Good morning, everyone. Thank you for having me here today.
My name is Robbi Weldon, and I am an employee of CNIB. I also am a person with sight loss since the age of 15. I am a four-time Paralympic athlete and mother of two children. Although I race 95 kilometres an hour downhill on the tandem, my biggest fear is crossing the street each day to catch the bus to work.
As said, physical barriers are a large part of the barriers that persons with blindness or partial sight face on a daily basis, but stronger than that are the access to information and the attitudinal barriers.
As a person with sight loss, I don't use a guide dog and often don't use a cane. It's an invisible disability, having to explain myself to persons in service industries. For example, I was coming back from a World Cup in May to the Toronto Pearson International Airport through customs, and I used the accessibility lane. I approached the worker in customs, and he reprimanding me for being in the accessible lane, even though I had identified that I had vision loss. Those are the types of attitudinal barriers we face.
We're here today to promote the idea that beyond legislation, there's a great deal of funding required on an ongoing basis to educate and bring awareness to Canadians at all levels about the importance of changing those attitudes and removing barriers, whether they be physical or, as I said, access to information and attitudinal barriers.
Thank you.