Your MP and What You Can Do
Your MP represents you when it comes to making decisions about things that affect the whole country.
You can vote to choose your MP at a general election.
1. Accessible Information
Other formats
People need information in different formats.
It is estimated that over 60% of people with learning disabilities also have a hearing impairment, so visual information is crucial. Some people use signed languages.
Many people are blind or visually impaired. They rely on audio communication, large print or Braille. Be creative!
Imagination and commitment can help you provide information in the right format within sensible budgets.
- Offer your information in other formats.
- Make a plan to use different formats in the future.
- Commit to producing things in different formats.
- Make this part of the way you work.
- Budget and think ahead.
- Often it's cheaper to produce more than one thing at the same time.
- You might want to put more than one document on an audio tape or CD for example.
- Look at some examples of information in different formats.
- Involve people with learning disabilities.
- The best way to make sure something is useful is to ask your audience.
- Ask people with learning disabilities what is important and ask them to test what you are aiming to produce.
- Contact organisations who will put you in touch with self-advocates. Self-advocates are people with learning disabilities who represent themselves. Many people offer services in this area and you can pay people for their expertise.
- Take the time to work with people with learning disabilities.
Using Audio
Some people who are visually impaired like to receive information only in audio. Other people might like to have information in audio format if they cannot read.
You could make information available on tape or CD.
Example
Click on the audio button below to listen to the caption.
Using Video
Video is an easy way to communicate with people.
Using Video with a sign language
A high number of people with learning disabilities have a hearing impairment and many use British Sign Language (BSL) or speech supported signing, like Makaton or Signalong.
Example
Here is an example of a video using speech supported signing.
The player will show in this paragraph
Transcript
United Response can tell you things in a way you understand.
Like video or cassette tape.
Using symbols or sign.
Plain writing with pictures or photos.
And lots more
Captions and Subtitles
Many people who are deaf or hard of hearing need videos to be captioned. Captions are also known as subtitles.
