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A cohort of Scottish charities have launched a campaign calling for new requirements for braille labelling to be included on the packaging of food products.
Currently, braille labelling is only required on the packaging of medicines which the charities said leaves braille users unable to identify the food products they wish to purchase and use.
Launched by Sight Scotland, Oban and District Access Panel, and Disability Equality Scotland on World Braille Day, the new campaign is aiming for a statutory duty to be placed on businesses and retailers to provide braille labels on food products stating the product name and use by/sell by dates.
A petition calling for the changes has now been published by the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee at the Scottish Parliament and will be sent to the Scottish Government for a response.
Craig Spalding, chief executive of Sight Scotland and Sight Scotland Veterans, said, “We are today, on World Braille Day, launching a campaign calling on the Scottish Government to introduce new legislation which would force all retailers to provide braille labelling on food products. It is simply unfair that braille users cannot currently identify the food products they want to buy and use.
“People living with sight loss have the same rights as anyone else and ensuring information is available in braille is vital for the inclusion of visually impaired people in our society. We know that some businesses and retailers are already taking action to produce more information in braille. However, the vast majority of products are still not labelled in braille.”
Marie Harrower, a member of Oban and District Access Panel and a braille reader, added, “I feel passionate that blind and partially sighted people should be able to identify products, especially food products, in order to store away shopping, and retrieve products quickly, easily and with the minimum of effort. I wonder what people with sight would think if labels were removed and they had to seek assistance or do some guessing. I am absolutely delighted that the Oban and District Access panel, Sight Scotland and Disability Equality Scotland are vigorously supporting this access issue and campaign to have braille labels on products.”
Lyn Pornaro, CEO at Disability Equality Scotland, commented, “Disability Equality Scotland firmly supports the introduction of braille labelling across a wider variety of goods. Statutory requirements for braille labelling are long overdue and until they’re in place visually impaired people will remain at a significant disadvantage in society.”
The petition can be found by here, and the campaign can be supported and followed on Twitter at @BrailleLabels and by using the hashtag #jointhedots.
