no longer going to
support accessibility in these fields, so I'm not going to
be able to do the job that I want to
do or have been doing in some cases. So yeah.
And then of course, we fast forward to Friday, um,
(02:53):
the DC airport crash and, and with a jet collided
with a helicopter. And we also fast forward to Trump's comments.
And we know now that it's not just a case
of Trump mistaking.
S2 (03:05):
No, no, no, it's not a case of collateral damage.
S3 (03:08):
Because I had assumed that when they were talking about diversity,
equity and inclusion, they were, you know, going through the
whole gender roles and non-binary and like gender as a
social construct. I was assuming that that's what they were
talking about. But so I did think that, you know,
I was hoping that it was because Donald Trump and
his cabinet weren't aware of the effects that this would
(03:30):
have with people with disabilities. But as we can clearly
see by his comments on Friday, this isn't the case anymore.
We're not collateral damage. We're clearly being targeted.
S2 (03:40):
So let's remind everybody of what exactly he said.
S4 (03:45):
We do not know what led to this crash, but
we have some very strong opinions and ideas, and I
think we'll probably state those opinions now. The FAA's website
states they include hearing, vision, missing Extremities. Partial paralysis. Complete paralysis. Epilepsy.
The FAA's Diversity and Inclusion Hiring Plan, which says diversity
(04:08):
is integral to achieving FAA's mission of ensuring safe and
efficient travel. I don't think so. I don't think so.
I think it's just the opposite.
S2 (04:20):
Just the opposite. Just the opposite. I don't know about you.
I'm not hankering for a job as an air traffic controller.
I think that, frankly, as a person with a vision impairment,
I would not be able to do it even with
the most advanced adaptive software. I don't want to be
the one that misses something and causes an accident.
S3 (04:39):
I completely understand that. But just because you don't want to,
there might be other people out there that do. And
I think this targeting of, of, of, um, people with
disabilities is going to make it so that those particular
people won't have the opportunity.
S2 (04:55):
Exactly right. And we're going to cross over to over
to other disabilities now. I don't see any reason why
someone in a wheelchair or someone missing a leg or
an arm or something like that can't do that job.
It could not be an air traffic controller.
S3 (05:08):
Well, as I commented to you before, Sam, in my opinion,
as long as that candidate or that particular person has
shown that they're able to do the job, their disability
should not exclude them from doing that job. I mean,
it's kind of pointless for me to become an air
traffic controller because I'm totally blind. I can't see it
on the screen. But then again, I wouldn't apply for
(05:29):
that kind of job. Exactly.
S2 (05:30):
So what we are going are doing at the moment,
we've got some feelers out for people in the, in
America who have been covering these issues. And if we
can speak to them, or if you know anybody who
is based in America now and would like to speak
to us, we want to hear from them as well.
S3 (05:46):
We do. I had a migraine now before, and now
it's just up its level. Like my brain hurts just
thinking about this.
S2 (05:52):
But let's move to something a bit more positive. Earlier
this week, we talked to um. Lars. And, uh, it
was a great interview. So let's cross over to that now.
S3 (06:05):
Today on studio One, we are talking to Lars Bosselman,
who is the director of the European Blind Union. Lars,
welcome to studio one.
S5 (06:14):
Hello. From Paris. Across the time zone difference.
S6 (06:18):
Well, yes, exactly. It's, uh, later on today, it's the evening.
Here we are at the moment. And, uh, what I'm
looking at, um, the sun is starting to go down. It's, um,
about just under 30 degrees as far as temperature goes.
And you can hear some Australian birds off in the distance.
What is it like where you are?
S5 (06:37):
Well, I can tell you it's around 930 in the
morning here. So ten hours or something like that before
your time. And, uh, we are, well, having, like, a
end of January day. Winter day meeting here in Paris. Quite,
quite greyish, I would say today, the sky, as far
as I can tell. I mean, I'm fully blind, so
(06:57):
I'm not exactly sure, but it seems quite covered and
cloudy and the sort of the temperature will go up
until ten degrees highest today. Well, that gives you an impression.
Not exactly the same we're talking about here.
S6 (07:11):
So you're in Paris, but your accent isn't quite French?
S5 (07:15):
No. Personally speaking, I'm a well spotted. Of course I'm
a German citizen. I'm living in France for the last
five years. And before that, I've been living in Belgium
as well. So not been living in my own country
for quite some time now. But yes, I'm German and
that is probably more resonating with the accent I'm having
(07:37):
actually here.
S6 (07:37):
Well, that's the funny thing, is that in Australia, if
we talk about living in another country, it's always miles
away from where we are. But I mean, it's compared
to our corner of the world. Home is, all things considered,
not that far away.
S5 (07:51):
Yeah, that's the I don't know whether it's the beauty
or whatever it is of Europe. Of course you can,
within quite short distances, go to quite different language communities,
cultures and so on. So within quite a smaller space,
you have all of that experience without travelling too far.
S6 (08:09):
And so it brings us quite neatly to the European
Blind Union. Um, you would support vision impaired and blind people.
And so that would be from all across Europe or
just a particular section of the European Union?
S5 (08:23):
No. So we have as a European blind Union, we
are having 42 countries that are members in the blind Union.
So that gives you already quite an impression of, uh,
the breadth and the coverage of what we are doing.
So this goes actually much beyond the European Union as
a political entity, which only has 27 member states.
S7 (08:46):
So what is your role within the European Union?
S5 (08:49):
So my my own role is, as you already said
in the introduction, I'm the executive director, so that means
I'm on the one hand, of course, very much working
with our own leadership, the board and so on to
support them in their work that they can fulfill their duties.
But I'm also heading the secretariat, the office of uh EBU,
(09:13):
which has now eight members or eight staff members, I
should more correctly say in different fields of activity. So
I'm heading that entity of the organization. And then I'm
of course, having a lot of more, let's say, representational
tasks to do communication. And this interview being part of
of that as well, but also in the area of
(09:36):
political work, advocacy work, as we would probably call it,
where I'm also having a representational role to represent the
interests of blind and partially sighted people at political meetings,
whether it's European Union level or other meetings, depending on
the circumstances, of course.
S7 (09:54):
So what made you want to get involved with the EBU?
S5 (09:58):
So, uh, as I said, in terms of timing, it
was about five years ago, actually, almost on the day, uh,
five years ago that I started, uh, my current role
here within the European Blind Union. And what made me
at the time apply. And that inspired me and motivated
me and continues to motivate me still today, is actually,
(10:19):
on the one hand, myself a blind person since my birth.
So this is the personal story, of course, that motivates
me to, um, do this, this job, which then goes
beyond the question of just earning your salary and your life,
which is important, of course, as well. But it's actually
I'm a strong believer that, of course, the interests and
(10:42):
the rights of blind and partially sighted people should be
represented and at the end of the day, achieved by
those who have a lived experience of being blind or
partially sighted. And so, in that spirit, if you'd like,
I applied and apparently got the job at the time.
So this was the main sort of factor of of motivation.
(11:04):
The other one, maybe just to complete my answer here,
was also that I have a background in working internationally
or at Europe wide at least. And so I could
ideally combine my self-motivation from my own, let's say, blindness
that I'm having with my professional also, past experience in
(11:29):
working at the European level within the not for profit sector.
S7 (11:33):
Can you tell us just offhand if you know, when
was the Abu established?
S5 (11:38):
So we just last year actually celebrated our 40th anniversary.
So this goes back to the 80s, mid 80s. 84,
to be more precise. Of of course, uh, it was established.
So I let you judge whether this is a young
or an old organization or middle somehow. And of course,
(12:01):
these days then when we were established in the mid 80s,
were quite a different, a different time, obviously, politically speaking,
in terms of the countries that existed. Um, speaking in
terms of the European Union and its political role. Speaking,
of course, which at that time was much less than
(12:21):
it is today.
S7 (12:22):
Definitely. And one of the reasons that I wanted to
get in contact with you for this interview was because
I read a very interesting article on the United Nations
Regional Information Center about how Brazil and I, uh, can
shape the future for blind and vision impaired people. So,
in your opinion, how can tools like Braille and AI
(12:44):
help improve access to To information for blind and low
vision individuals.
S5 (12:49):
Yeah, I think I mean, first of all, Braille, which
is also celebrating an important anniversary this year, which means
the 200 years of existence, if you'd like, is probably
one of the best and most, uh, groundbreaking innovations in
the field of access or allowing access for blind and
(13:09):
partially sighted people to many things. Information to start with,
but not only education. Some of the more cultural spheres
like music, sciences, learning languages and so on and so forth.
So this is probably and one of the beauties I
think of, of Braille is on the one hand, it's
very simple. Just combining a few dots together is as such,
(13:34):
really simple as an idea. But at the same time,
it's a genius idea and it makes it, uh, let's
say applicable to so many areas of life, as I
already said. But also it makes it adaptable. So it
was very useful already. Such a long time ago when
everything was paper based, let's say. And it also has
(13:58):
made its transition to its nowadays where we are talking
about tablets, computers, all kinds of devices, mobile devices and
so on. So this is still extremely useful today. And
actually because it can be so easily reproduced also electronically
and not only on on paper. So I think this
(14:19):
makes it so beautiful. And it has really meant a
lot of progress for many blind and partially sighted people
in in those areas. Now, when it comes to artificial intelligence,
this is of course an area which we are talking about. Well,
we are seeing already some of its potential, but probably
even not, uh, 5% of what it's going to do
(14:42):
in the future.
S8 (14:43):
Yeah, sure.
S5 (14:45):
So, uh, already today, when we are looking at, uh,
I'm just trying to make some examples here from practical,
from a practical level, when we're talking about voice recognition,
where you can actually basically dictate a text to a machine,
this is a kind of artificial intelligence, and then it
recognizes the words you are speaking and puts it into
(15:08):
writing with a very limited number of mistakes. In reality,
of course they are. You still need to correct some things, but, um,
these tools are extremely developed already these days, and this
has already been, uh, a very significant improvement and progress
for many blind and partially sighted people in the area
(15:29):
of of communication in the wider sense, if you like.
S6 (15:32):
One of the things that I've been, uh, amused about, um,
artificial intelligence, uh, there was an article about it recently,
and in fact, in that unlike a lot of other
computer programs, Rams. When it doesn't know something, it ends
up filling in the gaps for itself, and some of
the results can be rather amusing. So if it mishears
something a word, it will put in the word that
(15:53):
it thinks that it should be, as opposed to just
simply saying, sorry, I don't know. So, uh, while a
lot it is a very useful tool at the moment,
it is also a very limited tool.
S5 (16:05):
It's clear that there's a lot of development that still
needs to to to happen. That's what I was saying.
I think we only see probably a certain very tiny
percentage of what it's supposed to do or possibly able
to do in, in moving forward, of course. And there
are also threats, let's say also or at least challenges
with artificial intelligence. So it's not all that it's innovative
(16:28):
and positive necessarily. But I mean, if you look at
things like in recruitment, uh, artificial intelligence can be used
or is in some cases is already used today for
shortlisting candidates. Now let's assume there is a blind candidate.
Applying for a job at the artificial intelligence tool is
(16:49):
actually somehow insisting on the person who is applying to
look straight into the camera during an interview or some
kind of a presentation video even, which may replace a
CV or whatever. And if the if it's set up
the tool in such a way that this eliminates the
candidate because of him or herself not being able to
(17:11):
because of the blindness or sight restriction, somehow not being
able to just look straight into the camera as maybe
sighted people would do. Well, then this is possibly excluding
people from opportunities. So there are also risks that we
of course should not here ignore from that, from the discussion.
(17:33):
Then maybe I would also say more on the positive side,
where I at least more personally, this is not as
such a European Union Union's point of view, but my
personal hope very strongly in the area of artificial intelligence
is about accessibility overall. Now, today, we are always catching
up with making documents accessible, making whole websites accessible or
(17:57):
mobile applications because in the beginning, often this is an
important aspect that got forgotten. And in the future, hopefully
artificial intelligence could help us rather than manually correcting and
fixing accessibility issues. Rather building them from scratch into the website,
the texts, the documents and so on so that this
(18:19):
accessibility sort of fixing or catching up that we are
doing for the last 25 years is at some point
maybe stopping.
S7 (18:27):
Absolutely. And could you tell us about what are some
of the challenges that people with blindness or low vision
face in Europe, and how do you think that they
differ to other regions like Australia, for example?
S5 (18:41):
Yeah, the latter part of the question, how they compare
to your own context, I leave that judgment to you
or the listeners of your program, of course. Um, because
I don't know how Australia that well, uh, but um,
in Europe, maybe the first thing to say is, of course,
when we talk about Europe, we're quite still talking about, uh,
(19:02):
a diverse continent. So the reality in some countries may
also differ from one country to another within Europe. So
maybe that's the first thing to to say. And the
same is actually true for the, let's say, strength of
the blindness or partial sight movement in the various countries.
(19:23):
Having said that, um, I would still say that one
of the key challenges is in the area of employment.
And I'm not saying that this is the top number
one challenge only that somehow goes before the others. But
it's clearly an important challenge, which probably illustrates underlying other
(19:48):
challenges in other areas of work and somehow makes them
makes them more visible. So in the area of employment,
we can still see that even in countries that have
quite progressive and generous social protection and employment and many
other schemes favouring the recruitment, retention and so on, of
(20:10):
blind and partially sighted people and of people with disabilities
in general. Even in those countries, the statistics, as much
as we have them at least, are quite, let's say,
poor or many blind and partially sighted people compared to
the general population, because that's the point of comparison, obviously. So, uh,
this is this is a real issue still and, uh,
(20:34):
I think why I'm saying this here, and elaborating a
bit more on this employment issue, is it does probably
somehow culminate, if you like, other issues that blind, partially
sighted people are facing in in wider society related to education,
(20:54):
where of course, the transformation to the famous inclusive education
is an is an ongoing struggle for many countries also
in Europe. How to really practice this and make this
really equal quality education and not just inclusive education by
let's say, let's say bluntly, putting blind or partially sighted
(21:15):
people in a, in a classroom, which is a different
thing from quality education. It is certainly illustrates the challenge
in employment. Also, issues related to still perception of what
it means to be blind in wider society, so negative stereotypes,
(21:38):
prejudices and negative perception overall when it comes to blindness
being somehow, well, maybe that person is less productive, that
maybe that person needs help all the time. All those
kind of assumptions. There are still a lot of them
around in wider society. And this, of course, just to
(21:59):
say it nicely and friendly, does not help when it
comes to being on a in a competitive situation, which
the labor market always is. So I think this underlines
some of the sort of key, key challenges that I,
that I see in in addition to, of course, the
wide area of accessibility, which is sort of a the
(22:20):
overall catch all phrase. Of course, there's accessibility in many
places that is still a real issue. Physical accessibility, but
also nowadays, of course, a lot of lot of digital
accessibility where there is both progress and sometimes still issues.
S6 (22:38):
Now, I've been over to Europe on a number of
different occasions to various countries. And a comment that I've
often made is if you want to be a blind
person anywhere, if you had the choice, pick Spain because um,
Foundation Fondation RNC is that looks like it's a pretty
strong organization and does seem to provide a lot of support.
(22:59):
What would you say would probably be the country you
wouldn't want to pick necessarily, if you were blind or
visually impaired?
S5 (23:07):
Oh, that's that's a tough one. Uh, first of all,
because I don't know all the countries myself, of course.
And I don't want to blame a country as as such. Uh.
Of course. Um, let me just have a quick thought about.
I mean, there are negative examples in terms of I mean,
I'm not saying this here too negatively because because of course,
(23:29):
I'm living there and I like to live in France.
But France is not a very well advanced country when
it comes to accessibility in many places. And they and
also Belgium, where I used to live before, is not
a very good example in terms of accessibility. And those
are I'm deliberately saying this because these are the countries
that I know fairly well because I've been living or
(23:49):
I am living there for a long time, so I
can judge a little bit this, this situation and why
I would say they are problematic cases. They are actually
these are countries who do not have the excuse of
not being wealthy, because if I took a poorer country
in Europe and there are, of course, as you know,
also some poorer countries in, let's say, Southeast Europe, uh,
(24:13):
if you look at Albania or other countries, they do
not have the same state of general development than France
or Germany or Belgium or others would have. So the
expectation maybe towards them would be lower from from the outset.
But of course, in Belgium and France, for example, this
(24:33):
is not the case. They have all the money and
resources and policies and whatever they need, and they could have.
And still the situation of in terms of accessibility and
so on is actually quite, quite lagging behind.
S7 (24:47):
Before you touched on, um, various misconceptions and stereotypes that
are held about blind people or people with low vision.
In your opinion, what would you say you know, the
most damaging stereotypes or misconceptions are?
S5 (25:02):
I think that the biggest misconception that is around is
that for many sighted people, if you ask them, which
I haven't ever really done in a scientific way, but
if you ask many sighted people what would be the
worst thing that could happen? You sort of life is
sort of a sense that you lose. Probably most people
would say the sight and this tells you probably something
(25:26):
because then from that starting point of being, oh my goodness,
if that happened to me, I would somehow not know
what to do, how to deal with things, and is
life even still worth or whatever? So it gets immediately
into quite a dramatic, I think, more tragic situation and
(25:46):
derived or based on that very negative. Uh, I think
perception then comes all of this, oh my goodness, then
people are in need for help all the time and
all life situations. They cannot cook, they cannot do this.
They cannot walk around easily. Um, and so on. So,
so I think based on that, um, sort of perception
(26:07):
that this being blind or losing part of your sight is,
is one of the worst things that could possibly happen
to you, is then really based a lot of very
false conceptions and assumptions. I think that's that's the biggest
that's the biggest one, actually. Um, and we need to
sort of fight this or at least through education, through
(26:28):
awareness raising, and through many other things, at least put
this into perspective and well, ideally at the end of
the day and turn it around.
S7 (26:37):
Do you think that there's any hope that, you know,
society will come to understand that these are just misconceptions
and stereotypes, or do you think they'll always exist?
S5 (26:47):
Well, it's probably probably misconceptions and stereotypes, not only towards
blind or partially sighted people, but towards many other people.
They they they do exist. But at the same time, um,
it's also our job and society's job in general, of course, to,
as I said, turn these around and this takes time.
This is not the revolution. This is probably an evolution
(27:08):
as as always. But there's also a lot of improvement.
I mean, if we look back at how it was used,
I don't know how this discussion would have been 30
years ago or 30 years in an historic kind of
perspective in a short period of period of time, probably
all these discussions wouldn't have taken place, actually. And if
(27:29):
you look into the we talk about the talked about earlier,
about the challenge also maybe to transform some of our
systems to make them inclusive in the field of education,
for example. I mean, 30 years ago, even the concept
of inclusive education, uh, was not talked about, at least
not in wider society. This was a niche issue that
(27:51):
started to emerge here and there, but was not a generally, uh,
let's say, accepted concept and an aim of society. So
there's a lot of progress as well. But of course,
if you are blind or partially sighted, you are living
your life now and today, and you want to see
the change more concretely in your daily life now and
(28:12):
today and not sort of wait for another 20, 30,
40 years to to sort of see more philosophical changes
in attitudes. So that's always a bit, I think of uh, of, uh,
let's say discrepancy between what you can expect really, the
change that you see immediately and sense immediately in your
daily life, and what are sort of the broader societal
(28:34):
changes that actually just do take time.
S7 (28:37):
How does the EU ensure that European governments uphold accessibility standards?
S5 (28:44):
Well, one thing is, uh, and I mean, our main work,
of course, in the first place is through through the
already mentioned advocacy, uh, that we do, whether it's the
European Union or through our members at the national level
within the different European countries. So, um, it's on the
one hand, of course, to lobby the the countries that
(29:04):
they improve existing legislation or adopt new one and depending
on the needs, of course. Uh, so this is, this
is one, uh, key approach to, uh, to that issue.
The other thing then, of course, is always and that's
where I think it What's saying is, is ever growing
the the importance of what I'm going to say now,
(29:26):
but the implementation nevertheless there are nowadays also in Europe
and I'm sure not only in Europe, more and more
pieces of legislation which are at least good. There can
always be better, they can always be improved, but they
are at least good as a starting point in many
places and areas of of life. But then there's often
(29:49):
a gap when we look at the how these are implemented.
So the our role and our job also internally, but
also then of course going back to the governments and
the parliaments and so on, is to make sure that
we actually somehow we have a kind of a watchdog
role when it comes to what our countries and the
European Union itself actually doing in implementing the laws that
(30:14):
they have given themselves. And this is bad and sometimes
good examples that we bring back to them? Of course.
S6 (30:21):
Has there been any particular moments in the last five
years where you've gone, ah, this kind of makes it
all worthwhile.
S5 (30:28):
Yes. I mean, there are always. I mean, the thing
about European work and I think I mean, not only
about the European work, but it's true that processes and
at an EU level, and if we were working, which
we are not at the UN, United Nations level, that
would probably be even harder. You measure progress along a
(30:49):
long time scale. You're not sort of going into ah,
now comes the great breakthrough immediately. This is just because
countries have to agree amongst themselves with the parliament. There
are so many actors involved, so that progress is, even
at the legislative level, a bit slower than it can
(31:10):
be in some, I don't know, at the very local
level where you have immediately also an outcome that is tangible.
I mean, you're lobbying for, I don't know, a traffic
light to get across. An acoustic system to announce that
it's red or green. And you will all be in
for it locally. And it's finally implemented. Well, it's immediately
visible that there's a result of your lobby work or
(31:32):
advocacy work. And this is, of course a bit different
when we look here at at EU level. Nevertheless, there
are successes. And just last year there has been something
that we have been calling for for ten years at
least as European Blind Union, but also together with the
European disability movement overall. And so that goes back before
(31:53):
my time as, as director is the European disability card.
So that at least would help when you're moving from
one country to another within Europe to give you the
same rights when traveling and having shorter stays in different countries.
And this has finally now been adopted last year, after
a long, long struggle, long controversies and so on and
(32:17):
so forth, and will enter into force in the coming
years because it needs to be now implemented by the
various countries. So this illustrates, yes, this has been a
real success, a real achievement. But again, there comes a
but with it, the achievement at the legislative sort of
the advocacy level which we have now and which we
celebrate it as we want to do. It is, of course,
(32:38):
still now the practice is still then still, let's say,
2 to 2 years down the line. So even there,
you still have to be a bit patient before you
really have the sort of card, in this case in
your hand and can really feel the difference. I mean,
almost physically when you're travelling.
S6 (32:57):
Lars, thank you for joining us on Studio One. It's
been a pleasure talking to you.
S5 (33:00):
Thank you for having me. Have a good day or evening.
S7 (33:03):
Thank you.
S5 (33:04):
Evening.
S2 (33:06):
So that's a wrap for this week. A big thank
you to Lars.
S3 (33:08):
And of course, thank you for listening. You can find
the podcast of this program, including some extra content on Apple, Spotify,
Google or your favorite podcast platform next week.
S2 (33:21):
How have you coped in the world of love and romance?
S3 (33:25):
We ask a few friends what their experiences are when
finding that significant other, or maybe just some company for
the evening.
S2 (33:32):
Between now and then, please do get in touch with
the show. Whether you have experience of any of the
issues covered on this week's episode of Studio One, or
if you think there is something we should be talking about.
You never know. Your story and insight may help somebody
else who is dealing with something similar.
S3 (33:46):
You can reach us via email at studio One at org.
That's studio number one at Vision Australia. Or of course,
you can search for us on social media, whether that
be Facebook, Instagram or just look for VA Radio Network.
We want to hear from you.
S2 (34:06):
Bye for now.
S1 (34:07):
Vision Australia Radio gratefully acknowledges the support of the Community
Broadcasting Foundation for Studio One.
This is studio one on Vision Australia radio.
S2 (00:12):
Hello, I'm Sam.
S3 (00:13):
And I'm Lizzie.
S2 (00:15):
And this is studio One, your weekly look at life
from a low vision and blind point of view. Here
on Vision Australia Radio.
S3 (00:20):
On this week's show, we turn our attention overseas. Lars Bosselmann,
the executive director of the European Blind Union, is our guest.
S2 (00:29):
We also have a couple of things to say about
a certain white House press conference held last week.
S3 (00:35):
As we always say at this point, please do get
in touch with the show. Whether you have experience of
any of the issues covered on this week's episode of
Studio One, or if you think there's something we should
be talking about. You never know. Your story and insight
may help someone who's dealing with something similar.
S2 (00:51):
You can email us Studio One at Vision Australia. That's
studio number one at Vision Australia.
S3 (00:57):
Or of course you can search us up on Facebook.
Just go to facebook.com, slash VA Radio Network.
S2 (01:04):
Hello, Lizzie. How are we going on this fine, but
somewhat hot day.
S3 (01:09):
Very good. Sam. Very good. Although, as we were about
to discuss very shortly, there's been some interesting developments over
the weekend in terms of, uh, disability inclusion and equity
in the United States, hasn't there?
S2 (01:24):
Well, we've kind of been tracking this story for a
little while, but some things kind of changed, uh, on Friday. Now,
I remember a comment that you'd said, um, when we
were first talking about this on on Tuesday and you
said surely things affecting, uh, people with a disability is
(01:45):
just sort of collateral damage.
S3 (01:46):
Because we were commenting on the Dei initiatives. And for
anyone that's not in the loop, Dei is diversity, equity
and inclusion. And basically these initiatives that were enacted years
ago were to make it fair and accessible for Americans
with a disability or any accessibility issues, to be able
(02:10):
to work in civil service jobs. And the reason that
this conversation had come up in the beginning was because
I was I'm actually following a few, uh, blind and
low vision content creators in America, and a lot of
them have been commenting about the scrapping of these Dei initiatives.
And they've been saying, look, as a person who's totally
blind or has vision loss, I can't serve in the
(02:33):
military and therefore a civil service job is the only
way that I'm able to serve my country. And now
you're basically telling me that you're no longer going to
support accessibility in these fields, so I'm not going to
be able to do the job that I want to
do or have been doing in some cases. So yeah.
And then of course, we fast forward to Friday, um,
(02:53):
the DC airport crash and, and with a jet collided
with a helicopter. And we also fast forward to Trump's comments.
And we know now that it's not just a case
of Trump mistaking.
S2 (03:05):
No, no, no, it's not a case of collateral damage.
S3 (03:08):
Because I had assumed that when they were talking about diversity,
equity and inclusion, they were, you know, going through the
whole gender roles and non-binary and like gender as a
social construct. I was assuming that that's what they were
talking about. But so I did think that, you know,
I was hoping that it was because Donald Trump and
his cabinet weren't aware of the effects that this would
(03:30):
have with people with disabilities. But as we can clearly
see by his comments on Friday, this isn't the case anymore.
We're not collateral damage. We're clearly being targeted.
S2 (03:40):
So let's remind everybody of what exactly he said.
S4 (03:45):
We do not know what led to this crash, but
we have some very strong opinions and ideas, and I
think we'll probably state those opinions now. The FAA's website
states they include hearing, vision, missing Extremities. Partial paralysis. Complete paralysis. Epilepsy.
The FAA's Diversity and Inclusion Hiring Plan, which says diversity
(04:08):
is integral to achieving FAA's mission of ensuring safe and
efficient travel. I don't think so. I don't think so.
I think it's just the opposite.
S2 (04:20):
Just the opposite. Just the opposite. I don't know about you.
I'm not hankering for a job as an air traffic controller.
I think that, frankly, as a person with a vision impairment,
I would not be able to do it even with
the most advanced adaptive software. I don't want to be
the one that misses something and causes an accident.
S3 (04:39):
I completely understand that. But just because you don't want to,
there might be other people out there that do. And
I think this targeting of, of, of, um, people with
disabilities is going to make it so that those particular
people won't have the opportunity.
S2 (04:55):
Exactly right. And we're going to cross over to over
to other disabilities now. I don't see any reason why
someone in a wheelchair or someone missing a leg or
an arm or something like that can't do that job.
It could not be an air traffic controller.
S3 (05:08):
Well, as I commented to you before, Sam, in my opinion,
as long as that candidate or that particular person has
shown that they're able to do the job, their disability
should not exclude them from doing that job. I mean,
it's kind of pointless for me to become an air
traffic controller because I'm totally blind. I can't see it
on the screen. But then again, I wouldn't apply for
(05:29):
that kind of job. Exactly.
S2 (05:30):
So what we are going are doing at the moment,
we've got some feelers out for people in the, in
America who have been covering these issues. And if we
can speak to them, or if you know anybody who
is based in America now and would like to speak
to us, we want to hear from them as well.
S3 (05:46):
We do. I had a migraine now before, and now
it's just up its level. Like my brain hurts just
thinking about this.
S2 (05:52):
But let's move to something a bit more positive. Earlier
this week, we talked to um. Lars. And, uh, it
was a great interview. So let's cross over to that now.
S3 (06:05):
Today on studio One, we are talking to Lars Bosselman,
who is the director of the European Blind Union. Lars,
welcome to studio one.
S5 (06:14):
Hello. From Paris. Across the time zone difference.
S6 (06:18):
Well, yes, exactly. It's, uh, later on today, it's the evening.
Here we are at the moment. And, uh, what I'm
looking at, um, the sun is starting to go down. It's, um,
about just under 30 degrees as far as temperature goes.
And you can hear some Australian birds off in the distance.
What is it like where you are?
S5 (06:37):
Well, I can tell you it's around 930 in the
morning here. So ten hours or something like that before
your time. And, uh, we are, well, having, like, a
end of January day. Winter day meeting here in Paris. Quite,
quite greyish, I would say today, the sky, as far
as I can tell. I mean, I'm fully blind, so
(06:57):
I'm not exactly sure, but it seems quite covered and
cloudy and the sort of the temperature will go up
until ten degrees highest today. Well, that gives you an impression.
Not exactly the same we're talking about here.
S6 (07:11):
So you're in Paris, but your accent isn't quite French?
S5 (07:15):
No. Personally speaking, I'm a well spotted. Of course I'm
a German citizen. I'm living in France for the last
five years. And before that, I've been living in Belgium
as well. So not been living in my own country
for quite some time now. But yes, I'm German and
that is probably more resonating with the accent I'm having
(07:37):
actually here.
S6 (07:37):
Well, that's the funny thing, is that in Australia, if
we talk about living in another country, it's always miles
away from where we are. But I mean, it's compared
to our corner of the world. Home is, all things considered,
not that far away.
S5 (07:51):
Yeah, that's the I don't know whether it's the beauty
or whatever it is of Europe. Of course you can,
within quite short distances, go to quite different language communities,
cultures and so on. So within quite a smaller space,
you have all of that experience without travelling too far.
S6 (08:09):
And so it brings us quite neatly to the European
Blind Union. Um, you would support vision impaired and blind people.
And so that would be from all across Europe or
just a particular section of the European Union?
S5 (08:23):
No. So we have as a European blind Union, we
are having 42 countries that are members in the blind Union.
So that gives you already quite an impression of, uh,
the breadth and the coverage of what we are doing.
So this goes actually much beyond the European Union as
a political entity, which only has 27 member states.
S7 (08:46):
So what is your role within the European Union?
S5 (08:49):
So my my own role is, as you already said
in the introduction, I'm the executive director, so that means
I'm on the one hand, of course, very much working
with our own leadership, the board and so on to
support them in their work that they can fulfill their duties.
But I'm also heading the secretariat, the office of uh EBU,
(09:13):
which has now eight members or eight staff members, I
should more correctly say in different fields of activity. So
I'm heading that entity of the organization. And then I'm
of course, having a lot of more, let's say, representational
tasks to do communication. And this interview being part of
of that as well, but also in the area of
(09:36):
political work, advocacy work, as we would probably call it,
where I'm also having a representational role to represent the
interests of blind and partially sighted people at political meetings,
whether it's European Union level or other meetings, depending on
the circumstances, of course.
S7 (09:54):
So what made you want to get involved with the EBU?
S5 (09:58):
So, uh, as I said, in terms of timing, it
was about five years ago, actually, almost on the day, uh,
five years ago that I started, uh, my current role
here within the European Blind Union. And what made me
at the time apply. And that inspired me and motivated
me and continues to motivate me still today, is actually,
(10:19):
on the one hand, myself a blind person since my birth.
So this is the personal story, of course, that motivates
me to, um, do this, this job, which then goes
beyond the question of just earning your salary and your life,
which is important, of course, as well. But it's actually
I'm a strong believer that, of course, the interests and
(10:42):
the rights of blind and partially sighted people should be
represented and at the end of the day, achieved by
those who have a lived experience of being blind or
partially sighted. And so, in that spirit, if you'd like,
I applied and apparently got the job at the time.
So this was the main sort of factor of of motivation.
(11:04):
The other one, maybe just to complete my answer here,
was also that I have a background in working internationally
or at Europe wide at least. And so I could
ideally combine my self-motivation from my own, let's say, blindness
that I'm having with my professional also, past experience in
(11:29):
working at the European level within the not for profit sector.
S7 (11:33):
Can you tell us just offhand if you know, when
was the Abu established?
S5 (11:38):
So we just last year actually celebrated our 40th anniversary.
So this goes back to the 80s, mid 80s. 84,
to be more precise. Of of course, uh, it was established.
So I let you judge whether this is a young
or an old organization or middle somehow. And of course,
(12:01):
these days then when we were established in the mid 80s,
were quite a different, a different time, obviously, politically speaking,
in terms of the countries that existed. Um, speaking in
terms of the European Union and its political role. Speaking,
of course, which at that time was much less than
(12:21):
it is today.
S7 (12:22):
Definitely. And one of the reasons that I wanted to
get in contact with you for this interview was because
I read a very interesting article on the United Nations
Regional Information Center about how Brazil and I, uh, can
shape the future for blind and vision impaired people. So,
in your opinion, how can tools like Braille and AI
(12:44):
help improve access to To information for blind and low
vision individuals.
S5 (12:49):
Yeah, I think I mean, first of all, Braille, which
is also celebrating an important anniversary this year, which means
the 200 years of existence, if you'd like, is probably
one of the best and most, uh, groundbreaking innovations in
the field of access or allowing access for blind and
(13:09):
partially sighted people to many things. Information to start with,
but not only education. Some of the more cultural spheres
like music, sciences, learning languages and so on and so forth.
So this is probably and one of the beauties I
think of, of Braille is on the one hand, it's
very simple. Just combining a few dots together is as such,
(13:34):
really simple as an idea. But at the same time,
it's a genius idea and it makes it, uh, let's
say applicable to so many areas of life, as I
already said. But also it makes it adaptable. So it
was very useful already. Such a long time ago when
everything was paper based, let's say. And it also has
(13:58):
made its transition to its nowadays where we are talking
about tablets, computers, all kinds of devices, mobile devices and
so on. So this is still extremely useful today. And
actually because it can be so easily reproduced also electronically
and not only on on paper. So I think this
(14:19):
makes it so beautiful. And it has really meant a
lot of progress for many blind and partially sighted people
in in those areas. Now, when it comes to artificial intelligence,
this is of course an area which we are talking about. Well,
we are seeing already some of its potential, but probably
even not, uh, 5% of what it's going to do
(14:42):
in the future.
S8 (14:43):
Yeah, sure.
S5 (14:45):
So, uh, already today, when we are looking at, uh,
I'm just trying to make some examples here from practical,
from a practical level, when we're talking about voice recognition,
where you can actually basically dictate a text to a machine,
this is a kind of artificial intelligence, and then it
recognizes the words you are speaking and puts it into
(15:08):
writing with a very limited number of mistakes. In reality,
of course they are. You still need to correct some things, but, um,
these tools are extremely developed already these days, and this
has already been, uh, a very significant improvement and progress
for many blind and partially sighted people in the area
(15:29):
of of communication in the wider sense, if you like.
S6 (15:32):
One of the things that I've been, uh, amused about, um,
artificial intelligence, uh, there was an article about it recently,
and in fact, in that unlike a lot of other
computer programs, Rams. When it doesn't know something, it ends
up filling in the gaps for itself, and some of
the results can be rather amusing. So if it mishears
something a word, it will put in the word that
(15:53):
it thinks that it should be, as opposed to just
simply saying, sorry, I don't know. So, uh, while a
lot it is a very useful tool at the moment,
it is also a very limited tool.
S5 (16:05):
It's clear that there's a lot of development that still
needs to to to happen. That's what I was saying.
I think we only see probably a certain very tiny
percentage of what it's supposed to do or possibly able
to do in, in moving forward, of course. And there
are also threats, let's say also or at least challenges
with artificial intelligence. So it's not all that it's innovative
(16:28):
and positive necessarily. But I mean, if you look at
things like in recruitment, uh, artificial intelligence can be used
or is in some cases is already used today for
shortlisting candidates. Now let's assume there is a blind candidate.
Applying for a job at the artificial intelligence tool is
(16:49):
actually somehow insisting on the person who is applying to
look straight into the camera during an interview or some
kind of a presentation video even, which may replace a
CV or whatever. And if the if it's set up
the tool in such a way that this eliminates the
candidate because of him or herself not being able to
(17:11):
because of the blindness or sight restriction, somehow not being
able to just look straight into the camera as maybe
sighted people would do. Well, then this is possibly excluding
people from opportunities. So there are also risks that we
of course should not here ignore from that, from the discussion.
(17:33):
Then maybe I would also say more on the positive side,
where I at least more personally, this is not as
such a European Union Union's point of view, but my
personal hope very strongly in the area of artificial intelligence
is about accessibility overall. Now, today, we are always catching
up with making documents accessible, making whole websites accessible or
(17:57):
mobile applications because in the beginning, often this is an
important aspect that got forgotten. And in the future, hopefully
artificial intelligence could help us rather than manually correcting and
fixing accessibility issues. Rather building them from scratch into the website,
the texts, the documents and so on so that this
(18:19):
accessibility sort of fixing or catching up that we are
doing for the last 25 years is at some point
maybe stopping.
S7 (18:27):
Absolutely. And could you tell us about what are some
of the challenges that people with blindness or low vision
face in Europe, and how do you think that they
differ to other regions like Australia, for example?
S5 (18:41):
Yeah, the latter part of the question, how they compare
to your own context, I leave that judgment to you
or the listeners of your program, of course. Um, because
I don't know how Australia that well, uh, but um,
in Europe, maybe the first thing to say is, of course,
when we talk about Europe, we're quite still talking about, uh,
(19:02):
a diverse continent. So the reality in some countries may
also differ from one country to another within Europe. So
maybe that's the first thing to to say. And the
same is actually true for the, let's say, strength of
the blindness or partial sight movement in the various countries.
(19:23):
Having said that, um, I would still say that one
of the key challenges is in the area of employment.
And I'm not saying that this is the top number
one challenge only that somehow goes before the others. But
it's clearly an important challenge, which probably illustrates underlying other
(19:48):
challenges in other areas of work and somehow makes them
makes them more visible. So in the area of employment,
we can still see that even in countries that have
quite progressive and generous social protection and employment and many
other schemes favouring the recruitment, retention and so on, of
(20:10):
blind and partially sighted people and of people with disabilities
in general. Even in those countries, the statistics, as much
as we have them at least, are quite, let's say,
poor or many blind and partially sighted people compared to
the general population, because that's the point of comparison, obviously. So, uh,
this is this is a real issue still and, uh,
(20:34):
I think why I'm saying this here, and elaborating a
bit more on this employment issue, is it does probably
somehow culminate, if you like, other issues that blind, partially
sighted people are facing in in wider society related to education,
(20:54):
where of course, the transformation to the famous inclusive education
is an is an ongoing struggle for many countries also
in Europe. How to really practice this and make this
really equal quality education and not just inclusive education by
let's say, let's say bluntly, putting blind or partially sighted
(21:15):
people in a, in a classroom, which is a different
thing from quality education. It is certainly illustrates the challenge
in employment. Also, issues related to still perception of what
it means to be blind in wider society, so negative stereotypes,
(21:38):
prejudices and negative perception overall when it comes to blindness
being somehow, well, maybe that person is less productive, that
maybe that person needs help all the time. All those
kind of assumptions. There are still a lot of them
around in wider society. And this, of course, just to
(21:59):
say it nicely and friendly, does not help when it
comes to being on a in a competitive situation, which
the labor market always is. So I think this underlines
some of the sort of key, key challenges that I,
that I see in in addition to, of course, the
wide area of accessibility, which is sort of a the
(22:20):
overall catch all phrase. Of course, there's accessibility in many
places that is still a real issue. Physical accessibility, but
also nowadays, of course, a lot of lot of digital
accessibility where there is both progress and sometimes still issues.
S6 (22:38):
Now, I've been over to Europe on a number of
different occasions to various countries. And a comment that I've
often made is if you want to be a blind
person anywhere, if you had the choice, pick Spain because um,
Foundation Fondation RNC is that looks like it's a pretty
strong organization and does seem to provide a lot of support.
(22:59):
What would you say would probably be the country you
wouldn't want to pick necessarily, if you were blind or
visually impaired?
S5 (23:07):
Oh, that's that's a tough one. Uh, first of all,
because I don't know all the countries myself, of course.
And I don't want to blame a country as as such. Uh.
Of course. Um, let me just have a quick thought about.
I mean, there are negative examples in terms of I mean,
I'm not saying this here too negatively because because of course,
(23:29):
I'm living there and I like to live in France.
But France is not a very well advanced country when
it comes to accessibility in many places. And they and
also Belgium, where I used to live before, is not
a very good example in terms of accessibility. And those
are I'm deliberately saying this because these are the countries
that I know fairly well because I've been living or
(23:49):
I am living there for a long time, so I
can judge a little bit this, this situation and why
I would say they are problematic cases. They are actually
these are countries who do not have the excuse of
not being wealthy, because if I took a poorer country
in Europe and there are, of course, as you know,
also some poorer countries in, let's say, Southeast Europe, uh,
(24:13):
if you look at Albania or other countries, they do
not have the same state of general development than France
or Germany or Belgium or others would have. So the
expectation maybe towards them would be lower from from the outset.
But of course, in Belgium and France, for example, this
(24:33):
is not the case. They have all the money and
resources and policies and whatever they need, and they could have.
And still the situation of in terms of accessibility and
so on is actually quite, quite lagging behind.
S7 (24:47):
Before you touched on, um, various misconceptions and stereotypes that
are held about blind people or people with low vision.
In your opinion, what would you say you know, the
most damaging stereotypes or misconceptions are?
S5 (25:02):
I think that the biggest misconception that is around is
that for many sighted people, if you ask them, which
I haven't ever really done in a scientific way, but
if you ask many sighted people what would be the
worst thing that could happen? You sort of life is
sort of a sense that you lose. Probably most people
would say the sight and this tells you probably something
(25:26):
because then from that starting point of being, oh my goodness,
if that happened to me, I would somehow not know
what to do, how to deal with things, and is
life even still worth or whatever? So it gets immediately
into quite a dramatic, I think, more tragic situation and
(25:46):
derived or based on that very negative. Uh, I think
perception then comes all of this, oh my goodness, then
people are in need for help all the time and
all life situations. They cannot cook, they cannot do this.
They cannot walk around easily. Um, and so on. So,
so I think based on that, um, sort of perception
(26:07):
that this being blind or losing part of your sight is,
is one of the worst things that could possibly happen
to you, is then really based a lot of very
false conceptions and assumptions. I think that's that's the biggest
that's the biggest one, actually. Um, and we need to
sort of fight this or at least through education, through
(26:28):
awareness raising, and through many other things, at least put
this into perspective and well, ideally at the end of
the day and turn it around.
S7 (26:37):
Do you think that there's any hope that, you know,
society will come to understand that these are just misconceptions
and stereotypes, or do you think they'll always exist?
S5 (26:47):
Well, it's probably probably misconceptions and stereotypes, not only towards
blind or partially sighted people, but towards many other people.
They they they do exist. But at the same time, um,
it's also our job and society's job in general, of course, to,
as I said, turn these around and this takes time.
This is not the revolution. This is probably an evolution
(27:08):
as as always. But there's also a lot of improvement.
I mean, if we look back at how it was used,
I don't know how this discussion would have been 30
years ago or 30 years in an historic kind of
perspective in a short period of period of time, probably
all these discussions wouldn't have taken place, actually. And if
(27:29):
you look into the we talk about the talked about earlier,
about the challenge also maybe to transform some of our
systems to make them inclusive in the field of education,
for example. I mean, 30 years ago, even the concept
of inclusive education, uh, was not talked about, at least
not in wider society. This was a niche issue that
(27:51):
started to emerge here and there, but was not a generally, uh,
let's say, accepted concept and an aim of society. So
there's a lot of progress as well. But of course,
if you are blind or partially sighted, you are living
your life now and today, and you want to see
the change more concretely in your daily life now and
(28:12):
today and not sort of wait for another 20, 30,
40 years to to sort of see more philosophical changes
in attitudes. So that's always a bit, I think of uh, of, uh,
let's say discrepancy between what you can expect really, the
change that you see immediately and sense immediately in your
daily life, and what are sort of the broader societal
(28:34):
changes that actually just do take time.
S7 (28:37):
How does the EU ensure that European governments uphold accessibility standards?
S5 (28:44):
Well, one thing is, uh, and I mean, our main work,
of course, in the first place is through through the
already mentioned advocacy, uh, that we do, whether it's the
European Union or through our members at the national level
within the different European countries. So, um, it's on the
one hand, of course, to lobby the the countries that
(29:04):
they improve existing legislation or adopt new one and depending
on the needs, of course. Uh, so this is, this
is one, uh, key approach to, uh, to that issue.
The other thing then, of course, is always and that's
where I think it What's saying is, is ever growing
the the importance of what I'm going to say now,
(29:26):
but the implementation nevertheless there are nowadays also in Europe
and I'm sure not only in Europe, more and more
pieces of legislation which are at least good. There can
always be better, they can always be improved, but they
are at least good as a starting point in many
places and areas of of life. But then there's often
(29:49):
a gap when we look at the how these are implemented.
So the our role and our job also internally, but
also then of course going back to the governments and
the parliaments and so on, is to make sure that
we actually somehow we have a kind of a watchdog
role when it comes to what our countries and the
European Union itself actually doing in implementing the laws that
(30:14):
they have given themselves. And this is bad and sometimes
good examples that we bring back to them? Of course.
S6 (30:21):
Has there been any particular moments in the last five
years where you've gone, ah, this kind of makes it
all worthwhile.
S5 (30:28):
Yes. I mean, there are always. I mean, the thing
about European work and I think I mean, not only
about the European work, but it's true that processes and
at an EU level, and if we were working, which
we are not at the UN, United Nations level, that
would probably be even harder. You measure progress along a
(30:49):
long time scale. You're not sort of going into ah,
now comes the great breakthrough immediately. This is just because
countries have to agree amongst themselves with the parliament. There
are so many actors involved, so that progress is, even
at the legislative level, a bit slower than it can
(31:10):
be in some, I don't know, at the very local
level where you have immediately also an outcome that is tangible.
I mean, you're lobbying for, I don't know, a traffic
light to get across. An acoustic system to announce that
it's red or green. And you will all be in
for it locally. And it's finally implemented. Well, it's immediately
visible that there's a result of your lobby work or
(31:32):
advocacy work. And this is, of course a bit different
when we look here at at EU level. Nevertheless, there
are successes. And just last year there has been something
that we have been calling for for ten years at
least as European Blind Union, but also together with the
European disability movement overall. And so that goes back before
(31:53):
my time as, as director is the European disability card.
So that at least would help when you're moving from
one country to another within Europe to give you the
same rights when traveling and having shorter stays in different countries.
And this has finally now been adopted last year, after
a long, long struggle, long controversies and so on and
(32:17):
so forth, and will enter into force in the coming
years because it needs to be now implemented by the
various countries. So this illustrates, yes, this has been a
real success, a real achievement. But again, there comes a
but with it, the achievement at the legislative sort of
the advocacy level which we have now and which we
celebrate it as we want to do. It is, of course,
(32:38):
still now the practice is still then still, let's say,
2 to 2 years down the line. So even there,
you still have to be a bit patient before you
really have the sort of card, in this case in
your hand and can really feel the difference. I mean,
almost physically when you're travelling.
S6 (32:57):
Lars, thank you for joining us on Studio One. It's
been a pleasure talking to you.
S5 (33:00):
Thank you for having me. Have a good day or evening.
S7 (33:03):
Thank you.
S5 (33:04):
Evening.
S2 (33:06):
So that's a wrap for this week. A big thank
you to Lars.
S3 (33:08):
And of course, thank you for listening. You can find
the podcast of this program, including some extra content on Apple, Spotify,
Google or your favorite podcast platform next week.
S2 (33:21):
How have you coped in the world of love and romance?
S3 (33:25):
We ask a few friends what their experiences are when
finding that significant other, or maybe just some company for
the evening.
S2 (33:32):
Between now and then, please do get in touch with
the show. Whether you have experience of any of the
issues covered on this week's episode of Studio One, or
if you think there is something we should be talking about.
You never know. Your story and insight may help somebody
else who is dealing with something similar.
S3 (33:46):
You can reach us via email at studio One at org.
That's studio number one at Vision Australia. Or of course,
you can search for us on social media, whether that
be Facebook, Instagram or just look for VA Radio Network.
We want to hear from you.
S2 (34:06):
Bye for now.
S1 (34:07):
Vision Australia Radio gratefully acknowledges the support of the Community
Broadcasting Foundation for Studio One.
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