Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government, through the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator Helen Coonan, announced this week that it will be establishing an inquiry to investigate developments in captioning for the deaf and hearing impaired. That is something that the Democrats welcome very strongly. My colleague Senator Stott Despoja, in particular, has campaigned on this issue for a long time. The Democrats more broadly have sought to get greater attention for it—I certainly have done so—through meetings at the community level and through statements from time to time supporting greater action in this area.

I would like to reinforce my support for this inquiry and emphasise how significant this issue is. It is in many ways a hidden or unacknowledged issue just how many Australians are affected by hearing loss or deafness, whether it is something they have from birth or whether it happens at a young age or later in life through some sort of disease or accident. It affects a huge number of Australians. Obviously, that impacts on their ability to communicate with their fellow human beings.

Captioning is one simple way to bridge that communication gap. The government inquiry will be investigating captioning options, including whether or not we can have 100 per cent captioning for television, movies, DVDs, public service announcements and the like. It is something that is often forgotten. It includes something as simple as people wanting to follow what happens in parliament—and there are actually people who do try to follow what happens in parliament. We are being broadcast at the moment. People can follow these proceedings online by watching them on the internet or they can listen to them through the ABC parliamentary broadcast service. I understand that many thousands of people do that. It might not feel like it at the moment, in an empty chamber late on a Thursday night, but there are actually thousands of people who follow these sorts of proceedings.

But the simple fact is that if you have got hearing loss you cannot follow them. There is no mechanism. The broadcast through the online service is not captioned. If you watch question time, which is broadcast on ABC free-to-air, it is not always necessarily captioned adequately. Certainly, there is the option for people to read Hansard, but that is not available until the next day. For people who want to follow the details of any public service announcements or speeches, having an automatic requirement for captioning on television and other areas should be very important. There is currently an exemption for captioning requirements on digital television multichannels, for example, even though the technology is certainly there.

Another issue to add to that mix, and one that the inquiry could consider, is the availability, accessibility and affordability of technology that enables people with hearing loss to follow speeches, for example. I know that, when I have given speeches at various events from time to time, it is possible for people to have this technology. It is a bit like a laptop. A person will transcribe the speech pretty much in real-time, and people can follow it. It will come up in the same way as any sort of captioning that can occur live and in real-time on the television—but there is an expense attached to it. For public interest and public access purposes, there should be an examination of the access to and the use of that sort of technology to see whether there are ways to reduce the cost barriers.

The inquiry, as I understand it, is due to be completed by April of next year, and the report will be tabled in the parliament at its conclusion. A discussion paper will be released for public comment in coming weeks. For the many people who have been calling for action in this area—the Democrats have been pushing for it—I think it is a real opportunity, and I encourage them to participate in it. Many, many Australians are affected by hearing loss, and this is one way of addressing its impact.

I would like also to emphasise some other barriers. There is a real shortage of Auslan sign language translators, and it is very difficult even to be able to get training to become a translator in this area. I know that in my home city of Brisbane the number of courses that are run to skill people in sign language and translation is very limited, and it is expensive to undertake that training as well. Getting more support to train translators and looking at ways, perhaps, to reduce the cost of hiring such translators are other ways to reduce the barriers. It is not just a charitable public service to do these things so that people with hearing loss are aware of what is going on and can communicate back. We are missing out. The community as a whole misses out because of the difficulty for people with hearing loss to be able to contribute and participate effectively in the wider community. We as a nation miss out on the talents and contributions that those people make, and it is in the interests of all of us to maximise the opportunity for people to be able to participate in all sorts of ways, whether economically, socially or culturally, at community level. The more we can reduce these barriers, the more all of us will benefit.

On a related topic, I would like to mention as well how significant the number of people with hearing loss in Australia is. Apart from people who are subject to deafness from birth or to severe hearing loss and impairment because of congenital conditions, disability, disease or accident, an enormous number of people are developing acquired hearing loss through industrial noise or, in many cases, through music. Speaking as someone who has spent a lot of time listening to a lot of music—some of it much louder than is good for me—I can say that that point needs to be made more often. Not just hard-rock headbangers are affected by hearing loss; a number of people in the classical music field are also affected. A very high proportion of classical musicians and people who listen to classical music suffer from hearing loss. It is not a genre-specific consequence; it is simply a matter of decibels and frequencies, frankly. Damage to ears and loss of hearing capacity are not reversible. Once you have hearing loss, it is not recoverable. Obviously, you can use hearing aids and other technology to assist you, but your natural hearing ability is one of those capacities that decline. It does not develop as you get older through childhood, like many other abilities—it actually declines right from birth, as I understand it, and continues to decline. Once you have done the damage you cannot reverse it.

I say that as someone who has mild hearing loss. Our Prime Minister, whatever positive or negative things you might want to say about him, is a very good example of how somebody with significant hearing impairment can make an extraordinarily significant contribution to public life. That is another point that needs to be made: the fact that people suffer from hearing loss should not be a barrier to them fully and effectively participating and contributing to the wider community. Whether you think Mr Howard’s contribution has been a plus or a negative is obviously a partisan debate. It is not my purpose to debate that here tonight, but the fact is that he has contributed, and many, many thousands—tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands—of hearing impaired Australians contribute as well.

It is obviously better to try to reduce the number of people who have hearing loss, particularly when it is acquired unnecessarily through exposure to noise. In all seriousness, I would be interested in a test being conducted in this chamber and, particularly, in the House of Representatives in the middle of question time. I have absolutely no doubt that, on some of the noisier days, the level of noise and exposure to noise for people sitting in the chambers is unsafe. I mean that quite genuinely. Exposure to loud noise, even for short periods of time, on a prolonged basis can cause significant hearing loss. But a bigger area that needs to be watched is the growing use of earphones, particularly the type that are used on iPods—the modern bud earphones that go right inside the ear rather than the muffler earphones that were used back when I was somewhat younger. They have a risk of exacerbating hearing loss and, whilst there is some recognition of that in the latest devices that are being put out, I do not think there is enough awareness amongst people across the board of just how real that risk is. I am certainly not calling for a ban or anything like that. I am talking about the need for greater public awareness of how easy it is to experience hearing loss through exposure to noise. Some simple preventative mechanisms much reduce your risk.