Deafness Forum Captioning Awards - Presentation of award for Free to air TV

Deafness Forum Captioning Awards - Presentation of award for Free to air TV

Graeme Innes AM

Sydney, August 23 2007

Thank you for the chance to present this award, and congratulations to Deafness Forum for once again organising this prestigious event.

Over the past year, the Human Rights Commission has enjoyed a very productive relationship with Deafness Forum and other groups, including the Australian Association of the Deaf, and Media Access Australia . We've worked on a number of projects: TV, DVD and Cinema captioning, as well as the UN Convention on the Rights of people with Disability.

Like Alex Varley, I've been encouraged by the growing partnership, and recognition of similar interests, between the deaf sector and the blind sector, when it comes to information and media access. I look forward to the day when I'm also invited to make a presentation for awards relating to Audio Description- perhaps at this same function. And I also look forward - as a person who's blind - to enjoying the audio-described products.

in 2003 the Commission granted a temporary exemption from complaints for free to air TV networks, following productive negotiations between the disability community and service providers. This exemption was on condition that providers achieve certain percentages of captioning, and I'm very happy to note that those percentages have been met, or exceeded, over the past four years.

It's now time to look to the future. The exemption also included a requirement that the networks, in consultation with representative organisations, look at further increases in captioning at the expiry of the exemption. We understand that networks have been having internal discussions, and we look forward to further consultation and negotiation with the disability sector in the next few months.

Speaking of the future, we are aware of the BBC trials of captioning on downloadable versions of programs, and hope that this will follow on swiftly in Australia , as more and more people choose to watch their favorite programs via downloads. 

While today is about celebration, I can't miss this opportunity to comment on the release this week of a Government funded DVD produced by the Raising Children Network, which will be provided free of charge to all families with a new baby. Deafness Forum and others immediately sprang into action because the DVD had neither captions nor audio description. Launching this important resource during Hearing Awareness week, without access features, was a big contender for the disability version of the Ernie awards. I'm pleased to tell you that captions will be included on the next production batch in a few weeks time. I've yet to hear about audio description.

I've written to the Prime Minister, suggesting that this incident demonstrates a need for a review of policy and procedures, to ensure the accessibility of all information provided or funded by the Australian Government.

Anyway, back to a more positive event; the awarding of the Free to Air TV award. My congratulations to all the nominees, and indeed to all the networks for improving access throughout the year, but there is only one winner. I have an envelope, thoughtfully provided by the deafness forum in braille.

The winner is ABC TV generally for captioning beyond HREOC requirements, and for Anzac day captioning.