I recently caught up with journalist, speaker and disabled rights /access campaigner Christiane Link about her life, journey and work. I very much hope you enjoy our interview and her guest blog below. Equality, access and education are really important issues in any society – and one area that it strikes me where we have so much to do is in the area of how we make society open and accessible to people living with disabilities. Thanks Christiane for the interview and your guest blog.
Guest Blog by Christiane Link www.christianelink.com
I love to work in coffee shops. I am a journalist, I like to write in
busy environments and in fact I find it inspirational too. Sometimes I
even meet interesting people I later write about or who tell me
interesting stories I research further and then write about too.
I also like to work at different places. Even so I have access to a
co-working space, I change my writing locations all the time. I am a
big fan of Foursquare, a location based service where you get
recommendations by other users or even your friends. I maintain a
To-Do list with places I want to work at.
I also do interviews in cafés and coffee shops, I go to events at
different places and I try to enjoy London as much as I can. In my
case that means I have to check before if this place is wheelchair
accessible. I am a wheelchair user and a step or two means this is a
no-go cafe for me. I can’t walk at all, I can’t leave my wheelchair
outside. If there is no ramp, I am excluded. I will never become a
customer of this business.
Very often the solution would be to buy a ramp for 50 or 100 Pounds to
give other wheelchair users and me access to this premises. I can’t
count any more how often baristas and cafe owners apologised to me for
not having a ramp – and then didn’t change anything.
This is not an issue caused by lack of money. 50 or 100 Pounds is
reasonable for business owners. They could afford it. They just never
thought about it. At least when I am in front of their door asking for
a ramp, you would think they want to change something, don’t want to
send the next wheelchair user asking for a ramp away.
Most of the time, these businesses are not bothered. Not bothered by
the law – reasonable adjustments are a key part of the Equality Act
2010 and a manual ramp is reasonable for most businesses – not
bothered sending a customer away.
On the other hand I am a very loyal customer of businesses who go the
extra mile, have well trained staff and a ramp to accommodate
wheelchair users. I even recommend them to others because they make a
difference in my life. I also like it when businesses failed first but
then do everything do it right the next time. The businesses which buy
ramps and welcome me next time.
I strongly believe that everyone can do a tiny bit to make this
society a bit more inclusive. Most of the time it doesn’t cost money,
it’s just a matter of attitude and to think a bit differently. Only a
society which is open to all is an open society.
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