A belated update on the demonstrations by spoken language interpreters:
I attended the demo in my lunch hour on 15th March. As far as I know I was the only sign language interpreter who attended the London demo and there was one other interpreter in attendance at the demo in Manchester.
There are more sign language interpreters in support of terminating the MoJ’s disastrous framework agreement but who couldn’t attend.
Nevertheless at the demo I witnessed great solidarity, a sense of community, a clarity of direction. All of which I have, sadly, not witnessed for some time with sign language interpreters in the UK.
I take my hat off to the interpreters who have stuck together and I sincerely hope this farcical agreement is scrapped. When, not if, it does, sign language interpreters and Deaf people will have you to thank for that and I am humbled and grateful.
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I was at the demo as a lipspeaker and a qualified court reporter and sadly the only lipspeaker at the demo. It was the first and only demo I have ever been on in 62 years and I am proud of my own efforts to stop the MOJ inviting tersp. transors and LSPs to accept an unlawful discrimination policy. I can evidence and show that I really do care about the state of our justice system and will continue to show a zero tolerance towards invitations that discriminate against deaf and hearing people based on linguistic and preferred methods of communication. It is one of the best things I have done in my life for others. The Government want to take away our fundemental rights and freedoms that ancestors secured for us. This level of apathy is shocking. We need more people who actively do things for change and less people who just complain and moan about things in private.