Royal National Institute of Blind People

History

RNIB was first established on 16 October 1868 as the British and Foreign Society for Improving the Embossed Literature of the Blind. The first meeting, which was held at 33 Cambridge Square, Hyde Park, London, involved founder Thomas Rhodes Armitage (a physician who was partially sighted) and Daniel Conolly, W W Fenn and Dr James Gale (all three of whom were blind). Later, the organisation became the British and Foreign Blind Association for Improving the Embossed Literature of the Blind and Promoting the Employment of the Blind – generally shortened to the British and Foreign Blind Association.

In 1914, the organisation relocated to larger premises in Great Portland Street. From 2000 until 2023, RNIB operated from premises on Judd Street, in Bloomsbury, London, which it shared with Guide Dogs. In 2023, The Duchess of Edinburgh opened the organisation's new headquarters in the Grimaldi Building on Pentonville Road, London, which has been adapted to cater for the needs of people who are blind, partially sighted or neurodivergent.

RNIB's remit has always included reading and writing (e.g. Braille), education and employment. From the 20th century, welfare/social support has been important. However, it was not till the late 1980s that eye health became a major focus. Previously, eye health was seen as the sole prerogative of ophthalmologists and optometrists.

In 1914, the organisation changed its name to The National Institute for the Blind, or NIB, to reflect its status as a national body involved in all aspects of the welfare of blind people. The organisation was officially renamed the Royal National Institute for the Blind in 1953, having been granted a Royal Charter in 1949. In 2002, the organisation was renamed the Royal National Institute of the Blind ("of" rather than "for" blind people) when it became a membership organisation. To coincide with the launch of the UK Vision Strategy in 2008, it was renamed the Royal National Institute of Blind People. In October 2008, RNIB and Action for Blind People agreed in principle to combine some services across England. The new arrangement began in April 2009, resulting in Action for Blind People becoming an associate charity of RNIB. It merged with RNIB on 1 April 2017.

Anna Tylor, who is partially sighted, has been RNIB's Chair since 2020. Matt Stringer was appointed Chief Executive in 2019. King Charles III is the charity's Patron. His mother, Queen Elizabeth II, was RNIB's Patron throughout her reign (1952–2022).

Programmes and services

RNIB's helpline gives access to sight loss experts for questions and guidance.

RNIB's extensive range of reading services includes RNIB Bookshare – a free library of over one million items, which supports students and others in education with a vast collection of accessible textbooks and materials – and Talking Books, a service first established in 1935, which provides thousands of audiobooks, both fiction and non-fiction.

RNIB’s ECLO (Eye Care Liaison Officers) service aims to help patients understand the impact of a sight loss diagnosis and to direct them to appropriate sources of support.

Since the 1950s, the children's puppet character Sooty is an exclusive feature on the charity's collection boxes.

Campaigning

RNIB campaigns to change behaviours and perceptions around sight loss. It has been involved with several large-scale campaigns including calls for action to create a safer and more inclusive public transport system. In 2023, the charity played a key role in a national campaign to scrap plans to close ticket offices in train stations. In 2022, the charity launched its largest-ever advertising campaign, See the person, not the sight loss, to raise awareness of sight loss and the support that people who have visual impairments might need. Along with other leading health charities, RNIB lobbied throughout 2023 for better disability support across the National Health Service (NHS).

The charity has campaigned for mandatory secret ballots for people with visual impairments. After the 2024 general election RNIB delivered an open letter to 10 Downing Street highlighting that according to its research roughly 87% of the UK's citizens with visual impairments were denied their right to vote in secret. The campaign follows a 2019 court judgement that declared the UK's current voting arrangements for people with blindness or visual impairments to be unlawful. RNIB pointed out that in spite of the judgement, the majority of the UK's visually impaired voters do so using technology that requires them to be accompanied into the voting booth and have their choices read aloud by an assistant. only one person living with blindness in the UK has voted in secret, using a device known as the McGonagle Reader. This comprises an audio player with headphones and a plastic template to locate the boxes on the paper.

Schools, homes and other institutions

RNIB used to run a number of schools, homes, and other institutions. In 2018, an Ofsted report was highly critical of the RNIB Pears Centre for Specialist Learning, near Coventry, which comprised a school and a children's home, founded in 1957 as Rushton Hall School. Ofsted described it as inadequate in three categories and requiring improvement in the other two. It highlighted failures in safeguarding the vulnerable children and in training staff to support them. Later that year, RNIB announced that it had been unable to make sufficient improvements and was closing the Centre; RNIB's chief executive resigned.

Also in 2018, the Charity Commission for England and Wales launched its own inquiry into RNIB following serious allegations of systemic failings within the organisation. In 2020, the Commission ruled that there had been significant management, oversight, and staffing shortcomings which had led to repeated incidents where young people in the charity's care were put at risk or harmed. The Charity Commission's chief executive described this investigation as "one of the worst examples we have uncovered of poor governance and oversight having a direct impact on vulnerable people." The Commission stated that RNIB's corporate stewardship of services for children with complex needs fell far short of expectations and that the charity's board had been focused on narrow regulatory compliance and dismissive of criticism from the regulatory organisations it was accountable to – the Care Quality Commission and Ofsted. It found failures in training, safeguarding, record-keeping, reporting, responding to complaints, and the administration of medication, as well as instances of harm.

It was then reported that RNIB was selling all eighteen of its care homes and schools. In light of RNIB's progress in fulfilling the action plan, the Charity Commission withdrew its adverse decision in June 2022.

Notes

References

Sources

References

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