Marcus/Rita,

My first mailie to this group an access issues.  Thank you for giving me the
opportunity to reach a wider audience of concerned parties.  I will give a
brief introduction of myself and what I am trying to do on this issue for
those in the group who do not know me or what I am about.

I work for Emirates Airline (EK) and am based in Dubai where the company has
its' headquarters.  I am the father of an autistic child.  Autism is a
particularly invidious mental impairment, probably genetic in origin, that
impacts a triad of mental faculties and impairs the cognitive, communication
and socialisation skills of such individuals.

As there is a patent lack of good educational provision for autistic
children in Dubai my wife and children (one adopted from Mumbai, India and
the other a bit of a late surprise - it is our "natural" child [Daniel] that
is autistic) are now UK based so that we can get the best education for
Daniel.

I am responsible for the development and subsequent maintenance of all the
property that EK occupies.  As such I follow legislative developments for
property in all parts of the world but more especially in the UK and EU with
keen interest.  I also try to export what is practicable to properties that
we own in third world countries where such enlightened legislation is non
existent.

As a parent of a disabled child and a Property professional I have been
following the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) with great interest.  The
DDA is supposed to benefit all disabled people.  At present the property
world in the UK is looking at how access to buildings needs to alter to suit
the disabled.  Unfortunately the emphasis is all on providing access for
physically handicapped, not the entire disabled population!  To my mind
there is a need to ensure that everyone includes the mentally impaired when
they are putting together legislation.  The wording in the applicable
legislation seems to point people in the wrong direction - terms such as
"giving the same access to goods and services as enjoyed by able bodied
people" abound in the DDA and the various standards that the BSI are
developing.  That is patently wrong and must change.  May be being pedantic
but you can't be too careful with wording in legislation.

Needless to say, one can be quite able bodied yet still disabled and I
contend that there is a need to look at what needs to be done to facilitate
access for those who are mentally impaired, not just concentrate on the
needs of the physically handicapped.  This is not to belittle the needs of
the physically handicapped, of course these have to be considered, but it
strikes me that the emphasis is all wrong in the applicable legislation.
95% of the disabled population in the UK are mentally handicapped yet sweet
nothing seems to be being considered for them.

As a result of some very pointed critiscism directed at the RICS, they have
now set up a unit to look at this further.  They have asked me to lead the
unit.  (If any of you are tuned into the current autism99 conference you
will see a mail message that I have posted on this and other related
issues.)  Any feedback that I can get to move this forward would be very
much appreciated.  I have been given carte blanche to write my own "job
description" for the RICS role.  Need some help here.

Also, as I have stated in the message posted at the Internet conference, I
am looking for ways that we can enhance the service that we as an airline
provide for disabled passengers.  I have had some very valuable feedback on
this from responses received through autism99 but nothing much on access
issues for autistic people.

I have talked to the most senior management within EK to get backing to
enhance our service and have buy in from the top on this.  Apart from our
senior management being nice people and wanting to be a corporation with a
heart (and I'm not being sarcastic here - there is a genuine desire to want
to help), there is obviously competitive advantage to be gained and I have
used this as a selling point too.  I see this as a win:win situation for my
company and for disabled people as a whole, especially as where EK go,
others follow.  EK has won the coveted airline of the year award for the
past two years running and other airlines (people like BA) watch what we do
very carefully.  Anyway, to stop selling EK, as a result EK has set up a
working group to look at what we can do to help disabled people, no matter
what the disability.  Any thoughts and feedback on this would also be very
much appreciated.

One of the other things that I have done is to go through my local MP (well,
local to my family) Nick Harvey.  To my surprise he has been extremely
responsive and pro-active.  He is discussing with John Hutton and seeking
clarification on various terms of the DDA - such as what is "reasonable"
access and what are "reasonable" alterations to premises - the explanatory
notes that go with the DDA leave much to be desired.  I suspect that these
will need to be tested through the courts and that is not a state of affairs
that should be left unchanged, much clearer, mandatory, guidelines are
necessary.  That is one of the aims and objectives that I wish to put
forward in my role within the RICS.

I look forward to hearing from you guys/gals and gaining your valuable
input.  Hope that this isn't too long winded and boring!

Regards,

Patrick




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