NEW ZEALAND A LEADER Rehabilitation of the handicapped

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33452, 6 February 1974, Page 5

NEW ZEALAND A LEADER Rehabilitation of the handicapped

New Zealand is ahead of any country June Opie knows in rehabilitating handicapped people towards independence and Miss Opie has travelled extensive!) studying what is being done to give disabled people equal opportunity.

A New Zealander who now lives in Cornwall, June Opie was stricken with poliomyelitis 26 years ago, and described her fight to overcome her physical handicap in her best - selling autobiography, “Over Aly Dead Body.” .“New Zealand could very well be the first country to provide the disabled with total independence,” she said in Christchurch yesterday. The most important factors now, in achieving this, were for electronic engineers and technicians to construct more artificial aids, and for local authorities’ architects and those responsible for urban development to include disabled persons on their advisory committees when considering plans for greater integration of handicapped people into the community. Disabled persons, with sufficient experience and intelligence to sit on advisory committees, knew best what was ! needed. Miss Opie said. Their advice should be sought from the outset, before mistakes were made and public money was wasted. j “We know so well what we cannot do, and if we were given the opportunity to make this perfectly plain, then the technicians would !make the right things for us,” Ishe said. “IRONSIDE” HELPED The television series “Ironside” had done “a marvellous job” in making the disabled acceptable almost anywhere. Miss Opie said. I "It is no longer a surprise [when we pop up at: Istanbul Airport, in North Africa, or in the Yemen,” she said. "This is what ‘lronside’ has done for us. But. of course. Raymond Burr is not disabled. So what he can do in his wheelchair is beyond the physical reach of a true para plegic; and this is easily recognisable to any wheel- , chair handicapped person by ‘the obvious use he makes of his legs to maintain his bal ,ance and propel himself at speed." For example, when “Ironside” went down the ramp from his office in his wheel-, : chair, he used his feet and.! i legs to take his weight and I leant forward slightly. “If we did this, we would fall out of our chairs,” Miss Opie said. “The technique we have to use is quite different. ■This is what 1 mean when 1 ! suggest, that the next step towards total independence is to bring in the disabled as j consultants before any plans; are drawn up. There is so much to be done in all fields; of disablement as electronic: aids become more sophisti-i cated.” PILOT SCHEME? ■ Miss Opie believes that; Christchurch, because it is flat and developing fast, is an ideal location for what could become a pilot housing' scheme in which the disabled are a “natural part” of :the community. I “I am concerned, as the :numbers of disabled people: i increase, about the well- 1 intentioned schemes to house them in group settlements,” she said. “There is never a group settlement that does not. become a ghetto. I have seen this kind of thing in many places in Europe, but on a very sophisticated scale I in Holland and in England.” ■ The disabled should not be

) segregated. For one thing, (they had to get used to. ’other people's unwittingly ! hurtful reactions to them, ’especially from, children. I |What seem to be cruel redactions are perfectly natural . human reactions, she said, ; particularly to gross dis‘‘ability, like that afflicting I‘thalidomide children. Mis's Opie was most enthusiastic about a residential / unit at Sussex University for >; severely handicapped stull dents who have to use elecijtric wheelchairs. “Those who have to use electric' wheel-' -‘.chairs are totally dependent Jon help for toiletting and qmust have special equipment tifor taking lecture notes.” she' r said. FORK-LIFTS J The complete unit was; : given to the university by a J Burmese oil magnate, who ■ had asked the disabled stu- " dents themselves what they L needed. They had told him • that their first requirement ■ was a recharging bay for the • I electric batteries in their ■chairs. >■ “The kind of mistakes that ‘lean be made by planners, J with all the good will in the Uworld. are things such as ■’i fork-lifts al airports,” Miss I Opie said. “The one at Heath- ■; row Airport, London, terrifies: : ;me —and I don’t, think I am: 1 (frightened easily. Now I re-)

. fuse to go on one, and simply cask two of the ground crew -ito carry me from my wheel--chair to my seat in the air- , craft. This request has never : been refused anywhere in the 11 world. The whole atmosphere J then becomes a human one;, jwe all joke about it," Disabled people living in. any community had also to learn to trust others to help I ‘them. • “In certain circumstances,. •I we have to rely on other 11 ■ human beings rather than Jmechanical devices,” Missjl .‘Opie said. “But when well J want to be alone and private.] Jin our own homes, we need'.] all available mechanical aids 1 1 ■ ‘—and hundreds of others not even thought of yet.” Miss Opie is an executive! member of the Association '•of Disabled Professionals J '(which was established in 'iLondon in 1971. J This association has been ’effective in making more uni-: diversities accessible to dis- ,; abled students by putting in J lifts, ramps, and easier toilet' facilities. “We are most concerned '(that the total range of study! J courses is open to the disabled, no matter what the: J handicap or how severe.”! 'Miss Opie said. “If someone -in a wheelchair has Uni-; -versify Entrance, he or she! ''should be able to make any; ichoice of course—even a’ ,: diploma in physical education to become an instructor.” : University planners gras-; ped the opportunity to have the association’s suggestions. ‘she said. Miss Opie is revisiting New: ■Zealand to see her mother. Mrs K. E. Opie, of New Plymouth, and other relatives. While in New Zealand. Miss, Opie, who is a widely experienced broadcaster in England. has recorded a series of radio talks for the N.Z.8.C., 'on her travels, and will appear in a television pro- , gramme of “On Camera” beifore she leaves for London’ on March 3.

NEXT BOOK

She expects her next book, on her recent tour of Asia Minor in a car fitted with hand controls, to be published at the end of the year. J It is seven years since June ; -Opie was in New Zealand. ''“When on the plane coming back, I kept telling myself -that the country would prob--ably not look as beautiful as I had remembered it,” she ‘i said. “But I find it more ibeautiful than ever.”