Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/364850
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 17 AUGUST 2014 News 5 No beach for tourist let down by locked-up sand wheelchairs MATTHEW AGIUS LILLY Tolu wheeled herself into the lobby of the Sliema hotel where she has been staying for the past two weeks, flanked by her husband Fernando and niece Romina. I say wheeled herself in, because Tolu has been wheelchair-bound for the past year as a result of an ill- ness. Her smile and easy-going nature indicate an irrepressible character. Undeterred by her recent disability, she says she loves swimming and has recently taken up wheelchair fencing. Tolu, an Italian, has been visiting Malta since she was two years old and has strong family ties to the is- land. As she lights up one of several cigarettes she will smoke during the course of the interview and takes a drag, she gets straight to business: she is upset – and with good rea- son. In her own words, Tolu has been "misled by the MTA website". One of the aspects of living with mobility problems is the neces- sity to meticulously plan activities. When travelling abroad, airlines have to be told in advance to make arrangements for wheelchair us- ers, hotels and restaurants must be checked to ensure that they are wheelchair-friendly and so on. Due to the fact that Tolu loves the sea – she swims using a flotation device – and that using a conven- tional wheelchair on sand is a recipe for disaster, she did her homework before her visit and noted that the MTA website listed the beaches of- fering specialised sand wheelchair facilities. Based on that informa- tion, she visited the bay closest to where she was staying, St. George's Bay. According to Tolu, "the sand wheelchair services were advertised as operating from 10am to 6pm, but when I went to the beach at 5:10pm, the beach supervisor told me that the chair was not available, be- cause it was locked in the cleaner's room." On Tolu's suggestion, the super- visor then called his manager, who "apologised and expressed her em- barrassment at the situation". On the manager's suggestion, they tried again the next day after 10am – to no avail. Contacted for the second time by the Tolus, Scicluna called the ministry for tourism. "Nobody came. We waited till ten past midday and then left," she said, in a defeated tone. Tolu reports that when contacted, the ministry "expressed its surprise at the arrangement" and said that the cleaners were scheduled to be at St Paul's Bay that day, which effec- tively put paid to her plans. Her suggestion that the lifeguard be entrusted with the storage of the wheelchairs certainly sounds more practical. The niece, Romina Tolu, ex- pressed disappointment at seeing her aunt's hopes of spending time at the beach dashed – all because of "half-baked measures that were not thought out well enough". The problem is compounded at Golden Bay, where the specialised wheelchairs are stored together with beach umbrellas that are rented out by a private kiosk. "What if the ki- osk is not open? We have to choose between going back to the hotel or wasting our holiday waiting". "It's the small things that make you angry," explains Romina. "Things like calling up a restaurant before booking to confirm it has toilets for the disabled and then finding them locked or out of order. "Even the direction the toilet door opens should be taken into account. It shows that accessibility is an af- terthought in planning. A mere box-ticking exercise. It is not the person who is disabled… rather the environment is disabling." Ministry looking into reports of low standards CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 A Caruana aide was quick to point out that gener- alisations were wrong. "The minister also visited the Mtarfa home and what she saw there was exemplary," the aide said. The elderly are catered for by a blend of government homes with different private contractors for cleaning, cook- ing and care, or a combination of gov- ernment and private contractors for medical and private care. Complicating matters are the fact that private homes for the elderly which until last July could not be offi- cially monitored, were not accountable to any central monitoring authority. Several government-owned homes have also been contracted to private operators for extremely long periods. In two cases, two government homes were contracted to Nazzareno Vas- sallo's Caremalta company, on ten and twenty-year contracts. The government has opened a se- ries of public consultation meetings on standards for residential homes for the elderly. Despite years of talk on national standards, it is only now that a public consultation process was launched. The national minimum standards for care of the elderly in residential homes will be based on putting the elderly at the centre of care, respecting their dig- nity, freedom, security and mental and physical well-being, as well as their right to privacy. Are your relatives being cared for? Are your elderly relatives being cared for? Share your story with MaltaToday: this newspaper is aware that some homes for the elderly are not catering well enough for elderly patients and sufferers of conditions such as dementia because standards for care are not uniformly enforced. Sometimes, complaining to authorities and hospital management is simply not enough. Send us an email now in full confidence on maltatoday@mediatoday.com.mt or call 21382741 and ask to speak to a journalist on our front-page story. Justyne Caruana Lilly Tolu – misled by the MTA website about sand wheelchairs (left)