NHS 24 and NHS Inform are supporting the “It’s Ok to Ask” campaign. The campaign aims to encourage people to ask questions during their healthcare appointments, things like: What are the benefits of my treatment? What are the risks of…
Category: News
deafscotland May News
May is a busy month for Inclusive Communication in Scotland. It features focused action during ‘deaf awareness week’, ‘mental health awareness week’ and is national walking month. Walking is good for Scotland’s 1 million people affected by hearing loss and…
Third Covid-19 Report
The third Covid-19 Report: The move back to ordinary is now written. We have also produced a plain language summary which is being translated into BSL. The BSL summary will be available here soon
New information on Covid-19 shared by NHS 24
NHS Lothian has made a video to to reassure people about the coronavirus vaccine. For more information from members, go to https://deafscotland.org/covid-19-information-from-members/
Mental Health, Sensory Loss and Human Rights – the Transition Report calling for Sensory Literate Services
deafscotland, Deafblind Scotland, Royal National Institute for the Deaf (RNID), Sight Scotland and the ALLIANCE agreed in January 2021 to co-produce this report to inform and change decision making. Through our practice and experience, we recognise communication poverty is increased…
deafscotland adds its name to Human Rights Consortium Scotland (HRCS) submission
Human Rights Consortium Scotland wrote a submission to the Independent Human Rights Act Review. deafscotland added its name in support. The Joint Committee on Human Rights at Westminster is holding a parallel review and the submission was sent onto this…
Statement from ACOSVO
It is with the heaviest of hearts that we share this statement about the sudden passing of our dear friend, Chair of ACOSVO, and Chief Officer of Paths for All, Ian Findlay. We are all devastated and need to take…
WHO World Hearing Day – “Hearing Care For All – Screen, Rehabilitate and Communicate”
Yesterday was the WHO World Hearing Day – 03/03/2021. We sent a briefing to all the MSPs to tell them about the day and to ask them to consider how they would apply the Principles of Inclusive Communication to the…
Walking Project Survey
We got a grant from Paths for All to provide inclusive information on walking safely in Scotland. We need to start the evaluation process with a baseline survey. If you have a hearing loss, please help us by completing the…
Covid- 19 Communication Toolkit from NHS 24 Engagement Team
Our communication toolkit includes suggested text for your bulletins and social media posts. It also tells you more about our: alternative formats (translations, audio versions and Easy Read); and tools (chatbot, voicebot , app and webchat). We have translated some…
A big thank you for everyone who has donated to deafscotland
We would like to say Thank you to everyone who has donated to us using Virgin Money Giving, the Charity Aid Foundation or by direct debit/cheque. We use this money to keep our website going. To produce our monthly newsletter.…
Kathy Li – General input of designing
In March 2020, deafscotland was to host its Annual Conference – Connect and Capitalise. The theme was ‘Right Design for Communication’. The conference had to be cancelled due to the first lockdown for the Covid-19 pandemic. Kathy Li was to…
All Our Rights In Law: Report on the conversations held with people across the four pillars of deafness
The Scottish Government’s National Taskforce on Human Rights Civil Society Reference Group is looking at the development of a new human rights law for Scotland that is informed by the views and experiences of rights-holders, particularly those whose rights are…
VIRTUAL ASSISTANT TECHNOLOGY FOR THOSE WITH HEARING LOSS AND DEMENTIA
deafscotland is pleased to announce we have received funding from Foundation Scotland to produce a toolkit to help people with hearing loss and dementia use Virtual Assistant technology. We are looking for volunteers to join our Working Group and be…
PVG Disclosure during Covid-19 pandemic
deafscotland is registered as a counter signatory body with Disclosure Scotland (under its legal name – Scottish Council on Deafness). At the moment, we are not countersigning disclosure applications. We’re a small team and have very limited resources in place. We’re currently…
SELF-MANAGEMENT INFORMATION
Paid for by a grant from The ALLIANCE’s Self-Management Fund deafscotland, working in partnership with Deaf Links, has produced information films for deaf people about Self-Management and what it means. The report Safety First…Keeping people safe with Communication for All which contains the baseline survey results…
COVID -19: INFORMATION FROM MEMBERS
Ideas for Ears It has been recognised that during lockdown and now into recovery, people who use hearing aids have suffered a huge disadvantage due to socail (physical) distancing. Even though the Equality Act 2010 is now 10 years old,…
RESLIENCE AND SAFETY
We have produced a number of videos on cyber-crime, disability hate crime and domestic abuse. These videos are fully accessible. Videos with information for adults: General scams – Child protection – Romance fraud – I Am Me Police Scotland – …
HUMAN RIGHTS BRIEFINGS
deafscotland has produced a number of Human Rights briefings. deafscotland made a Submission to the UK Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights: Inquiry on the ‘UK Government’s COVID-19 Response’. WORD PDF deafscotland wrote a letter to the Scottish Parliament’s Equality and Human Rights Committee asking if the…
UK PARLIAMENT COMMITTEES
UK Parliament Scottish Affairs Committee: Coronavirus and Scotland Inquiry https://committees.parliament.uk/work/274/coronavirus-and-scotland/publications/ PDF UK Parliament Joint Committee on Human Rights: Inquiry on the UK Government’s COVID-19 Response PDF
SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT COMMITTEES
The Cross Party Group on Mental Health (CPGMH) The CPG on Mental Health focused on the theme of Access to Treatment and Joined-up Accessible Services from the Mental Health Strategy 2017-2027. SAMH and the CPGMH have published a report on…
Scottish Government Consultations
Consultation on the Letter of Rights for Scotland Our response is number 982140293: click here The Advisory Group on Economic Recovery Call for Views: Our response is number 94292526: click here Revenue Scotland The purpose of this consultation is to…
Annual report 2020
Communication For All has been our major campaign in 2019/20. Our focus has been on making communication and language inclusive and accessible to everyone through our activities. To spread the word and create support for this message, we’ve developed partnerships…
Giving evidence at the Scottish Affairs Committee
Our Chief Officer, Janis McDonald, gave evidence on Wednesday 4 November at the UK Parliament Scottish Affairs Committee. To watch the video, go to 14:01:58 minutes into the recording (the video is only available with audio): https://parliamentlive.tv/event/index/16858b78-bd6d-4030-9765-0d222e6d042d
Safety First Report
deafscotland received funding from a number of sources to produce accessible information on a number of subjects that people, including deaf people, should know about. Part of each funding package was set aside to gather some social research: baseline data…
Self-Management Survey:No 2
Deaf Links is taking forward the Self-Management work that it started with deafscotland. This second phase looks at moderate to severe mental ill-health and how to support Deaf BSL users themselves or are caring for BSL users who are mentally…
Covid-19: the Communication Virus
The following ran in The Herald on 11 May 2020 as The Opinion – from Janis McDonald. Covid-19 has had a huge impact on our society, unlike anything most of us have ever experienced. Physical distancing creates barriers beyond the…
MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS WEEK 2020 – ARCHIVE
This week is Mental Health Awareness Week (18 to 24 May 2020). The theme this year is “kindness“. Copyright BBC “Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.” Helen Adams Keller She was an American…
Website update
We have updated our resources section. It now has deafscotland publications, publications from members, and information about Covid-19 from members. If there is anything else you would like to see here, please let us know by emailing admin@deafscotland.org
OUR CONFERENCE TOMORROW (17 MARCH 2020) IS CANCELLED
In line with the UK Government announcement at 5pm today, it is with much regret that we need to postpone our conference that should have taken place tomorrow (17 March) in the DoubleTree by Hilton in Glasgow. We apologise for any…
Disruption from Storm Ciara
Storm Ciara has flooded our bit of the The ALLIANCE Offices and deafscotland staff are all working in other places until Tuesday 18 February at least. We ask that you please bear with us until normal service resumes.
Equality Action Pledge
The Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights (CRER) and Glasgow Council for the Voluntary Sector (GCVS) were asking organisations to sign up to the an Equality Action Pledge, which is committed to improving representation in the Third Sector. For more…
Lip reading outcomes
A lip reading survey was done earlier in the year in the NHS Highland area. The questions were based on the therapy outcome measures for hearing rehabilitation. To look at the results, go to https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-RJ93Y5CW7/
Annual report 2019
Communication for all Communication is one of the key challenges faced by those affected by deafness. Our focus is on making communication and language accessible for everyone. To achieve this, we have focused our activities to reflect ‘Communication for All’.…
Fundraising complaint
We have had several people contact us to say that they have had young people coming to their doors late in the evening asking for donations for deafscotland. We do not raise funds in this way so if this happens…
Way to go, Hazel!
Dr Hazel McFarlane, disability researcher and activist, Policy and Implementation Officer and See Hear Lead for South Ayrshire Council, and co-facilitator for our Inclusive Communication and Accessible Information workshop/training, has been named in the Disability Power List 2019 of the…
Safety Survey
deafscotland is producing accessible information on a number of safety issues. We would like to know how you feel about your own safety and what information would help you feel safer in your home and when you are out and…
Human Rights Training just announced!
deafscotland is running two new Human Rights training sessions on Thursday 9 May in Glasgow. For more information go to deafscotland.org/what-we-do/training/
Thank you for making our conference great!
deafscotland and Disability Equality Scotland would like to thank all the delegates, stall holders, workshop leaders, language/communication support professionals, sponsors and the hotel for making our Scottish Sensory and Equality Conference 2019: Communication for All a great day. We will…
Annual report 2018
Beyond 90 years The Scottish Council on Deafness celebrated its 90th birthday in 2017. This milestone sparked conversation about our place and function in Scotland. Society looks very different now to what it did 90 years ago: it was time…
Deafness and the Democratic Process
#deafscotland supports #NDW18 Our @BSLConsultant believes every deaf person has the right to learn about democracy and vote! Let’s make votes matter to deaf people. #alldeaf #notequalyet #communication4all #TalkDemocracy @ElectoralCommUK For more information click here!
2021 Census: Question on Health Conditions
SCoD has been campaigning to get the health question in the Census changed since 2007. We have beein involved in the consultation on the health conditions question for the 2021 Census. As there is still little accurate data on the…