Mr. Desmond Kenny:

I can answer the question as a reassurance to Mr. Harris and Senator Ardagh. The evolution of benefits for blind people over the decades has been slow. It can be traced back to the Poor Law in 1840, when there were the blind, the deaf, the dumb and what were called the imbeciles. We evolved from that charity model. We have had decades of engagement with the community in the recent century to inculcate or have introduced systems and schemes that now look easy and seem to be easily achievable.

With regard to autism generally, I would say to Mr. Harris and the committee that we found, as a community of blind people, that for much of what we wanted to progress, we could better progress it through the European Blind Union, of which we were members, in the various consultative committees of the EU. The regulations regarding web accessibility, medicines, procurement and issues relating to that all came out of those particular committees. The autism community need to place themselves in the right place at the right time. We all know it is good to say “I spoke to the chairman” and let people know we were talking in a higher place when telling somebody what is happening. As they have spoken in Europe, and Europe is doing things, I believe we should use our MEPs more than we currently use them to prosecute potential legislation.

Blind people have advanced over the years and decades. What I would like to do in some way is to share the piggybacking of our success with AsIAm and with the autism community so we can share some of that around our sensory needs.

I would be fearful that if we work in total isolation of our sensory requirements, I could go back some day and find the lift no longer talks to me, tells me what floor I am on or the doors are closing in order to meet a request that was made for a totally silent environment. We can learn and pass on our learning to AsIAm and to Mr. Harris in all that.