Action for Blind People is a national sight loss charity in the United Kingdom that provides help and support to blind and partially sighted people of all ages.

History

Action for Blind People was founded in 1857 as the Surrey Association for the General Welfare of the Blind and later became the London Association for the Blind. The Association's main activities in the early days were teaching blind people to read and to learn practical trades. Opportunities and attitudes towards blind and partially sighted people changed over the years, along with the nature and the scale of the Association's work. As a result their title was changed to Action for Blind People in 1991.

RNIB Group

Action for Blind People formed a partnership with the Royal National Insitute for Blind People (RNIB) in April 2009 and became part of RNIB Group.

This enables both organisations to provide a unique combination of complementary strengths and expertise to help an ever inceasing number of people with sight loss. Working together in this way allows both organisations to share skills and deliver services in line with the UK Vision Strategy and RNIB Group Strategy.

Organization

Action has 17 regional teams across England and four Resource Centres. Action for Blind People operates a Mobile Sight Loss Information service that travels around the UK. Action for Blind People also runs four hotels, but in 2009, the hotels were rebranded as Vision Hotels. Action local teams are based in Birmingham, Bristol, Carlisle, Exeter, Leeds, Liverpool, Loughborough, Manchester, Middlesbrough, North London, Norwich, Preston, Salisbury, South London, Stafford, Stoke and Wallsend.

External links

• http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/feb/22/disability-living-allowance-blind-people