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MOBILITY INFORMATION |
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Positive about disabled people |
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As a holder of the Disability Symbol,
Anderson Medical & Mobility has undertaken several commitments about
employment of any person with a disability. In terms of recruitment this
means that: |
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- We undertake to interview
candidates, who have a disability, providing they meet the minimum
criteria of the job.
The staff involved will not be able to identify these candidates at
the interview selection stage because they do
not have personal information.
- Standard letters sent to applications
inviting them to the interview will offer assistance with carrying out
tests or
selection procedures e.g. the completion of the personal profile analysis
forms.
- When we interview a person with a
disability we will make alternative arrangements if required.
- We will make reasonable adjustments as
necessary to meet the requirements of the job and the person.
- We will consult with disabled employees at
least once a year to see what the company can do to help them
develop
and use their abilities at work.
- We will make every effort, should employees
become disabled, to make sure that they stay in employment.
- We will ensure that key employees develop
the awareness of disability needed to make our commitments work.
- We will review these commitments on an
annual basis, plan ways to improve them and inform employees on
progress
and future plans.
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What is Motability? |
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Motability
exists to help get you on the road to freedom: |
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- By using your higher
rate mobility component of Disability Living Allowance or War Pensioners'
Mobility
Supplement
(WPMS) to buy certain products.
- By raising funds, as
a registered charity, to help meet the costs of special equipment and
adapted products for
disabled
people who could not afford to become mobile without extra help.
- Through
administering the Government's Mobility Equipment Fund, giving grants for
specially adapted products
for
people with the most severe disabilities.
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Motability
is a non-political, non-profit-making organisation. Its chief patron
is HM The Queen and it
has the
support of all the major political parties.
- Because of this,
Motability has the power to get better deals on finance, the purchase
price of cars and
wheelchairs etc.
- Many people use the
Motability wheelchair scheme to obtain the powered wheelchair or scooter
of their choice.
- The type of
wheelchair available range from a battery-powered four-wheeled chair,
through the popular three-
wheeled
scooters, up to the weatherproof four-wheeled scooter for outdoor use.
Which one you choose is up to
you. However,
first consider your needs, how you will use the vehicle, the terrain you
will be using it on, and
then you can test the
vehicle before you decide.
- Please note that you
cannot use the Lower Rate Mobility Component of the DLA or the care
components of
DLA (or a
combination of them) to obtain a vehicle.
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If you have any
questions about the Motability Scheme then please contact us, or you can
contact the
Motability
customer information services on (01279) 635666. Also note that the
Motability Credit is only
available in the UK. |
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Be positive about disabled people |
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The primary
problem facing disabled people is other people's attitudes, argue
Christina McGill and
Margie Woodward
of Scope, the largest disability organisation in Britain. |
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The trend towards
politically correct (PC) language has taken a bashing over the years.
Tabloid sneers and middle
class
mid-air parenthesis have discredited it and made it a subject for
ridicule. Yet it can have a positive impact on
our
development as individuals and as a community. |
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The language of
disability has undergone a relatively recent 'PC facelift', with
established habits proving particularly
hard to shift both for the media and the public. At face value the
traditional lexicon of disability may seem to
describe
reality. Who could argue with words like 'victim', 'cripple',
'courageous', 'plight', 'affliction', 'wheelchair-
bound' and the
'struggle' of 'the disabled' to gain a 'normal life'? |
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Listing them here
it's easy to see their overall negative impact. Yet the constant drip-feed
which they form is a
force in
the repression of disabled people. By using words which instil pity,
sympathy or awe, as well as some
which are simply
inaccurate, we take the easy way out, relegating disabled people to a
class without choices and
without individuality. |
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Take the term
wheelchair-bound. A simple three-part adjective? Total nonsense, more
like. While a chair made
mobile
by the addition of wheels might best be described as a wheelchair, to
describe the person it carries as
'wheelchair-bound' is plain stupid. A person who uses a wheelchair does not spend
every breathing moment sitting
in it - there are
no chains, no laws and no superglue. |
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define the person/machine relationship? The term 'user' seems to fit.
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The resulting noun,
'wheelchair user', offers a whole new set of associations. Instead of the
impersonal, inflexible,
limited and passive implications of the word 'bound' we gain an impression
of choice, control, individuality and a
means
to an end. The wheelchair is used by the individual to enable them to go
about their day-to-day business.
For many it is
their most liberating possession, taking them over the threshold into the
street, to their workplace,
the pub, the theatre. |
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By using terms such
as this we acknowledge disabled people's equal right to their humanity and
personality. Their
wheelchair or hearing aid or specific impairment is no longer the single
aspect of their lives used to define them. |
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Positive language
like this supports the belief that disability is caused not by a human
body's non-conformism,
but by
the built and social environment lacking the flexibility to accommodate
all people in all our variety. |
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If
disabled people were included at the start of every endeavour,
there would be little need for charity and
campaigning to break down the barriers which currently exist.
Moreover, many other people would benefit. Make a
shop accessible for a wheelchair user and you make it better
for parents with pushchairs;
put lifts in tube stations
and more pensioners will get out and about; mount public
telephones at a lower height and children can reach
them in an emergency. |
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When we talk about
disability in a way which stresses people's physical limitations we may be
missing the point.
However, when we describe them as victims and sufferers, or even brave
heroes, we are also making a damaging
mistake. |
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The term 'brave'
implies a choice, and while it might be brave for a disabled person to
tackle a bank robber, it's
erroneous
to say they're brave for living with their condition. Many disabled people
feel angry at being said to suffer
from their
condition, saying they suffer only as a result of the limitations placed
upon them by society and the
environment. It's
not their problem, it's a problem imposed upon disabled people by others.
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Research carried out
by Scope asked disabled people about their lives. Seventy-five per cent of
those surveyed
agreed
with the statement 'people jump to conclusions about what I can and can't
do without establishing the
facts', while 60
per cent of people agreed with the statement 'people get embarrassed
because they don't know
how to cope with my
disability'. One respondent said: 'Basically you can live with discomfort
and pain. People's
reactions to your disability
or deformity is the real killer.' |
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Through using more
positive language about disability, society may ultimately stop jumping to
conclusions
because of
the way people look, even learning to consider every person for their
individual qualities. If we can
develop these skills
the effect on the way we plan our activities and environment will invite
greater inclusion and
participation by disabled
people. We'll be a richer community for it. |
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