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One in five Australians has a disability. Yet arts centres often don't provide adequate access for them. Authors of the report Removing the Obstacles, Carmen Sui and Courtney Weller, both UTS students, are asking why?
They think that the crux of the problem is that art centres are mostly located in heritage buildings. Operators of these venues argue that they can't provide front-door disability access because of the heritage laws, which stop them altering the building's facade.
The report commissioned by Accessible Arts, Arts Law Australia and UTS:Shopfront aims to tackle this problem. One of its recommendations is for greater cross-referencing between heritage and discrimination legislation to improve access for disabled people.
Weller and Sui believe that the defence of "unjustifiable hardship" under the Commonwealth Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) is being misused by organisations trying to escape their obligation to provide disabled access "What's happening I think goes against the entire intention of the DDA," says Weller.
Wheelchair disability advocate Stewart MacLennan says that there is a real need for improvement. He says that access at some venues has been getting worse.
"If you like me suddenly ended up in a wheelchair you would be as shocked and frustrated as I was with all the physical and attitudinal barriers that suddenly confront you," says MacLennan.
NSW Disability Discrimination Legal Centre chairperson, Rosemary Kayees, says that she is keen to preserve heritage, but she also wants to be treated as an equals.
"It's about front door access," she says. "It is about being recognised as a group of people going to a performance or exhibition. We go there as individuals, with friends and lovers. And that we're not just there to be put into a leper box, with all the other people in wheelchairs."
UTS business faculty associate dean, Simon Darcy, drew on his background as a town planner to give advice on the report. He says architects and designers have an opportunity to find creative solutions to the problem. "A lot of the architecture is about meeting community needs," says Darcy.
Article written by Biwa Kwan, originally published in Precinct issue 5 2008, page 8.