A charity support network for disabled people has marked its
expansion into Scotland with the opening of a new centre by HRH the
Princess Royal, writes John Kavanagh.
AbilityNet was formed in 1998 through the merger of The
Computability Centre, set up by the BCS, IBM and Birmingham
University to advise disabled people, employers and carers on IT,
and the Foundation for Communication for the Disabled, which
provides systems. The BCS is a trustee, with IBM and Microsoft
among the big supporters.
AbilityNet has six centres in England, some hosted by employers,
which together handled 14,000 calls last year to its free helpline
(0800 269545). It ran awareness seminars for 3,000 managers and
caring professionals, and assessed or trained 1,600 disabled
people. It also equipped more than 600 disabled people with IT.
The Scottish centre is hosted by Agilent Technologies -
Hewlett-Packard's measurement equipment arm - at South Queensferry,
West Lothian.
The Princess Royal was shown round by the centre's manager Andy
Clarke and AbilityNet chief executive John Maitland who
demonstrated special keyboards, mouse alternatives and voice
recognition software.
"She was especially impressed by the speed that AbilityNet
consultant Robin Christopherson, who is blind, navigated a screen,"
Clarke says.