Audio description on Australian TV: campaign updates and recent developments

Transcript

13 September 2015

Roberta: Media Access Australia's CEO, Alex Varley, recently attended a Parliamentary event to discuss the progress of audio description on Australian TV. Alex discusses developments from the event, what the future holds for Australian consumers and the current status of receiving AD on Australian TV. Welcome, Alex.

Alex: Hi there, Roberta.

Roberta: So what was the event and how did it come about?

Alex: Okay, so this event was kind of like a show and tell on audio description for all the Parliamentarians in Federal Parliament and it's really the next step in a fairly major campaign that's been running by Vision Australia and Blind Citizens Australia and ourselves and other blind groups. What we wanted to do was actually take the whole issue to Parliament itself and give them more information on what's going on. It was actually sponsored by the Greens Senator, Rachel Seiwert and co-sponsored by Malcolm Turnbull, Communications Minister, and Jason Clare, the Shadow Communications Minister.

Roberta: Was the call for an audio description service widely supported?

Alex: Well, it's kind of interesting because the event really was to highlight what audio description is actually about, so there were some demonstrations of audio description and then a couple of comments about the people's lived experience of trying to watch television without it. What we had there was a few politicians and a few advisers and everybody was invited and everybody got information about it. So I really think it's the first step in really educating them properly. The good thing was that Malcolm Turnbull, the Communications Minister, came along and gave a short speech and it's really the start of a bigger campaign.

Roberta: Now, Vision Australia produced a campaign video around the issue. Can people see this and what it is trying to do?

Alex: Yes, so we all obviously think that if you're trying to demonstrate audio description and what it means to people's lives who are blind or low vision, a good way of doing that is to show a video and Vision Australia produced this and it was released earlier this month and what it really does is it says, okay, people need audio description and there's a petition going around which is being championed by someone who a lot of your listeners would probably know, Stephen Jolley. He is well-known to blind people and the easiest way to get to it, actually, is to go to the www.audiodescription.com.au website where there's links to the petition and information about it and the video that's associated with it all. So it's really a big awareness-raising video.

Roberta: Alex, I understand that you talked about recent developments overseas, so where has there been more audio description happening?

Alex: Well, as your listeners would be well familiar, most of the English speaking world has audio description but it's now popping up in Asia and we received a contact from Thailand where they were mentioning that they had started a fledgling audio description service on public television there earlier this year and they are doing a few hours a week. They were contacting us to say, "Well, we've only just got going. Maybe you can help us develop this further and give us information on how your services are." I think it was somewhat embarrassing for us to go back and say, "Well, we don’t actually have services on TV here, so well done, perhaps we can learn from you." So it's actually starting to come across in Asia now as well.

Roberta: If people want to get involved in what seems like a very important campaign, what can they do?

Alex: Well, what I would encourage them to do is, as I said before, the easiest way, go to www.audiodescription.com.au website and it's got all the links there but watch the video. Share that with your friends and your families and on social media and also go to the petition which is sitting alongside it so that you can sign that and get the numbers and show people that audio description on television is something we need now because, as the campaign says, it tells the whole story.

Roberta: Thank you very much for that today, Alex. It's another step forward and I hope it won't be too long before there are more steps forward.

Alex: Yes, and we really need to get that audio description on television happening in Australia. That's very clear.

Roberta: I've been speaking with Media Access Australia CEO, Alex Varley, who recently attended a Parliamentary event to discuss the progress of audio description on Australian TV. You can assist with this, to go to that website, watch the video, have a look at the survey and sign the petition, very important. For more audio description news and developments you can call Media Access Australia on 02 9212 6242 or visit the website, www.mediaaccess.org.au. You can also visit the AD on TV website, www.audiodescription.com.au for campaign updates. Media Access Australia is a supporter of this program.

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