July 2, 2025 • 28 mins
This week Sam speaks with Ian Bailey, optometrist lecturer and low vision pioneer still currently working in the school of optometry at University of California in Berkeley.
You'll hear part one of their conversation this week from Ian's early life up until leaving London for postgraduate studies in Indiana.
Then later on in the show, Liz joins us for the latest updates from Vision Australia's fortnightly newsletter For Your Information, or FYI.
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 (00:21):
From Vision Australia. This is talking vision. And now here's
your host Sam Colley.
S2 (00:31):
Hello, everyone. It's great to be here with you. And
for the next half hour we talk matters of blindness
and low vision.
S3 (00:39):
The thing that I can remember being embarrassed by was
at one time, I was at a social function with
my parents, and one of my dad's friends asked me, Hey, Ian,
do optometrists grind the lenses themselves? And I thought, I
have no idea. Here I am in the second year
of optometry program officially, and I didn't really know what
(01:00):
optometrists did, whether they did this or did that. But
I started taking things really seriously and became an energetic
and enthusiastic optometry student after that.
S2 (01:12):
Welcome to the program. This week we feature part one
of my conversation with Ian Bailey, optometrist, lecturer, researcher, and
low vision pioneer who was here to chat to me
all about his career in optometry. Starting off this week
with his early life and career leading up to his
(01:37):
move to London in the early to mid 60s. That
conversation is coming up very shortly, so make sure to
stick around. And then after we hear from Ian this week,
Liz Dalakouras is back to give us an update on
the latest from foyer information, otherwise known as FYI. I
(01:59):
hope you enjoy this week's episode of Talking Vision. This
week we feature part one of my conversation Association with lecturer, optometrist,
researcher and low vision pioneer Ian Bailey. I caught up
within a couple of weeks ago to chat about his
(02:22):
career in optometry. Leading up to where he's still currently
working at the University of Berkeley in the Bay Area
of San Francisco. And it's my great pleasure to welcome
in right now, Ian, welcome to Talking Vision. It's an
absolute pleasure to have you today.
S3 (02:45):
And I'm pleased to be here now.
S2 (02:47):
Ian, let's start off at the beginning with the formative
years and how you got into optometry in the first place.
I'm sure there's a story there.
S3 (02:58):
Yeah, it's a it's a pretty weird story, though, that, um,
I went to Coburg High School and I was a
bit of a a Class clown. Sort of a bit
of a troublemaker at school. Um, I used to get
pretty good grades. Um, didn't work very hard. It was
(03:19):
more fun being a naughty boy at the back of
the classroom than I'm working hard. But I did pretty
well with my grades and, um, had no particular career
thoughts or direction. Um, when I was in 11th grade,
my mother, um, took me to, um, a careers exhibition
(03:41):
at the exhibition hall. Um, and she made me go.
And I got some material from, um, organizations that were
related to science things. And so I had engineering and chemistry, and, um,
and I picked up some brochures for optometry. I didn't
(04:02):
know really what optometry was at that stage. My parents
had never seen an optometrist. I'd never spoken to an optometrist. Um,
just didn't know anything about it. But I filled in
a lot of forms and applied for scholarships or traineeships
for different scientifically related um organizations, and optometry was one
(04:26):
of them. And I thought, if I get a scholarship
and what I could do is even if I didn't
want to do optometry, if I got the money, I
could give it back when I decided that I wasn't
going to do optometry. So I thought I'd, you know,
I was just taking a bit of a bit of insurance. Well,
when I did matric, I did moderately well. Um, at matric,
(04:50):
it's 12th grade. Used to be called matriculation. In those
days I did reasonably well and I got the best
matriculation grades of of the the small number of people
that wanted to get into optometry. Commentary. And so I
got this scholarship, and I think it was worth something
like £370. They had pounds in those days at £375.
(05:16):
I don't know whether it was a year or total.
And I was admitted to university. I got a Commonwealth
scholarship and for the first year of university, um, for
any of the science courses that were related to biology,
and that would include dentistry and medicine and, and physiology, zoology,
(05:38):
anything like that. You did basically the same course. You
did physics and chemistry and um, and zoology and math.
And so I did that for my first year and
I had this scholarship. I put the money in the
bank and thinking that I could give it back, um,
(05:58):
if I decided not to do optometry when I really
had to make the decision at second year because I could,
I would have been or would have been a possibility
for me to transfer to medicine or or or something else.
And so at first year uni, I played more cards
than I played with my textbooks and sort of got through,
(06:22):
but I basically wasn't really pursuing my studies seriously or
with great seriousness or. Um, and I wasn't really pursuing
a career. Um, and, um, I passed my first year, um,
and going to the second year, that's when I had
(06:43):
to sort of sign up for optometry. Um, and so
I said, hey, I don't know what else to do.
I may as well give this optometry a go. Um,
I didn't quite know what optometry was started. Um, at
the at the School of Optometry, which was then in a, um,
(07:05):
a building on Collins Street. It was the College of Optometry.
It was an affiliated college of the Melbourne University. It
wasn't a degree giving, um, institution. And there was a
small group of us, um, actually five, as it turned out, um,
starting how real optometry program, which was at our second
(07:28):
year of university and we had another two more years
to go after that, and I started to learn what
optometry was, um, as course went along. I was a
thing that I can remember being embarrassed by was at
one time, I was at a social function with my parents,
(07:50):
and one of my dad's friends asked me, Hey Ian,
do optometrists grind the lenses themselves? And I thought, I
have no idea. Here I am in the second year
of the optometry program, officially. Um, and I didn't really
know what optometrists did, whether they did this or did that,
(08:11):
but I started taking things really seriously and became an
energetic and enthusiastic optometry student after that. And so, um,
it was sort of partway into my second year of
the program that I became an enthusiastic optometry student. And
the at the time, the, um, head of the optometry
(08:35):
program was Barry Cole. And he was about five years
or six years, actually seven years older than me. So
he would have been in his late 20s, and he
was the only full time faculty member at the school.
All the others were part time and some coming from
(08:56):
the university, some I'm coming from private optometric practice. And
Barry Cole was just really enthusiastic. And he had a
real emphasis on the science underlying optometry. It wasn't how
to learn the methods. It was to understand the science
(09:18):
that underpinned the methods. And then you would get the
methods under control. And so we had an extraordinary emphasis
coming from Barry Cole on getting to know the science.
And it really was extraordinary. There were five of us
(09:39):
that ended up graduating with that class. Two were New Zealanders,
and the other two ended up in academic life and
are really distinguished vision scientists. Tony Adams, who's dead, became
the dean of optometry at the University of California, Berkeley,
which is the best school of optometry in the world,
(10:02):
and nobody would argue with that. And Don Mitchell ended
up having his career as a professor of psychology in Canada,
in in Nova Scotia, the University of Dalhousie. And so 60%
of the class had distinguished scientific and academic careers. I
(10:25):
should have mentioned that during my final year of high
school and during the four years of optometry program, I
had a girlfriend who is now and still my wife.
We started going together when I was in high school,
and when I graduated or completed the optometry program at
(10:45):
the end of 62. Um, we married a few weeks later.
We married in February of 63. And, our plan was
to go into private. I was going to go into
private practice. We were going to start to put some
money together to buy a house, and we wanted to
start having kids pretty quickly.
S2 (11:12):
And Sam Kelly and you're listening to Talking Vision on
Vision Australia Radio, associated Stations of Reading Radio and the
Community Radio Network. I hope you enjoyed the first half
of my conversation this week with Ian Bailey. If you
missed any part of that conversation with Ian or you'd
(11:34):
love to hear it again, talking vision is available on
the podcast app of your choice, or you can also
find it through the Vision Australia library. One other place
where you can find all episodes of Talking Vision is
the Vision Australia Radio our website. At VA radio, that's
(11:55):
VA radio. All one word.org. But for now, back to
the program and the second half of my conversation with Ian.
S3 (12:06):
I worked for a leading Melbourne optometrist at the time. Um,
his name was Bruce Beasley. He had he was the
president of the Australian Optometric Association. He was very important
in optometric politics. And he had offered me a partnership
(12:27):
with really, really good terms. You know, I, you know,
and I was with him for the year of 1963.
And he said, um, after Christmas, we'll talk about arrangements
we'll need to make about getting together as business partners
or practice partners. Contact lenses at the time were really
(12:51):
quite new. Soft lenses hadn't hadn't been invented. And, um,
most of the lenses being fitted were corneal lenses, um,
made out of perspex or plexiglass?
S2 (13:03):
Yes. Very hard, very uncomfortable.
S3 (13:06):
Yeah, yeah. Um, and we were not well trained in
contact lenses. I saw a couple of patients, and I
felt so inadequate and felt that I was, you know,
all bloody patients having to deal with somebody as incompetent
as me. So I was feeling uncomfortable about my optometric skills.
(13:29):
And also I thought, do I really want to marry
Bruce Besley? Do I want to be linked to Bruce Besley,
the whole of my professional career? Because that's that's the
way it looked like it was going for a while.
And I decided I didn't want to do that, so
I didn't bring up the subject of, um, talking about, um,
(13:52):
partnership arrangements. And I was feeling antsy and insecure about my, um,
quality of optometric care because I really wanted to be good.
During my second year in private practice, I was practicing
in Moonee Ponds, and I was managing the practice, and
(14:13):
there was myself as receptionist and, um, an optical workshop guy, and, um,
that I was also going into the School of Optometry
to teach in the clinic one day a week. Um,
and when I was at the School of Optometry, I
(14:33):
went to the library and was flicking through some journals
and saw that England, um, was um, or in England,
they were offering night time classes for continuing education optometrists
teaching them about contact lenses. So I thought that would
(14:53):
be a a good thing to do. And then I
had to persuade my wife, um, my new wife, um, that, um,
would be a good thing to go to England so
I could get some contact lens experience. Um, and it
took me a while to persuade her. Um, I was
(15:14):
helped in the persuasion by, um, Pete Seeger, the singer.
S2 (15:19):
Oh, my goodness.
S3 (15:21):
Now, who? Well, he had a song called Little Boxes.
Little boxes, little boxes, all made out of ticky tacky.
S2 (15:27):
Yes. Of course.
S3 (15:30):
And so every time that that that was on the
radio in those days, and I would turn it up
full volume whenever it came on. So I don't know
whether it was Pete or me, but my wife agreed to, um,
come to England. So, um, at the end of 64, um, um,
(15:51):
on New Year's Eve, we, um, got on an Italian ship,
the Galileo. Um, and, um, took off for England. We
took we went by ship because it was cheaper than
air flight in those days. Um, it took 23 days
(16:12):
to get there, and it was fantastic. We went, um, Adelaide, Perth, Singapore,
Bombay when there was a town called Bombay, um, Aden,
when there was a place called Aden, it's now Yemen. Um,
and then the boat went through the Suez Canal while we,
we were, um, part of a day trip to Cairo. Um, um,
(16:36):
stopped at Messina and we got off the ship in Naples, um,
and went on to, um, And went on to England.
In England. I got a job in the first couple
of days there. Um, and, um, it was in Kensington,
a sort of inner suburb of London. Um, and my
(16:59):
intention was that I was going to work in practice, um,
and go to the night, um, the night classes when they,
when they started up, um, and, um, the, at that practice, um,
I had to work all day Saturday, but I had
(17:21):
all day Thursday off. Um, my wife got a job, um,
working in a legal office, and, um, um, on the
first Thursday after we'd got our jobs, um, I had
a day all to myself while my wife was at
(17:41):
work at her work. And so I went to the
School of Optometry in London, where the where the contact
lens classes were going to be held. Um, um, I
was just sniffing around in the library, um, and a
guy came up to me who. And he turned out
to be the head of department. His name was Bob Fletcher.
(18:04):
He asked me who I was, and I told him
that I was an optometrist from Australia. I had two
years of optometric, of real practice, optometric experience. Um, I'd
had a little bit of experience teaching in the clinic
in Melbourne. Um, and he said, would you like to
be a graduate student instructor here at the City University?
(18:30):
And I said, what would be involved? And, um, he
told me what I'd have to do. Um, and I
had to do some research. I had to take some classes,
but I had to do some teaching, and some of
the teaching I would be helping with was in the
contact lens clinic. And so, um, even though it was
(18:52):
a little less money, um, for than I was getting in, in, um,
clinical practice, I, um, I took the job, um, and
worked in the same practice on Saturday. So I ended
up coming about even with the amount of money I
was receiving. I just had to work a six day
(19:13):
week rather than a five day week. Um, and there, um,
I picked up a lot of optometric skills very, very quickly. Um,
the City University London had the best contact lens, um,
crew in the world. They had, um, the best experts
(19:36):
in contact lenses anywhere. And I worked with all these
people and I could work where they made the contact lenses. Um,
they had a contact lens technician, a full time contact
lens guy who made the lenses for the school. Um, and, um,
I just loved being in contact lenses. I also did
(20:00):
a bit of research, um, because that was part of
the obligation. And I did some, um, teaching. Um, and, um,
when you learn more, when you have to teach than
you do if you're on the student side of the lectern. Um,
(20:22):
and so I ended up, um, working with a lot
of instructors getting, um, um, getting very personalized guidance. Um, but, um,
because you're worried of, you know, if you're going to
teach you so, so much worried about being found out
(20:45):
for your deficiencies, that you work hard on covering your ass. Um, and,
and so you end up getting to know your subject
very well. And so I learned about a lot about
contact lenses. Um, and in all, I was in London
(21:06):
for going on two years.
S2 (21:10):
Happy financial New year. But you know what that means.
It's time for a few updates to a series of programs,
such as the NDIS, and to have a chat with
us about that, as well as a few other updates
from elsewhere in the blind and low vision community. It's
(21:30):
my great pleasure to welcome back to Talking vision. Editor
of for Information Liz Dalakouras. Liz, welcome back to Talking Vision.
Great to have you.
S4 (21:42):
Great to be here.
S2 (21:43):
First off, Liz, we've got quite a bit of important
info about the NDIS. Quite a few changes, a bit
of uncertainty for people out there. So help our listeners
minds at ease and give us some info about the NDIS.
That's just come up.
S4 (22:02):
A lot of change happening in the sector next to
impossible to keep up with everything that's going on because
something will get said and the next week it's different.
It's the same in both NDIS and my aged care.
So that's exactly why we started a new resource series,
and it's a series of articles about the NDIS and
the changes that you'll be seeing recently. So in this
latest edition of FYI, we talked about the NDIS supports
(22:26):
and if you've noticed that suddenly that yours have changed
or they've disappeared off your plan, you are not alone.
So there are new rules that mean supports must now
directly relate to the impairments that were listed in your
original NDIS access request. And so many people are feeling
the impacts of this. So we've written an article to
help you better understand what's going on there.
S2 (22:49):
And as I understand it, Liz, there has also been, um,
some new pricing arrangements and there's updates around that as well.
S4 (23:00):
Yeah, there is just to add even more changes to
it all. Sam. So the Ndia has officially now released
the new 2025 to 26 pricing arrangements, and that does
include some minor changes to some of our services as
in Vision Australia services. So there have been changes in
pricing to certain therapy types like psychology and physiotherapy. And additionally,
(23:24):
there's been a minor increase in pricing for recreation and
NDIS employment services. but provide a travel price limits have
been reduced. So in some good news for us and
you guys, travel caps for therapy services will still apply
but are now billed at 50% of the hourly rate.
(23:45):
So all these changes have clicked in now as of today,
the 1st of July, and the Ndia will index participants
plans to match the increases, but they won't reduce the
funding for your therapy price cuts. So within FYI, there's
a link to take you directly to the NDIS website
to help you better understand that process as well.
S2 (24:04):
Okay, and Liz understand Uber's been quite busy with a
new transport subsidy trial. Tell us a bit about that one.
S4 (24:14):
Yeah, absolutely. They have. I mean we know how important
Ubers are for the blind and low vision community. Sam.
So Uber is launching a trial to advocate for provider
neutral transport subsidy schemes. And that's to move beyond what
is currently the taxi only model. So this new initiative
aims to demonstrate, through real world data, the benefits of
offering people with disability a greater choice in their transport services.
(24:38):
Uber will fund the equivalent subsidy and mirror existing schemes
in each state to gather the insights and support the
government policy needs for the reform. And Uber themselves have
come up with a survey that you can complete and
have your say.
S2 (24:53):
Perfect. And Liz, a new accessible game has just landed,
so that's quite exciting.
S4 (25:01):
Yeah, it really is. It's it's so cool. Sam and
the man who developed the game, he's actually going to
be a part of our Telelink Winter webinar series, which
I'll talk about a little bit later. But a new
game has landed. It's called The Land of Libya. It's
a phone and iPad game that was designed for people
who are blind or have low vision. And it's up
for a 2025 Apple Design Award. Very, very cool. So
(25:25):
whether you yourself are new to gaming, or you're just
curious about sussing out a new game for your phone,
The Land of Livia offers a relaxed, accessible experience that's
filled with rich storytelling and simple controls. All you need
to play this game is your imagination. Just visit the
App Store and have a try.
S2 (25:44):
Sounds fantastic. And let's jump into that telling discussion now.
There's quite a few special interest groups that are just
kicking off as we speak.
S4 (25:55):
Yeah, absolutely. They're starting very, very soon within the next week.
So there's still time to register. There are going to
be four stories with four powerful messages. So our Telelink
webinar series is always a very popular series. We do
them in the summer and the winter, and this winter
it's shaping up to be a great series. So we
have an incredible lineup that feature a professor, a businesswoman,
(26:19):
a gaming developer, the man who did Land of Livia,
and an educator. Their stories are just so cool. They're
filled with inspiration, how they overcame challenges and their triumphs.
You can visit us online and go straight to the
Telelink webpage to learn more about that.
S2 (26:36):
And to find out anything more about those sort of things,
and a lot more as well. You can of course,
sign up to the FYI mailing list by heading to
the Vision Australia website. Vision Australia and search for. For
your information. To get your name onto the mailing list
(26:58):
and have the latest issue of FYI emailed to you
every two weeks. Liz, thank you so much for your
time today. Great to catch up with you as always
and hear about all the exciting things in this issue
of FYI.
S4 (27:14):
Thank you for having me Sam, and we will chat
again in two weeks.
S2 (27:24):
And that's all the time we have for today. You've
been listening to Talking Vision. Talking vision is a Vision
Australia radio production. Thanks to all involved with putting the
show together every week. And remember, we love hearing from you.
So please get in touch anytime on our email at
Talking Vision at Vision Australia. That's talking vision all. One
(27:48):
word at Vision Australia. But until next week it's Sam
Corley saying bye for now.
S1 (27:59):
You can contact Vision Australia by phoning us anytime during
business hours on one 384 746. That's one 384 74
six or by visiting Vision Australia. That's Vision Australia.
From Vision Australia. This is talking vision. And now here's
your host Sam Colley.
S2 (00:31):
Hello, everyone. It's great to be here with you. And
for the next half hour we talk matters of blindness
and low vision.
S3 (00:39):
The thing that I can remember being embarrassed by was
at one time, I was at a social function with
my parents, and one of my dad's friends asked me, Hey, Ian,
do optometrists grind the lenses themselves? And I thought, I
have no idea. Here I am in the second year
of optometry program officially, and I didn't really know what
(01:00):
optometrists did, whether they did this or did that. But
I started taking things really seriously and became an energetic
and enthusiastic optometry student after that.
S2 (01:12):
Welcome to the program. This week we feature part one
of my conversation with Ian Bailey, optometrist, lecturer, researcher, and
low vision pioneer who was here to chat to me
all about his career in optometry. Starting off this week
with his early life and career leading up to his
(01:37):
move to London in the early to mid 60s. That
conversation is coming up very shortly, so make sure to
stick around. And then after we hear from Ian this week,
Liz Dalakouras is back to give us an update on
the latest from foyer information, otherwise known as FYI. I
(01:59):
hope you enjoy this week's episode of Talking Vision. This
week we feature part one of my conversation Association with lecturer, optometrist,
researcher and low vision pioneer Ian Bailey. I caught up
within a couple of weeks ago to chat about his
(02:22):
career in optometry. Leading up to where he's still currently
working at the University of Berkeley in the Bay Area
of San Francisco. And it's my great pleasure to welcome
in right now, Ian, welcome to Talking Vision. It's an
absolute pleasure to have you today.
S3 (02:45):
And I'm pleased to be here now.
S2 (02:47):
Ian, let's start off at the beginning with the formative
years and how you got into optometry in the first place.
I'm sure there's a story there.
S3 (02:58):
Yeah, it's a it's a pretty weird story, though, that, um,
I went to Coburg High School and I was a
bit of a a Class clown. Sort of a bit
of a troublemaker at school. Um, I used to get
pretty good grades. Um, didn't work very hard. It was
(03:19):
more fun being a naughty boy at the back of
the classroom than I'm working hard. But I did pretty
well with my grades and, um, had no particular career
thoughts or direction. Um, when I was in 11th grade,
my mother, um, took me to, um, a careers exhibition
(03:41):
at the exhibition hall. Um, and she made me go.
And I got some material from, um, organizations that were
related to science things. And so I had engineering and chemistry, and, um,
and I picked up some brochures for optometry. I didn't
(04:02):
know really what optometry was at that stage. My parents
had never seen an optometrist. I'd never spoken to an optometrist. Um,
just didn't know anything about it. But I filled in
a lot of forms and applied for scholarships or traineeships
for different scientifically related um organizations, and optometry was one
(04:26):
of them. And I thought, if I get a scholarship
and what I could do is even if I didn't
want to do optometry, if I got the money, I
could give it back when I decided that I wasn't
going to do optometry. So I thought I'd, you know,
I was just taking a bit of a bit of insurance. Well,
when I did matric, I did moderately well. Um, at matric,
(04:50):
it's 12th grade. Used to be called matriculation. In those
days I did reasonably well and I got the best
matriculation grades of of the the small number of people
that wanted to get into optometry. Commentary. And so I
got this scholarship, and I think it was worth something
like £370. They had pounds in those days at £375.
(05:16):
I don't know whether it was a year or total.
And I was admitted to university. I got a Commonwealth
scholarship and for the first year of university, um, for
any of the science courses that were related to biology,
and that would include dentistry and medicine and, and physiology, zoology,
(05:38):
anything like that. You did basically the same course. You
did physics and chemistry and um, and zoology and math.
And so I did that for my first year and
I had this scholarship. I put the money in the
bank and thinking that I could give it back, um,
(05:58):
if I decided not to do optometry when I really
had to make the decision at second year because I could,
I would have been or would have been a possibility
for me to transfer to medicine or or or something else.
And so at first year uni, I played more cards
than I played with my textbooks and sort of got through,
(06:22):
but I basically wasn't really pursuing my studies seriously or
with great seriousness or. Um, and I wasn't really pursuing
a career. Um, and, um, I passed my first year, um,
and going to the second year, that's when I had
(06:43):
to sort of sign up for optometry. Um, and so
I said, hey, I don't know what else to do.
I may as well give this optometry a go. Um,
I didn't quite know what optometry was started. Um, at
the at the School of Optometry, which was then in a, um,
(07:05):
a building on Collins Street. It was the College of Optometry.
It was an affiliated college of the Melbourne University. It
wasn't a degree giving, um, institution. And there was a
small group of us, um, actually five, as it turned out, um,
starting how real optometry program, which was at our second
(07:28):
year of university and we had another two more years
to go after that, and I started to learn what
optometry was, um, as course went along. I was a
thing that I can remember being embarrassed by was at
one time, I was at a social function with my parents,
(07:50):
and one of my dad's friends asked me, Hey Ian,
do optometrists grind the lenses themselves? And I thought, I
have no idea. Here I am in the second year
of the optometry program, officially. Um, and I didn't really
know what optometrists did, whether they did this or did that,
(08:11):
but I started taking things really seriously and became an
energetic and enthusiastic optometry student after that. And so, um,
it was sort of partway into my second year of
the program that I became an enthusiastic optometry student. And
the at the time, the, um, head of the optometry
(08:35):
program was Barry Cole. And he was about five years
or six years, actually seven years older than me. So
he would have been in his late 20s, and he
was the only full time faculty member at the school.
All the others were part time and some coming from
(08:56):
the university, some I'm coming from private optometric practice. And
Barry Cole was just really enthusiastic. And he had a
real emphasis on the science underlying optometry. It wasn't how
to learn the methods. It was to understand the science
(09:18):
that underpinned the methods. And then you would get the
methods under control. And so we had an extraordinary emphasis
coming from Barry Cole on getting to know the science.
And it really was extraordinary. There were five of us
(09:39):
that ended up graduating with that class. Two were New Zealanders,
and the other two ended up in academic life and
are really distinguished vision scientists. Tony Adams, who's dead, became
the dean of optometry at the University of California, Berkeley,
which is the best school of optometry in the world,
(10:02):
and nobody would argue with that. And Don Mitchell ended
up having his career as a professor of psychology in Canada,
in in Nova Scotia, the University of Dalhousie. And so 60%
of the class had distinguished scientific and academic careers. I
(10:25):
should have mentioned that during my final year of high
school and during the four years of optometry program, I
had a girlfriend who is now and still my wife.
We started going together when I was in high school,
and when I graduated or completed the optometry program at
(10:45):
the end of 62. Um, we married a few weeks later.
We married in February of 63. And, our plan was
to go into private. I was going to go into
private practice. We were going to start to put some
money together to buy a house, and we wanted to
start having kids pretty quickly.
S2 (11:12):
And Sam Kelly and you're listening to Talking Vision on
Vision Australia Radio, associated Stations of Reading Radio and the
Community Radio Network. I hope you enjoyed the first half
of my conversation this week with Ian Bailey. If you
missed any part of that conversation with Ian or you'd
(11:34):
love to hear it again, talking vision is available on
the podcast app of your choice, or you can also
find it through the Vision Australia library. One other place
where you can find all episodes of Talking Vision is
the Vision Australia Radio our website. At VA radio, that's
(11:55):
VA radio. All one word.org. But for now, back to
the program and the second half of my conversation with Ian.
S3 (12:06):
I worked for a leading Melbourne optometrist at the time. Um,
his name was Bruce Beasley. He had he was the
president of the Australian Optometric Association. He was very important
in optometric politics. And he had offered me a partnership
(12:27):
with really, really good terms. You know, I, you know,
and I was with him for the year of 1963.
And he said, um, after Christmas, we'll talk about arrangements
we'll need to make about getting together as business partners
or practice partners. Contact lenses at the time were really
(12:51):
quite new. Soft lenses hadn't hadn't been invented. And, um,
most of the lenses being fitted were corneal lenses, um,
made out of perspex or plexiglass?
S2 (13:03):
Yes. Very hard, very uncomfortable.
S3 (13:06):
Yeah, yeah. Um, and we were not well trained in
contact lenses. I saw a couple of patients, and I
felt so inadequate and felt that I was, you know,
all bloody patients having to deal with somebody as incompetent
as me. So I was feeling uncomfortable about my optometric skills.
(13:29):
And also I thought, do I really want to marry
Bruce Besley? Do I want to be linked to Bruce Besley,
the whole of my professional career? Because that's that's the
way it looked like it was going for a while.
And I decided I didn't want to do that, so
I didn't bring up the subject of, um, talking about, um,
(13:52):
partnership arrangements. And I was feeling antsy and insecure about my, um,
quality of optometric care because I really wanted to be good.
During my second year in private practice, I was practicing
in Moonee Ponds, and I was managing the practice, and
(14:13):
there was myself as receptionist and, um, an optical workshop guy, and, um,
that I was also going into the School of Optometry
to teach in the clinic one day a week. Um,
and when I was at the School of Optometry, I
(14:33):
went to the library and was flicking through some journals
and saw that England, um, was um, or in England,
they were offering night time classes for continuing education optometrists
teaching them about contact lenses. So I thought that would
(14:53):
be a a good thing to do. And then I
had to persuade my wife, um, my new wife, um, that, um,
would be a good thing to go to England so
I could get some contact lens experience. Um, and it
took me a while to persuade her. Um, I was
(15:14):
helped in the persuasion by, um, Pete Seeger, the singer.
S2 (15:19):
Oh, my goodness.
S3 (15:21):
Now, who? Well, he had a song called Little Boxes.
Little boxes, little boxes, all made out of ticky tacky.
S2 (15:27):
Yes. Of course.
S3 (15:30):
And so every time that that that was on the
radio in those days, and I would turn it up
full volume whenever it came on. So I don't know
whether it was Pete or me, but my wife agreed to, um,
come to England. So, um, at the end of 64, um, um,
(15:51):
on New Year's Eve, we, um, got on an Italian ship,
the Galileo. Um, and, um, took off for England. We
took we went by ship because it was cheaper than
air flight in those days. Um, it took 23 days
(16:12):
to get there, and it was fantastic. We went, um, Adelaide, Perth, Singapore,
Bombay when there was a town called Bombay, um, Aden,
when there was a place called Aden, it's now Yemen. Um,
and then the boat went through the Suez Canal while we,
we were, um, part of a day trip to Cairo. Um, um,
(16:36):
stopped at Messina and we got off the ship in Naples, um,
and went on to, um, And went on to England.
In England. I got a job in the first couple
of days there. Um, and, um, it was in Kensington,
a sort of inner suburb of London. Um, and my
(16:59):
intention was that I was going to work in practice, um,
and go to the night, um, the night classes when they,
when they started up, um, and, um, the, at that practice, um,
I had to work all day Saturday, but I had
(17:21):
all day Thursday off. Um, my wife got a job, um,
working in a legal office, and, um, um, on the
first Thursday after we'd got our jobs, um, I had
a day all to myself while my wife was at
(17:41):
work at her work. And so I went to the
School of Optometry in London, where the where the contact
lens classes were going to be held. Um, um, I
was just sniffing around in the library, um, and a
guy came up to me who. And he turned out
to be the head of department. His name was Bob Fletcher.
(18:04):
He asked me who I was, and I told him
that I was an optometrist from Australia. I had two
years of optometric, of real practice, optometric experience. Um, I'd
had a little bit of experience teaching in the clinic
in Melbourne. Um, and he said, would you like to
be a graduate student instructor here at the City University?
(18:30):
And I said, what would be involved? And, um, he
told me what I'd have to do. Um, and I
had to do some research. I had to take some classes,
but I had to do some teaching, and some of
the teaching I would be helping with was in the
contact lens clinic. And so, um, even though it was
(18:52):
a little less money, um, for than I was getting in, in, um,
clinical practice, I, um, I took the job, um, and
worked in the same practice on Saturday. So I ended
up coming about even with the amount of money I
was receiving. I just had to work a six day
(19:13):
week rather than a five day week. Um, and there, um,
I picked up a lot of optometric skills very, very quickly. Um,
the City University London had the best contact lens, um,
crew in the world. They had, um, the best experts
(19:36):
in contact lenses anywhere. And I worked with all these
people and I could work where they made the contact lenses. Um,
they had a contact lens technician, a full time contact
lens guy who made the lenses for the school. Um, and, um,
I just loved being in contact lenses. I also did
(20:00):
a bit of research, um, because that was part of
the obligation. And I did some, um, teaching. Um, and, um,
when you learn more, when you have to teach than
you do if you're on the student side of the lectern. Um,
(20:22):
and so I ended up, um, working with a lot
of instructors getting, um, um, getting very personalized guidance. Um, but, um,
because you're worried of, you know, if you're going to
teach you so, so much worried about being found out
(20:45):
for your deficiencies, that you work hard on covering your ass. Um, and,
and so you end up getting to know your subject
very well. And so I learned about a lot about
contact lenses. Um, and in all, I was in London
(21:06):
for going on two years.
S2 (21:10):
Happy financial New year. But you know what that means.
It's time for a few updates to a series of programs,
such as the NDIS, and to have a chat with
us about that, as well as a few other updates
from elsewhere in the blind and low vision community. It's
(21:30):
my great pleasure to welcome back to Talking vision. Editor
of for Information Liz Dalakouras. Liz, welcome back to Talking Vision.
Great to have you.
S4 (21:42):
Great to be here.
S2 (21:43):
First off, Liz, we've got quite a bit of important
info about the NDIS. Quite a few changes, a bit
of uncertainty for people out there. So help our listeners
minds at ease and give us some info about the NDIS.
That's just come up.
S4 (22:02):
A lot of change happening in the sector next to
impossible to keep up with everything that's going on because
something will get said and the next week it's different.
It's the same in both NDIS and my aged care.
So that's exactly why we started a new resource series,
and it's a series of articles about the NDIS and
the changes that you'll be seeing recently. So in this
latest edition of FYI, we talked about the NDIS supports
(22:26):
and if you've noticed that suddenly that yours have changed
or they've disappeared off your plan, you are not alone.
So there are new rules that mean supports must now
directly relate to the impairments that were listed in your
original NDIS access request. And so many people are feeling
the impacts of this. So we've written an article to
help you better understand what's going on there.
S2 (22:49):
And as I understand it, Liz, there has also been, um,
some new pricing arrangements and there's updates around that as well.
S4 (23:00):
Yeah, there is just to add even more changes to
it all. Sam. So the Ndia has officially now released
the new 2025 to 26 pricing arrangements, and that does
include some minor changes to some of our services as
in Vision Australia services. So there have been changes in
pricing to certain therapy types like psychology and physiotherapy. And additionally,
(23:24):
there's been a minor increase in pricing for recreation and
NDIS employment services. but provide a travel price limits have
been reduced. So in some good news for us and
you guys, travel caps for therapy services will still apply
but are now billed at 50% of the hourly rate.
(23:45):
So all these changes have clicked in now as of today,
the 1st of July, and the Ndia will index participants
plans to match the increases, but they won't reduce the
funding for your therapy price cuts. So within FYI, there's
a link to take you directly to the NDIS website
to help you better understand that process as well.
S2 (24:04):
Okay, and Liz understand Uber's been quite busy with a
new transport subsidy trial. Tell us a bit about that one.
S4 (24:14):
Yeah, absolutely. They have. I mean we know how important
Ubers are for the blind and low vision community. Sam.
So Uber is launching a trial to advocate for provider
neutral transport subsidy schemes. And that's to move beyond what
is currently the taxi only model. So this new initiative
aims to demonstrate, through real world data, the benefits of
offering people with disability a greater choice in their transport services.
(24:38):
Uber will fund the equivalent subsidy and mirror existing schemes
in each state to gather the insights and support the
government policy needs for the reform. And Uber themselves have
come up with a survey that you can complete and
have your say.
S2 (24:53):
Perfect. And Liz, a new accessible game has just landed,
so that's quite exciting.
S4 (25:01):
Yeah, it really is. It's it's so cool. Sam and
the man who developed the game, he's actually going to
be a part of our Telelink Winter webinar series, which
I'll talk about a little bit later. But a new
game has landed. It's called The Land of Libya. It's
a phone and iPad game that was designed for people
who are blind or have low vision. And it's up
for a 2025 Apple Design Award. Very, very cool. So
(25:25):
whether you yourself are new to gaming, or you're just
curious about sussing out a new game for your phone,
The Land of Livia offers a relaxed, accessible experience that's
filled with rich storytelling and simple controls. All you need
to play this game is your imagination. Just visit the
App Store and have a try.
S2 (25:44):
Sounds fantastic. And let's jump into that telling discussion now.
There's quite a few special interest groups that are just
kicking off as we speak.
S4 (25:55):
Yeah, absolutely. They're starting very, very soon within the next week.
So there's still time to register. There are going to
be four stories with four powerful messages. So our Telelink
webinar series is always a very popular series. We do
them in the summer and the winter, and this winter
it's shaping up to be a great series. So we
have an incredible lineup that feature a professor, a businesswoman,
(26:19):
a gaming developer, the man who did Land of Livia,
and an educator. Their stories are just so cool. They're
filled with inspiration, how they overcame challenges and their triumphs.
You can visit us online and go straight to the
Telelink webpage to learn more about that.
S2 (26:36):
And to find out anything more about those sort of things,
and a lot more as well. You can of course,
sign up to the FYI mailing list by heading to
the Vision Australia website. Vision Australia and search for. For
your information. To get your name onto the mailing list
(26:58):
and have the latest issue of FYI emailed to you
every two weeks. Liz, thank you so much for your
time today. Great to catch up with you as always
and hear about all the exciting things in this issue
of FYI.
S4 (27:14):
Thank you for having me Sam, and we will chat
again in two weeks.
S2 (27:24):
And that's all the time we have for today. You've
been listening to Talking Vision. Talking vision is a Vision
Australia radio production. Thanks to all involved with putting the
show together every week. And remember, we love hearing from you.
So please get in touch anytime on our email at
Talking Vision at Vision Australia. That's talking vision all. One
(27:48):
word at Vision Australia. But until next week it's Sam
Corley saying bye for now.
S1 (27:59):
You can contact Vision Australia by phoning us anytime during
business hours on one 384 746. That's one 384 74
six or by visiting Vision Australia. That's Vision Australia.
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