Member News
John Bercow, speaker of the House of Commons, was one of the guests at an event in Parliament yesterday, on the importance of creating a more accessible democracy.
The event, held by disability charity United Response in association with Dods, The House Magazine and ePolitix.com, was designed to provide new MPs with hints and tools to ensure the hard to reach are able to engage in democracy beyond the general election.
Speaking during the event, Bercow said:
"Making Parliament more accessible is a passion of mine, which is why I admire what United Response is trying to do."
Former newsreader and president of United Response, Martyn Lewis CBE demonstrated the success that United Response has already had in providing the information and means so that people with learning, mental or physical disabilities feel able to vote at the general election.
"We created the first-ever multimedia interactive guide to democracy, in the Making Democracy Accessible toolkit."
The general election 2010 was the first time ever that all three parties have produced accessible manifestos.
"At the general election the number of voters rocketed from 16 per cent to over 40 per cent of the people we support," he said.
Jenny Watson, chair of the Electoral Commission, provided examples of the ways in which the Commission had provided tools to allow for a more accessible general election.
"We produced a fact sheet in conjunction with disability charity Scope's, Polls Apart campaign about voting rights for disabled people. That fact sheet described the help you could get if you wanted to vote in person on polling day."
For the future, Watson spoke of the importance of ensuring all polling stations are accessible to users.
"We think elections would be better run if local authority staff could use any public building as a polling station. To make that happen would mean changing the law. We will keep asking the government to do that if you think it is a good idea moving forward."
Shadow minister for work and pensions, Helen Goodman MP, suggested looking at the criteria for postal ballots.
"Postal ballots clearly increase the capacity for people to participate in elections."
As somebody with a learning disability who has encountered the problems involved in trying to engage with democracy, Yosief Semere said:
"Politics needs to be made more accessible with more pictures, bigger writing and less use of jargon."
Along with a team of United Response consultants who are able to advise on how best to create political literature and information so it is accessible, Diane Lightfoot, director of communications at United Response, provided simple tips on how to make it much easier for somebody with a learning disability to engage, such as:
"Try and use sentences with one key word and idea."
At the end of the day accessibility is good for all voters, not only voters who have a learning disability.
If you would like more information on the Every Vote Counts project and United Response, please see here.
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