Election issue

In this issue we’ve joined the rest of the media in ramping up a little pre-election fever. We’ve been talking to a number of first-time disabled voters to see which of the main parties floats their voting boat and to find out what issues will determine their electoral decision.

Top of their list is better and more accessible public transport – interesting when in this very same edition of the magazine we’re carrying an item on how plans to make London’s transport network more fully accessible for 2012 have bitten the dust.

But there’s one issue which disabled voters will be forced to confront whenever the election is called. It’s something which has been highlighted in Disability Now before and certainly will be more fully looked at by us again, but I make no apology for mentioning it now as we wait to hear when polling day will be.

The statement that it’s easier to vote for your favourite performer on The X Factor than it is to cast your vote for who will govern the country has now been made so often that it risks becoming a cliché. Yet that in itself is remarkable since it means that this is a state of affairs which doesn’t seem to surprise anyone.

Yet surely it ought to be surprising that the electoral system and the physical infrastructure which supports it make voting difficult for many disabled people and render it impossible for some.

Where are the ballot papers in alternative formats to print? What’s being done with the system to make it less intimidating and more accessible to people with learning difficulties? How many polling station staff could communicate effectively with a deaf person using sign language? What do you do as a wheelchair-user confronted with a polling station set up in a building you can’t get into?