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´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio 4 In Touch |
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Listen to this programmeFactsheet of this programmeTranscript of this programme Print this page FactsheetVISA TROUBLESListener Lee Garrett wants to marry his American fiancé Debbie Bacon but has been told she will not be eligible for a Fiancé Visa as he is visually impaired and in receipt of Disability Living Allowance. Guest: Julian Bild, a senior lawyer at the Immigration Advisory Service. CONTACTS UK VISA Foreign and Commonwealth Office King Charles Street London SW1A 2AH Web: Visa Guidelines: Information on UK Visas IMMIGRATION ADVISORY SERVICE The UK’s largest charity providing representation and advice in immigration and asylum law. Please note at the time of writing this website was not working. THE BORDER AND IMMIGRATION AGENCY Tel: Immigration Enquiry Bureau 0870 606 7766 (national rate number). General enquiries and advice. The Border and Immigration Agency is a new executive agency of the Home Office. The Agency assumes the responsibilities of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate (IND) for managing immigration control in the UK. Also consider applications for permission to stay, citizenship and asylum. THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH The Masque of the Red Death is a Punchdrunk and Battersea Arts Centre production based on the work of Edgar Alan Poe. Visitors can explore the four corners of Battersea Arts Centre and relive its Victorian origins as Punchdrunk immerses the building in Poe's imagination. A special character ‘The Traveller’ has been created to provide personalised audiodescribed tours for visually impaired visitors. It runs at the Battersea Arts Centre until April 12th, and is not recommended for those under 14. The performance runs from 17 September 2007 - 12 April 2008 19:15 and 19:45 £40.00 (Concs £30.00/£20.00) THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH IS SOLD OUT Tickets are however available for a Red Death Party on 22nd March. Prices range from £20 - £40 The Masque of the Red Death is an indoor promenade performance lasting up to 3 hours, with two timed entries at 7.15pm and 7.45pm. The production takes place at BAC, Lavender Hill, London SW11 5TN. Evening dress is optional. BATTERSEA ARTS CENTRE Box Office: 020 7223 2223 Minicom: 020 7223 5311 PUNCHDRUNK JEFF HEALEY Ian Macrae pays tribute to the blind Canadian rock musician Jeff Healey who died in Toronto aged 41. In Touch played part of his classic hit ‘Blue Jean Blues'. ´óÏó´«Ã½ news report on Jeff Healey GENERAL CONTACTS RNIB 105 Judd Street London WC1H 9NE Helpline: 0845 766 9999 Tel: 0207 388 1266 (switchboard/overseas callers) Web: The RNIB provides information, support and advice for anyone with a serious sight problem. They not only provide Braille, Talking Books and computer training, but imaginative and practical solutions to everyday challenges. The RNIB campaigns to change society's attitudes, actions and assumptions, so that people with sight problems can enjoy the same rights, freedoms and responsibilities as fully sighted people. They also fund pioneering research into preventing and treating eye disease and promote eye health by running public health awareness campaigns. HENSHAWS SOCIETY FOR BLIND PEOPLE (HSBP) John Derby House 88-92 Talbot Road Old Trafford Manchester M16 0GS Tel: 0161 872 1234 Email: info@hsbp.co.uk Web: Henshaws provides a wide range of services for people who have sight difficulties. They aim to enable visually impaired people of all ages to maximise their independence and enjoy a high quality of life. They have centres in: Harrogate, Knaresborough, Liverpool, Llandudno, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, Salford, Southport and Trafford. THE GUIDE DOGS FOR THE BLIND ASSOCIATION (GDBA) Burghfield Common Reading RG7 3YG Tel: 0118 983 5555 Email: guidedogs@guidedogs.org.uk Web: The GDBA’s mission is to provide guide dogs, mobility and other rehabilitation services that meet the needs of blind and partially sighted people. ACTION FOR BLIND PEOPLE 14-16 Verney Road London SE16 3DZ Tel: 0800 915 4666 (info & advice) Web: Registered charity with national cover that provides practical support in the areas of housing, holidays, information, employment and training, cash grants and welfare rights for blind and partially-sighted people. Leaflets and booklets are available. NATIONAL LEAGUE OF THE BLIND AND DISABLED Central Office Swinton House 324 Grays Inn Road London WC1X 8DD Tel: 020 7837 6103 Textphone: 020 7837 6103 National League of the Blind and Disabled is a registered trade union and is involved in all issues regarding the employment of blind and disabled people in the UK. NATIONAL LIBRARY FOR THE BLIND (NLB) RNIB Customer Services on 0845 762 6843 Email: cservices@rnib.org.uk Web: The NLB is a registered charity which helps visually impaired people throughout the country continue to enjoy the same access to the world of reading as people who are fully sighted. Trustees from the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB) and the National Library for the Blind (NLB) have agreed to merge the library services of both charities as of 1 January 2007, creating the new RNIB National Library Service. EQUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION DISABILITY HELPLINE (England) FREEPOST MID02164 Stratford upon Avon CV37 9BR Tel: 08457 622 633 Textphone: 08457 622 644 Fax: 08457 778 878 Mon, Tue, Thu, Fri 9:00 am-5:00 pm; Wed 8:00 am-8:00 pm. Enquiry: englandhelpline2@equalityhumanrights.com EQUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION HELPLINE WALES Freepost RRLR-UEYB-UYZL 1st Floor 3 Callaghan Square Cardiff CF10 5BT 0845 604 8810 - Wales main number 0845 604 8820 - Wales textphone 0845 604 8830 - Wales fax 9:00 am-5:00 pm, Monday to Friday (an out-of-hours service will start running soon) Enquiry: waleshelpline@equalityhumanrights.com EQUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION HELPLINE SCOTLAND Freepost RRLL-GYLB-UJTA The Optima Building 58 Robertson Street Glasgow G2 8DU 0845 604 5510 - Scotland Main 0845 604 5520 - Scotland Textphone 0845 604 5530 - Scotland – Fax 9:00 am-5:00 pm, Monday to Friday (an out-of-hours service will start running soon) Enquiry: scotlandhelpline@equalityhumanrights.com DISABLED LIVING FOUNDATION 380-384 Harrow Road London W9 2HU Tel: 0845 130 9177 Web: The Disabled Living Foundation provide information and advice on disability equipment. The ´óÏó´«Ã½ is not responsible for external websites General contacts Back to top TranscriptWhiteGood evening. Tonight: News of the special relationship between Britain and the USA, working just fine if only the bureaucrats would let it. And another twist to audio-description, this time where the audio describers are actually in the performance space with you, indeed where you're almost part of the play yourself. Clip There's a small archway in front of us, I think we get out. Okay. Just bent down, almost crawled through this archway. Where are we now? White More from a very mysterious Mani Djazmi later. Now Lee Garrett and Debbie Bacon want to get married. They're both visually-impaired - so what? Plenty of couples in that situation. He's a Brit, Debbie is an American. But plenty have overcome that hurdle too. But when Lee looked into applying for what's known as a fiancée visa for Debbie to come to Britain he was told that he had no chance of it being granted. Well we're joined from our Yeovil studio by both Lee and Debbie. Lee, first of all, just tell us a bit about you two and how you met. Garrett Well we originally met on the internet. Debbie sent an e-mail to a mailing list just introducing herself and I just happened to reply to it and told her a little bit about myself and a couple of days later we were talking using voice chat. Bacon I visited the UK two or three different times and then Lee came over to visit me a couple of different times and we talked pretty much on a daily basis for the last three years. On my visits I really enjoyed it, I liked the people, I like this area of the country and I was at a place in my life where moving wasn't such a big problem, I didn't think at least, because I have all - I have three grown children and my family is pretty much all on their ways and I thought it was a good time to make a change. White And love bloomed yeah? Bacon Oh yeah. White So Lee what was the problem with the fiancée visa? Garrett Well after we did some initial inquiries I then decided to contact my local MP to see if we could get some straight answers and he very kindly wrote, on our behalf, to the chief executive of the Immigration Service who then very kindly passed it on to somebody else who then wrote to us and basically stated that because they class Disability Living Allowance as what they call public money I would be unable to sponsor Debbie. Now I would have to sponsor her to get the fiancée's visa. White Right and just to remind people that if they don't know the Disability Living Allowance is a benefit that you get which is meant to cover your living costs and the things you need as a visually-impaired person. Garrett That's right and it is actually a non-means tested benefit, so it wouldn't matter how much money I was earning, if I was in full time employment, I would still be eligible for that benefit. White Right. So essentially you were being told that because this was public money it couldn't be taken into account in your ability to support Debbie if she lived over here? Garrett That's correct. White Were you surprised with all this Debbie? Bacon Not initially, I mean I understand the need for a country to limit its funding to people living in a country. What concerned me was that the benefits that Lee receives, or anyone else who receives this benefit, are legally received by them. I would not be receiving the benefits, nor would I be applying for any other benefits. I intend to continue on with the funding that I have for myself and to find work and we have other means of work as well. So that was a little bit of a shock to me. White Right. Lee you mentioned that you contacted your MP, who else have you contacted? Garrett Obviously once we received that response back from the Immigration Service we were really at a dead end. We contacted the Disability Discrimination people and they said because it would be Debbie applying for the visa in the States it didn't come under their jurisdiction. And obviously RNIB pretty much said the same thing. White So a very frustrating situation. Well we may be able to update that because joining us here in the studio is Julian Bild of the Immigration Advisory Service. First of all, just what is the problem here is it exactly as Lee and Debbie have explained it? Bild Not entirely. The rule that is causing Debbie this heartache is that someone coming to migrate to the UK must show that they can support themselves and any dependents that they bring with them without an additional recourse to public funds. So if the sponsor in this country is claiming public funds then that's no bar at all. What Debbie would have to show is that she can support herself without having to claim those additional public funds. White But she says she's intending to do that. Bild Well of course she wouldn't be entitled to claim public funds but she would need to show that as a couple that they have access to an equivalent amount of funds that they would have if they were both entitled to income support. So a couple receiving income support would be expected to live on something like £90 a week and have an additional amount for housing and council tax costs. White So she has to show her ability to work? Bild Well that's right and the guidance given to entry clearance officers that if someone has a history of working or they can show that they can reasonably easily find work then they should be allowed into the country to look for work if they can show in the meantime they can support themselves. I think the complication here is that the Home Office or the entry clearance officer, the visa officer's attitude to DLA is that that's not available to support someone who comes into the country because it's solely there to meet the needs of the person who's in receipt of that benefit. So as listeners will probably know there's a care element to that and a mobility element and that simply wouldn't be available to support Debbie because Lee needs it. But the situation's changed since she was previously advised ... White Oh has it. Bild ... so I can cautiously optimistic. White So in what way has it changed? Bild Well in a case which we refer to as MK Somalia it was a very similar situation where someone who was profoundly deaf in the UK wanted to bring her husband to join her here. She showed that with her DLA she was receiving more as a single person than the couple would receive if they had been receiving income support. But both the Home Office position and initially the tribunal position was that she needed that money for herself and she couldn't use it to support her husband. However, that case was appealed again to the Court of Appeal and the judges of the Court of Appeal disagree with that. They've said - and it's only recently been publicised - that in fact if someone wants to pay for a partner to come here to meet their particular needs, obviously emotional needs but also care and mobility needs, then there's no bar on them using their Disability Living Allowance to in effect pay their partner. And certainly on the figures I have in respect of Lee and Debbie his income more than adequately meets the test - he gets far more than the couple would receive on income support. White So are you saying your advice on that new case is that they should apply? Bild On the facts of the case, as I understand it, they have a very good case indeed. White Lee and Debbie, your reaction? Garrett Obviously it's very hopeful and obviously Debbie is due to go back in August and as soon as she goes back then obviously we'll look at her applying for the visa and take it from there but it sounds a lot more optimistic, a lot more hopeful than what it was when we walked in here this afternoon. Bacon I'm very pleased, I'm going to go look up that stuff myself. White You don't trust anyone do you. Bacon I have to have it in front of me yes. White Can I just ask - Julian, very quickly, are you happy to stay in touch with Debbie and Lee and perhaps help them steer their way through this? Bild Yes very happy indeed. White Lee and Debbie, I'm very pleased that we've been able to perhaps shed a bit of light and Julian Bild thank you very much indeed. Now last week we talked about audio-description on television and this week Mani Djazmi is here to tell us about an extraordinary theatrical experience that he's had where audio-description played its own unique role. So what made this experience so extraordinary Mani? Djazmi Well it was a performance of the Mask of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe. It was extraordinary on many levels really. As a theatrical experience it was different to anything I'd had before because rather than being played out on a stage in front of attentive people sitting in rows all the scenes were played out in different rooms in a building in the Battersea Arts Centre in South London. And the idea was that the audience wander through each room and pick up various snatches of scenes as and when they come across them. White How much did you know what to expect in advance? Djazmi I didn't know anything because it's very difficult to describe to someone because no two members of the audience come away with the same experience because depending on when you walk into a room that's what you see of the scene. So all I knew was that it was very random and anything's likely to happen at any time. I mean sometimes you walked into a room and there was nothing there, there was no one - not even an actor in there. Other times you walked in there and there were people arguing or people dying or people going mad. It was extraordinary. White And you had to wear a mask didn't you? Djazmi Yes we had to wear a mask because the Mask of the Red Death story is all about how people lock themselves away in an aristocratic house to avoid the plague. So all the audience members have to wear masks and the masks had these beaks coming out of them, these huge beaks, mainly because you weren't allowed to talk, so these beaks were designed to prevent people from putting their heads together and whispering. White Was it scary? I know you're a tough boy. Djazmi Well I am a tough boy and it wasn't scary, I didn't think it was scary. It was quite unnerving sometimes because as we'll hear there was quite a lot of - quite a few dead animals hanging off walls here and there and there was a lot of decay as well, there was one room I went in ... White Stuffed ones presumably. Djazmi Oh yeah absolutely they were stuffed ones. White Did you get any - well that's enough of a surprise - a dead animal - but I think you got a few human surprises as well. Djazmi I did. Well in their act the actors have incorporated some time where they can interact with the audience. There were a couple of times where I walked into a room and suddenly from nowhere the person who was acting just came and grabbed me and another time I went in there and the person - I think he was a nurse - just went mad and started throwing water all over me and checking that I didn't have the plague. But as I say this is all random, you couldn't expect it to happen, it just happened or it didn't. White How did the traveller tell you what was going on? Djazmi Well the traveller was - is a character that they created as the guide really, it's both the guide and the audio describer for blind and partially-sighted members of the audience. So this person comes around with you and in very hushed and whispered tones they describe everything from the decor to what the actors are wearing, what the characters are doing and whatever was happening. Clip from Mask of the Red Death Out there they know me as the traveller. But in here nobody knows me. I think it would be safer if you and I stuck together. If it's okay I'll accompany you through. Thank you. Welcome to the wonderful world of Poemany. I am the host of the Cabaret Royale - Morrice - and I live in the red velvet covered theatre which is housed up the grand marble stairs. If you take a right at the top you will come to the doors of our theatre - the Palais Royale. Here you can relax and have a glass of wine whilst raucous and tragic acts are performed for you. Yes I would say it's well worth a visit my dear, it's very, very good, wonderfully ... We've walked in to another girl's bedroom [indistinct words] dressing table [indistinct word]. And a girl's just walked in. Are you okay? A girl's just come up to me and is embracing me now. Right. I wish you hadn't called for him. We were happy weren't we, remember? The girl seems delirious, I don't think she knows who I am or she's certainly confusing me with somebody else. She's bending over to her dressing table now. She's just dabbing on some red lipstick around her mouth. She's smeared it everywhere as though blood's dripping from her mouth. There's a light in the corner. There's a small archway in front of us, I think we can get out. I've just bent down and almost crawled through this archway. Where are we now? We've come out through the fireplace. We're in a large gentleman's room. The ceiling is covered in material. And every wall is covered in dead animals. There's stuffed foxes, and birds and tiger skins on the walls. They're really in to their gloomy decor in here aren't they. They are. And they don't have a cleaner. It's a bit quiet, I'm a bit scared, I think we should find out where the people are. Okay. A friend of mine was in here late one night drinking and he left in one hell of a state. When he left his hair was as black as Satan's cat. When he turned up the next night his hair, even his fine moustaches, were an insipid shade of white. He lives not far, just the other side of the cemetery, if you take the short cut. And that night he was taken short so he cut through the bone yard. Within a minute he was leaning up against a family tomb, he's got his forehead resting against the cold marble, he's just standing there in a graveyard after midnight. He nearly jumped out of his skin. He looked around the far side of the tomb and there about three graves away was an old man kneeling on a cold granite slab hammering away at the marble headstone. What do you think you're doing? But they've spelt my name wrong. One flight below Madeleine's bedroom is the Hessian hovel of the black cat family and two flights below takes you to the catacombs, though I must warn you Mani it is not a safe place to be travelling alone my dear, I've heard there's a lot of strange goings on .. We're in a crypt, there's just stone tombs, around the edges of the room with little blue lighting - we have to get out, it's not safe. White Whoa, creepy stuff. So how did that compare with a night at the Royal Shakespeare then Mani? Djazmi Well I think it was much better personally. I mean I think in terms of the traveller, as you heard there, it was very live, it was real time, it was ongoing and the point of the performance was that people only saw bits and pieces, no one knows exactly what happened everywhere. And if you have a conventional audio-description service through a headset then obviously you'd have all the angles but this way you only saw what they saw. White It's very innovative, who's idea was it to make the Mask of the Red Death accessible? Djazmi Well the theatre company's called Punchdrunk and they put on another a performance a while ago and Maria Oshodi, who is a regular contributor to this programme, she's a very innovative and creative blind theatre director herself, she went along to this and she thought that they could brush up on their access a bit and between them they came up with the character of the traveller. White And how long is it on for? Djazmi It's on for one more month ending on the 12th April. White Well you came out with your hair I think roughly the same colour as you went in. Mani, thank you very much indeed. That's Mani Djazmi. We end with some news: the death of the blind blues guitarist Jeff Healey at only 41 but at the top of the music tree for the past 20 years. Well music fan Ian Macrae has joined us, Ian, with an appreciation of Jeff's career and his music. Macrae Yes. Died as a result of the same condition from which he lost his sight - retina blastoma - which eventually brought about the cancer from which he died. Toronto born, very recognisable power driven electric blues guitar, along the lines of people like Robert Cray and Buddy Guy I would say. White And with a very individual style. Macrae Well yes because he'd never seen anyone - he lost his sight at the age of 18 months, two years, and he'd never ever seen anyone hold a guitar and therefore when he got hold of a guitar himself he just held it in the way that was intuitive to him which was flat on his knee in the same way as you might hold a kind of a dulcimer. And he learnt to play in that way. White And how successful was he because I mean I suppose people think of someone like Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, he's not quite that big a name but very highly regarded? Macrae Yeah in the circles in which he moved among electric blues aficionados I think he was very, very highly appreciated and undoubtedly a very gifted player. White What do you think he'll be best remembered for? Macrae His most famous track is a thing called Angel Eyes but I think the thing that I've most recently discovered about him is, as I say, we all know him for this sort of hard driven blues based rock that he played but he was also a huge fan of 1920s American jazz and he had an alternative group with whom he used to play regularly - Jeff Healey's Jazz Wizards - I've not heard anything of theirs yet so that's where I'm going to go next to try and check that out. White Ian Macrae, thanks very much indeed. That's it for today. You can call the action line on 0800 044 044 or you can e-mail the programme via the website. From me, Peter White, my producer, Cheryl Gabriel and the rest of the team goodbye. Back to top |
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