HC Deb 30 November 1989 vol 162 cc371-2W
Mr. Kirkwood

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what information he has as to the ways in which people with a visual handicap incur extra cost as a result of their disability.

Mr. Scott

The surveys of disability in Great Britain carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys between 1985 and 1988 provide valuable information about the ways in which people with disabilities, including seeing disabilities, incur extra cost. The surveys were based on a sample of 10,000 adults, 27 per cent. of whom had seeing disabilities. A recent study by the Royal National Institute for the Blind of the additional expenditure incurred by 10 visually impaired people also provides information about extra costs.