Margaret May (McPherson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

I am happy to speak on the Minister for Ageing’s ministerial statement today on captioning for the hearing impaired and audio description for people who are sight impaired. Today’s announcement provides me with an opportunity to advise the House that it was actually the Howard government, in 2007, that was behind this initiative, when the then Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator the Hon. Helen Coonan, announced an investigation into access to adequate electronic media for the hearing impaired. I also want to put on the record and acknowledge the active role that the Democrats played in relation to that matter. The Howard government was committed to ensuring that every Australian had access to adequate electronic information channels, and today’s announcement is a positive step forward to meeting that commitment that was made by the former government.

I would like to extend my thanks to the minister for advising me earlier today of the initiative and extending to me the courtesy of time to become familiar with the announcement. It is one that I and older Australians in this country who are hearing and visually impaired certainly welcome. It is a great step forward. It is a positive step for those older Australians and I commend the minister for the great initiative. As I have said, it has been an important announcement and I would like to commend the government on the initiative to provide this funding, particularly the funding that is going to be provided—I understand from the minister’s press release of today—to those smaller, independent cinemas throughout regional and rural Australia. They will receive the funding, I understand, for the special audio equipment that will bring cinema to the lives of thousands of hearing and visually impaired older Australians.

I understand—and the minister certainly confirmed it today in her speech—that $350,000 is a one-off grant for a project entitled Helping Older Australians Enjoy the Movies: Accessible Cinema, and the funding itself will be provided to 12 cinema locations across Australia. We do not yet know where those locations will be, but I understand that announcement will be made shortly. Today’s announcement will bring the number of accessible cinemas for hearing and visually impaired people to 22, which is great news for those cinemas that will be successful in obtaining that funding. I hope too that in time, when the success of the program is realised, the government will look at expanding even further what I believe will be a very positive initiative for those older Australians who may in fact be socially disconnected from their communities and from cultural activities because of hearing and visual impairments. The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, as we have heard already today, have also commended the initiative, and I too echo the commission’s sentiments in their statement.

In my first term in this place I spoke about captioning for television and the importance to Australians with hearing impairments of having access to free-to-air television. The initiative being announced today recognises that Australians, particularly the elderly who are visually and hearing impaired, will be provided with a pleasure that we all take for granted. I would hasten to add that probably many of us in this House enjoy a trip to the movies. I know that as a busy member of parliament if I can grab a couple of hours to sit in a cinema it is a sort of escape. To see the latest Australian and international movies and to have that opportunity now available to older Australians with those impairments really is worthwhile. As we have heard from the minister today the program will be expanded. There will be 12 new cinemas, taking the number to 22 cinemas, making movies far more accessible to a far greater number of visually and hearing impaired older Australians.

Going to the cinema is one way that older Australians can maintain social interaction and there is no doubt that social and cultural pursuits play a big part in warding off that dreadful disease, dementia. Alzheimer’s Australia have warned Australians that dementia is on the rise and up to 156 cases are diagnosed in Australia every day. Alzheimer’s Mind your Mind program is all about proactively looking after your brain by keeping mentally active and of course minding your social life by staying connected and socially active. The initiative that the minister has announced today will certainly assist those older Australians to ward off the onset of dementia. Research has found that ongoing learning and mental stimulation throughout life is one of the keys to a strong, agile mind, and the movies, I believe, will help that stimulation and of course offer a social event in those people’s lives. It will give them social interaction, whether going to the movies with their grandchildren or with friends, and it will certainly include them in our local communities. As the minister has indicated in her speech today, this initiative will see an increased number of hearing and vision impaired people enjoy a film for the first time. It means that these people will share in an experience that many of us take for granted.

Overall, it is pleasing that the funding will assist those small cinemas in regional and rural Australia with the cost of the equipment needed to deliver the captioning and audio description to those people. Often in this House we forget that remote, rural and regional communities do not have access to many things that we take for granted. I hope that in the selection of locations the government is mindful of those communities most in need, in serving larger populations of hearing and visually impaired older Australians in those remote and regional communities throughout Australia.

In closing, I also want to commend the partnership between the Independent Cinemas Association of Australia and Media Access Australia on the work they have done with cinemas and consumers to ensure that cinemas are accessible to those people who are hearing impaired. Both these organisations, I understand, will work with the Department of Health and Ageing to select the 12 new cinema locations throughout rural and regional Australia and those suburban areas that will be successful with the funding.

Finally, I do commend this initiative. I commend the minister for bringing it to the House today and I also say to those older Australians who are going to have the opportunity to watch those Australian movies, which will all be captioned, and those international movies that we all take for granted: have those few hours off, go to the cinema and enjoy it with friends. It is a great initiative and I commend the minister.

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