Access to RTÉ’s Services for People with Disabilities
Section 26 (1) of the Disabilities Act 2005 requires a public body to provide access to its services to people with disabilities where practical and appropriate.
RTÉ’s services include radio and television channels, online sites, musical performing groups, Aertel, transmission networks and publications such as the RTÉ Guide. In so far as it is practical RTÉ strives to make it services accessible to people with disabilities.
A high proportion of our television programmes are subtitled for people with hearing losses and we have signed daily news bulletins and weekly weather bulletins on RTÉ One. With the introduction of digital television we now have the technical capability of introducing audio description on some of our programmes.
Daily contact with RTÉ is made available to the deaf and hard of hearing through a special “text-messaging” service (087-798 9128) and email address (subtitle@rte.ie) and a meeting is held in RTÉ annually with all the representative groups.
The majority of our text based online services are speech-enabled.
People in wheelchairs who visit RTÉ studios throughout the country will find that all studios have wheelchair access, as have all public areas and offices.
If a person with a disability encounters a difficulty in accessing any of RTÉ’s services we will do our best to assist in addressing that issue. If the issue cannot be resolved a formal complaint may be made
Making a Complaint about Access to Services
Section 26 (1) of the Disabilities Act 2005 requires a public body to provide access to its services to people with disabilities where practical and appropriate. If a member of the public feels that RTÉ in its provision of services discriminates against a person with a disability a complaint may be made to complaints@rte.ie.