An Accessible City of Culture

“Making our venues accessible for all visitors and residents of this City would be a major legacy of City of Culture 2013.” - Mayor of Derry Cllr. Kevin Campbell was speaking at the launch of the Change a Little Change a Lot Accessibility Awards, which aims to engage 30 venues hosting events as part of the UK City of Culture programme.

CEO of Culture Company, Shona McCarthy, echoed Mayor Campbell’s comments: “With 60 venues and over 30 schools hosting events and performances throughout 2013, accessibility is a live issue. This awards campaign will have significant positive impact on making our venues accessible to people with varying abilities.”

Brendan Bonner, Head of Health and Social Wellbeing Improvement (West) at the Public Health Agency says, “The PHA wants to ensure that people with a disability can participate in, and experience as many of the programmes and events that are being planned for the year-long City of Culture celebrations. It is also important that in terms of leaving a legacy, equality of access is at the heart of the long-term outcomes of this year of celebration. Also, in our role with CAWT we had been looking at the developments of the Change A Little, Change A Lot initiative and therefore it made sense to support the roll-out of the programme as part of the City of Culture events.”

Kevin Doherty, Acting CEO of Disability Action, the organisation who will deliver the free support package to participating venues says, “This programme, which is already happening in Donegal and Strabane encourages organisations to make little changes that will make a big difference to the lives of people with disabilities attending events and performances throughout City of Culture and beyond. We look forward to extending our relationship with venues across the City and giving them the recognition deserving of their achievements. We have no doubt there will be huge interest.”

Participating companies will be awarded formal certification and get free support along the way from Disability Action. They will also be profiled in local media and online for their actions with a free marketing package from Media Box.

Funding for this project has been provided by the European Union’s INTERREG IVA programme, secured by Co-operation and Working Together’s (CAWT) Community Awareness Programme. It is supported by the Public Health Agency, Western Health and Social Care Trust and Derry-Londonderry City of Culture.

CAWT CEO, Bernie McCrory says the programme is a significant step forward in making the North West an accessibility friendly region: “Accessibility is simply good business. Improving accessibility for disabled people has a much broader public benefit for the whole community. Our hope is that the North West will be viewed as a region of excellence in terms of accessibility just as Louth is viewed as an age-friendly county. With Donegal and Strabane already participating we hope other Councils will look at the experience in the North West and consider getting involved.”

The Change a Little Change a Lot Awards programme offers free support, training and expertise in accessibility covering five areas: built environment, awareness and attitudes, access to information, communication and event venue/performance specific. It is open to venues participating in the City of Culture programme.

An Independent Advisory Committee will decide on the allocation of all Awards.  At the end of the campaign one overall Change a Little Change a Lot Accessibility Award winner will be announced at an Awards Ceremony to be held in 2014.

Awards will be presented in three categories: Bronze, Silver and Gold to recognise the achievements of the participating venues.

ENDS.