Dr. D?nal Fitzpatrick:

The NDA very much welcomes the fact that an opportunity will be afforded to people to complete the next census online. I will correct the record on this if necessary but to the very best of my knowledge it was not possible to complete the most recent census in any form other than paper. As members can imagine, this excluded a significant number of visually-impaired people from being able to complete it independently. I have several anecdotal pieces of evidence from myself, friends and acquaintances. We very much welcome that the census will move online. It highlights a very interesting point which Mr. Harris mentioned earlier. It is very important that various modalities can be used by people to acquire information or to complete forms. I will give a quick example. We have specific requirements regarding the forthcoming European accessibility act to make answering the 112 emergency services number accessible to include real-time text or real-time video. This is a great example of what can be done by working at European level and the importance of a multimodal approach. People may still like to complete the census form on paper. There may be people with low technical literacy or who simply do not want to do it online and find it more comfortable to write. Having only this modality available excludes a significant number of individuals. This is why the NDA very much welcomes the fact that various modalities will be available.