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BBC Radio 4 In Touch |
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Listen to this programmeFactsheet of this programmeTranscript of this programme Print this page FactsheetIn TouchRadio 4 TX Day and Date Tuesday 200606 TX Time 20:40 - 21:00 Line Identity 0800 044 044 Presenter: Peter White Producer: Cheryl Gabriel Contributors: Sunil Peck (reporter) Tom Pey (Director of Policy & Development - Guide Dogs for the Blind Association) Ibrahim Mogra (Muslim Council of Britain ) Pervez Hussein (Muslim Guide dog Owner) Guide Dog Discrimination In Touch recently reported the case of Bernie Reddington, a blind woman who was refused the use of a taxi because the Asian driver who responded to her call objected to her guide dog. This is a common enough story amongst the visually impaired community, despite the fact that it is illegal to refuse service to a guide dog owner, unless you can provide proof of a medical condition which is aggravated by close proximity to dogs. Therefore having a religious or cultural objection to dogs, or indeed a genuine fear of them, is not covered. So what happens if you are an Asian taxi driver or retailer with a genuine aversion to dogs, faced with a blind customer and their guide dog? On tonight's In Touch, Peter White and reporter Sunil Peck attempt to address these issues facing visually impaired people. Disability Rights Commission http://www.drc-gb.org/ Telephone number: Telephone: 08457 622 633 Muslim Council of Britain http://www.mcb.org.uk/ Tel:+(44/0) 20 8432 0585/6 The BBC is not responsible for external websites General contacts Back to top TranscriptIN TOUCHTX: 20.06.06 2040-2100 PRESENTER: PETER WHITE PRODUCER: CHERYL GABRIEL White Good evening. We recently reported on the case of Bernie Reddington, a blind woman who was refused the use of a taxi because the Asian driver who responded to her call objected to her guide dog. Well this of course has been a common enough story in Britain over the past few years but the fact is that it's now illegal to refuse taxi services to a guide dog owner unless you can provide proof of a medical condition which is aggravated by close proximity to dogs. So that having a religious or a cultural objection to dogs or indeed a genuine fear of them isn't covered. So what happens if you are an Asian taxi driver or a retailer, for example, with a genuine aversion to dogs faced with a blind customer and their guide dog who want to use your taxi and/or your restaurant? Now obviously something perhaps a little unresolvable. Well to help me answer some of these questions I'm joined, by amongst others, Ibrahim Mogra, who's chair of the Mosque and Community Affairs Committee of the Muslim Council of Britain. Ibrahim, could you first of all perhaps just explain the situation and may be put it in terms of its religious cultural and geographical background? Mogra Sure. Well Islam teaches that all animals and all of God's creatures need to be cared for and looked after. However, there are certain things which are part and parcel of an animal's body or go through the animal's system that are regarded as impure. So, for example, blood, human and animal waste and dog saliva is regarded as ritually impure. So that if it were to touch my body or my clothes I'd have to wash that part or change my clothes before I could say my prayers. So religion comes into play to that extent only. The rest of the body of the dog - if it brushes past you or if you want to pat the dog on the head - that does not make you impure ritually, although it would be advisable to wash your hands before you use it to eat anything, just for hygiene reasons. But following from that what has happened over the centuries is that because Muslims do try to pray five times a day they have tried to stay away from the possibility of being made ritually impure by the lapping of a dog or the saliva of a dog. And so we are discouraged from keeping dogs as pets but certainly allowed to keep dogs for other reasons, such as security and indeed blind Muslims or visually impaired Muslims would be most definitely allowed to have a guide dog to help them move around and to go wherever they need to go. White But if you were a devout Muslim this would be a very serious issue, something which you would be quite justified to have anxieties about? Mogra Yes that is true but it is up to the ulama, the scholars, to educate such people to say Islam does have certain rules and regulations but it always make exceptions for individuals when it looks and examines their individual cases. So a partially sighted or a blind Muslim should have no worry, no anxiety, whatsoever in utilising a guide dog because Sharea and Muslim law does allow such individuals to utilise the guide dogs. White So put bluntly therefore should there be so much of a problem with taxi drivers who clearly feel that they have some aversion to guide dogs, should it be as common for them to refuse to take the dogs? Mogra I think we need to make a bigger effort of trying to educate them as well, to say that there are different facets to this whole situation - we have the religious dimension, we have the cultural dimension and perhaps we have just an individual's personal dislike for hairy creatures for example. White Which of course you could have if you were white or a Christian or Caribbean or whatever part of the world you came from. Mogra Precisely and this is something that is - I have seen very often with Asian children and in particular Muslim children, whenever I take my family to the park or something if there are other families with their dog you can see the Muslim children actually making a big effort to stay out of the way of the dog and if the dog were to run up to them, just to play with them, some of them would actually scream and run. And one such incident actually resulted in the loss of a young life when a dog chased after this young man and he fell off the cliffs in Lancashire. So these are the difficulties that can come about if we do not educate our communities correctly to say what is allowed and what is not allowed. White Okay, we'll come back to you on some of these points. We're also going to be joined by Pervez Hussein, who's a Muslim and who has been a guide dog owner since 1997. But first Sunil Peck is with us, he's been looking at the situation and Sunil until recently you lived in an area of London where a lot of shops and taxis are run by Muslims, as a blind guide dog owner how does that affect you? Peck Yeah I lived in Walthamstow and as you said there are a tremendous amount of Muslims living there and there are a lot of Muslim run shops, restaurants and minicabs and there are some fantastic places selling all variety of food, it's a great place. But while I was living there I felt really like an alien. White That's a very strong word to use - why? Peck Well it was things like when I'd be walking down the street and women and children would scream when they saw me and my guide dog Bosley coming towards them. And my family were always amazed to see sometimes huge hulking blokes leap back in terror as I walked towards them with Bosley too. And you know I'd be on a bus or I'd walk into a shop and I'd hear people saying - No dogs, no dogs. White So how did this mean you modifying your behaviour while you lived there? Peck Well I tended to do all my shopping online, rather than nipping to the shop round the corner to buy a carton of milk or nip out to buy a kebab, I'd just buy everything online. Which was a huge shame, as I say it was a great place. White So presumably there were a lot of places you would have liked to have gone to but you obviously thought you couldn't really. Peck Yeah and also minicabs are a problem, I could never find a minicab company who were prepared to take Bosley and myself. White So we have here a problem really of two what look like quite rather unresolvable problems because you've got a Muslim's genuine perhaps fear of dogs, in spite of what Ibrahim has said and we've also got a blind person's right to go, which has been hard fought for over the years, to go where they want to go. Ibrahim, how do you react to what Sunil has said? Mogra Yeah I'm extremely disappointed in the way the Muslims have behaved themselves. I think I and along with me I'm sure all the Muslim scholars ought to share responsibility that we have not educated our communities well enough because clearly here we have Sunil who is in need of a guide dog, he cannot go about his day to day life without the support and the use of his guide dog and these guide dogs are clearly visible - they have the fluorescent collars and it's obvious that this is not a dog that is going to harm you or come up to you and dirty you or anything like that, this dog is very well trained and is in charge of the person who is using it. And we should be prepared actually to go out of our way to accommodate such users. White Now I guess we should make it clear. Now Sharea law has said, hasn't it, as you mentioned, that is okay to carry guide dogs in your taxi and allow them into your shop, so the key issue is the saliva is it really? Mogra Absolutely, if that can be cleaned up then there is no problem whatsoever. White But isn't somebody entitled to say - a big dog comes into my - they might lick my hand or something like - you know I can understand why if I was of that faith and it was part of that teaching I might feel that way. We've got generations of tradition here haven't we? Mogra That's correct. I mean a Muslim will always be concerned, especially if they pray regularly that they keep their body and their clothes clean. But how often do you come across a person with a guide dog, these are very few and rare occasions and I think we should be big hearted enough to ensure that they feel at home and they feel part and parcel of our communities and not feel alien. White Let me bring in Pervez. Now you are a guide dog owner, was this a difficult decision for you to make as a Muslim? Hussein No it wasn't. I've been listening to Ibrahim and very interesting comment. I've been a guide dog owner since 1997 but I live in a predominantly white area, so - I live in Herefordshire which is very, very different. But years and years ago in 1998 I made a video of my guide dog - he actually guided me around the streets in Selforth and I took it back to my community which is in Birmingham, which is Alum Rock, Washwood Heath area and actually showed the video to my parents and my family. That actually showed them what the guide dog actually does. Now in relation to how I think Sunil was treated - it's probably the way he looks, just teasing you Sunil - a lot of the things which go on with guide dogs and the community are basically down to uneducation. I would like to see more from the Muslim Council of Britain and also possibly from the mosques because there's not a lot of teaching in relation to guide dogs. I mean I can go back still into the community in Birmingham and they still not have a clue about guide dogs and they don't know what they do. White Well I was going to say would it have been different if you'd been having your guide dog in Birmingham or Walthamstow, for example, would that have changed your decision? Hussein I'm a very strong individual but I think it would have - it certainly wouldn't have stopped me but the education part of it there's not a lot of publicity on guide dogs really within the Muslim community, very few Muslim guide dog owners in the UK, I think I'm one of the few. When Ibrahim talks about in relation to hygiene is part of the problem with the guide dog and his religious belief as well and there's over two million service providers of - who are Muslim who are missing out on a lot of people in the country due to religious belief. Now education is very, very important and that's the message that the Muslim Council of Britain in my opinion should be getting to the scholars and the mosque leaders and the communities working alongside guide dogs and Muslim guide dog owners. The problem is youngsters that run away from dogs, it's something that's been taught to them when they're young, not because they're always afraid of the dog, it's that they always think the same of every single dog - there's no distinction between a guide dog and a normal dog. White Let me bring in Tom Pey, he's policy director of the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association and you've been listening to this. There's a suggestion maybe that the guide dogs just haven't got a big enough profile amongst the Muslim community anyway. Pey I think there's an awful lot to learn here. The first thing is that it's only recently become law that guide dogs should be carried in taxis and private hire vehicles. Of course there's always been access for guide dogs into places. We get quite a number of complaints every week from guide dog owners, it's fair to say that these complaints cross all sectors of the community and they're not restricted solely to the Muslim community. But to deal directly with your point - we have found ourselves that when we deal directly with the individual, against whom the complaint was made, that normally we resolve the matter and so it is very clearly a matter of education and we're forming the view that we need to have a higher profile. Now we've done that working with communities in Lewisham and communities in Burnley and these have proved very successful for guide dogs and it's something that we need to do more of and we want to do more of. White Let me bring back Ibrahim, I mean what do you think needs to happen because it sounds as if a project here and a project there is only going to scratch the surface of this problem isn't it? Mogra I think the proposal of involving the Muslim Council of Britain with the mosques is an excellent one, I think we need to proactively bring this discussion to the forefront, to say here we have a situation in our country where people who would have been at a great disadvantage have the possibility of leading almost similar lives to ourselves who are sighted and this is what Islam says and this is what Islam allows and this is how we can go about accommodating such people and to also target our children to say dogs are nice cuddly beings and they will not necessarily harm you, of course when you come in touch with dogs' saliva or anything like that this is the teaching that you wash yourself, you change your clothes. And when you are in a situation where a dog wants to play with you, don't scream and run but under supervision try and give the dog a little pat and move away. White What's your view about the use of the law in this case because I mean clearly people like Bernie Reddington are saying however tolerant I might want to be the fact is this is stopping me getting from A to B. Do you think it's right that at this stage in proceedings, when as you said a lot of people perhaps have misunderstandings about guide dogs, is the law appropriate do you think? Mogra I think every case will be looked upon its own merit, there might be individuals who feel that the law is the only path that is open to them and they might want to utilise that. But I think at the same time I'm sure when the lawmakers bring any legislation into being they will have looked at all the different angles to the debate and clearly if somebody is contradicting and contravening the law then they should be held accountable for that. White So you're not objecting to that use of the law in cases where there seems to be no way of resolving it? Mogra Yeah I mean these cases I feel that are all resolvable, I don't think there will be any single case that can't be worked out. For example if you have the cab drivers, most of the black cabs have two compartments - the rear one for the passenger and the front one for the driver - so there's no chance of contamination. Once the passenger has been dropped off all it needs is a little bit more effort in mopping up and cleaning up. So I think there are ways that we can work around these issues and we should not make religion an excuse to make life even more difficult for those who find themselves in this situation of being blind or partially sighted. White And what about the situation in restaurants? I mean we've had Sunil saying really there are a whole load of restaurants that he'd loved to have gone to but didn't really feel he could, not with the dog at any rate. Mogra Yeah I think with that obviously there are the health and safety regulations and all that, provided that the establishment can ensure that there is a section where guide dog users can come and enjoy a meal there. If they can do it I think they should do it and it's not a question of if they can do it, I think we should encourage all these restaurants and takeaway places to actively make room for such individuals. I reflect back years ago when wheelchair users used to have so many difficulties and now we find, with God's grace, that wheelchair users are welcome almost everywhere and have access like anybody else. And I can see it's not long before guide dog users also will have similar access like sighted people. White Tom Pey, Ibrahim said at the beginning that he was keen that there should be more education, perhaps more working together, between himself and yourself and his faith and the Guide Dogs Association, as a result of tonight's programme might there be more of that do you think? Pey We really welcome the invitation and I can assure you we will take it up. I think everybody is agreed there needs to be understanding on both sides - guide dog owners need to be sensitive to the needs of the Muslim community, as much as the Muslim community need to be aware of the law and the needs of guide dog owners. And I think if we can achieve that balance, as was said previously, then I think a solution is in sight. So we will do everything we can. White Sunil Peck, you were the person who, in a way, apart from the Bernie Reddington case, brought this to our attention in its wider context - the fact that you could live in a community and feel really quite isolated in it - what do you feel needs to happen really as a blind person who's got a right to travel around, use transport, go to restaurants? Peck Yeah I think it's encouraging to hear what's been said but really from what I experience I think it's going to be a long haul before we get to a situation where someone like me could walk around Walthamstow and just nip into any restaurant as and when. But you know I hope I'm proved wrong. White Pervez Hussein, you went to the lengths of making a video, do you have ideas maybe about how this situation could be improved quickly enough really, otherwise it could take generations couldn't it? Hussein Well I personally think that the Muslim community needs to take a good look at themselves and the education part of it. The difficulty is that as we mentioned before I made a DVD, I think something like that needs to be made in relation to a Muslim guide dog owner, the things that they do in the home. This hasn't got issues just for guide dog owners, taxis and restaurants, it's got issues in relation to Muslims, young Muslims of today, who want a guide dog and find it very difficult to even get on the ladder of getting a guide dog because of the religious issues that are placed on them to get their independence. Now although our culture's very geared upon family values the difficulty is youngsters who really, really want a guide dog can't due to religious beliefs because of the uneducation that their families may have in relation to guide dogs. I would like to see the Muslim Council of Britain working with the scholars. And also in relation to restaurants, when a guide dog owner goes to a restaurant, if you go to an English restaurant you're treated the same as anybody else so in relation - this shouldn't be a [indistinct word] idea because guide dogs are also environmentally healthy tested, all of them are, so if you go into a restaurant she should be treated exactly the same as anybody else going into any restaurant. I would like to see guide dogs along with the Muslim Council of Britain, along with guide dog owners who are Muslim working in conjunction with all those parties and getting the scholars and getting into the communities and working together because this issue is not just a small issue, it's a very wider issue in relation to Muslims having guide dogs, Muslim shopkeepers, owners, restaurants - it's such a rooted problem, it's not going to be resolved very, very easily. White Could I just get a very quick reaction from Ibrahim Mogra to that? Mogra I think Pervez is quite right, we need to now to take a proactive approach, as I mentioned, and have to start this educating of our communities and I hope that all of us can join in partnership to bring this to the dining table of every Muslim home where they can discuss it as families. White Well let's hope that this programme perhaps has made some small contribution to that. Ibrahim Mogra, Pervez Hussein, Tom Pey, Sunil Peck - thank you all very much indeed. We welcome your comments on anything that you've heard tonight. You can call us on 0800 044 044. From me Peter White, my producer Cheryl Gabriel and the rest of the team, goodbye. Back to top |
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