Guest interview with Human Rights Law Award winner, Gilbert + Tobin's Darren Fittler

Transcript

28 December 2014

Roberta: Gilbert + Tobin's Darren Fittler joins us today. Darren has just won the 2014 Human Rights Law Award and recently completed his 40x40 fundraising challenge to help Media Access Australia to continue its work in making media more accessible. Welcome, Darren.

Darren: Thank you so much for having me.

Roberta: Now, Darren, you just won the 2014 Human Rights Law Award. What does the award recognise?

Darren: The award recognises, I think, achievement and the assistance in promoting and advancing human rights through law, so ordinarily given to a person who is legally qualified or that practices in law and is about promoting human rights.

Roberta: Why do you think you won the award? What have you been doing in the human rights area?

Darren: I think it's a couple of things. As an individual, as a person who's blind, I've been an advocate for people with disability and promoting human rights for some time. I had a case against the Electoral Commission to have braille ballot papers. I sat on the board of the Disability Discrimination Legal Centre and in that role I was able to get over to the United Nations and help with drafting the International Convention of Rights of Persons with Disability. In my legal capacity for the last 10 years, as an employee at Gilbert + Tobin, I have always put my hand up to do pro bono work. When the hours of the day that you are supposed to bill have completed, you are still encouraged to do pro bono work at my firm and I did sort of thousands and thousands of hours of pro bono work over the last few years. I think in the last four or five years I've probably averaged about 500 hours pro bono work a year that I do and I think the average across the country is probably 30 hours per lawyer. I think it's in recognition of the fact that I do do quite a lot of work. I go above and beyond but I really, I guess, commend the Human Rights Commission for giving this award to a person who just sits behind the scenes that gets on with business and just does it year in, year out, without reward and without the real want for reward. There's no limelight in what I do. I write constitution. I help get deductible recipient, that is I help with income tax exemptions. I help organisations convert and merge. I help with contracting. I do all sorts of things that are nothing to sing about.

Roberta: Well, I wouldn't say that. Now, some of our listeners may be aware of the recent case brought against Coles for its allegedly inaccessible online shopping site. Do you think cases against major Australian companies to make their websites accessible for people with disabilities will become more frequent in the coming year?

Darren: Well, in a way I hope so but in a way I don't. I think companies generally respond far better to doing things because they see that they should be doing it and that they do it with willingness as opposed to being told to or being sort of whipped into action. At the same time, there does come a time when action of this nature is required. I do think that we will see more of it. I think there's a lot of high-profile websites out there which will be difficult to have any major action taken against, mostly because they're not Australian companies and they're not even based in Australia. I do think that we will see some more action against Australian-based companies with a broad public facing website, yes.

Roberta: Lastly, Darren, you also recently completed the 40x40 fundraising challenge for Media Access Australia on your 40th birthday. Can you tell us more about that?

Darren: Yes, well, it was perhaps a very silly thing to be doing, now that I've done it, but I decided on my 40th birthday that I would get down to the gym. I would do 40 different exercises of 40 repetitions each and complete it using, most of the time, a 40-kilo weight, so 40 bench press, 40 chin ups, 40 sit ups, 40 lat pull-downs, 40 sumo high-pulls, 40 leg curls, 40 box jumps, 40 kettle bell swings. The aim really was to try and raise $40,000 for Media Access Australia, a bit of an unsung hero in a way in itself. It just gets on with business behind the scene and does the best that it can do to try and make sure that media, which really broadly defined is information, accessible to all, particularly for people who are vision impaired or people who are deaf or hearing impaired. It's the way of the world as it is now and will increasingly become the way of the future as smart devices and even your kitchen become connected to the internet and connected to media. One of my real passions is education and the work that Media Access Australia does, with assisting schools with accessible curriculum and parents with accessible devices and low-cost devices for children going through schooling and facilitating of doing their best to make sure that in that context children can access their textbooks and things, is a very important part of their work. So it's not all just about making sure there's audio-described movies for you at the cinema.

Roberta: Exactly.

Darren: I thought, look, I'll do my best to raise a bit of cash for these guys that get very little government funding and don't really have people doing that kind of thing for them very much.

Roberta: Okay, well, for more on digital and web accessibility you can call Media Access Australia on 02 9212 6242. Now, Darren, I want to congratulate you on this. I think it's a wonderful thing that you've been doing and very, very rightly awarded for it.

Darren: Thank you so much.

Roberta: I've been speaking with Darren Fittler from Gilbert + Tobin, who has won the 2014 Human Rights Law Award. This little program was brought to you proudly by Media Access Australia who is a supporter of this program.

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