Why do I feel quite so uncomfortable with the Royal National Institute for the Blind's recent Access to Written Information report?

Isn't that what I, as a totally blind person, would wish the RNIB to be looking into and promoting?

Well, yes, of course.

And the report follows the broadest, most detailed and statistically robust investigation there has been into the subject in the United Kingdom.

It shows, for example, how 30 per cent of people "with sight problems" can't read medical letters and labels, while a further 43 per cent have difficulty.

In terms of the general public (and "people with sight problems" - people who fail the driving test for reasons of sight - are members of the general public!) that's 21 per cent who can't read or find it difficult to read this quite possibly personally sensitive or even potentially vital information for themselves.

While the RNIB's main concern is with people's levels of day-to-day independence, from the "information" standpoint this must, surely, be inefficient.

But "solutions exist and must become more widespread", says the report, "such as larger, bolder print with good contrast, tape-recorded and Brailled instructions and confidential telephone transfer of medical test results".

When it comes to electronic visual displays on microwave cookers, washing machines and such, 64 per cent of people with sight problems and 13 per cent of all 16-and-overs are disadvantaged.

Larger displays, clearer writing, back-lit displays, voice output and raised knobs would allow manufacturers to sell more, Government to avoid some of the extra care costs that would otherwise ensue and, most importantly, would allow individuals themselves to stay as independent as possible, says the report.

I've chosen the examples above from the wide-ranging report as the only two offering comparative percentages including the overall population.

In its aim to examine "how people with sight problems get access to the information they need, or want" (my underlining) the report also covers magazines and newspapers, bus numbers, food labelling, equipment instructions and personal mail among categories of written information and print, Braille, audio and being read to, among means of accessing it.

It's not hard to imagine then that its main thrust is that the broadest benefit will come from making ordinary writing more readily readable in the ways mentioned above.

And, of course, I can't and wouldn't want to argue with that. But at several points the report also states that solutions to accessing written information for those with little or no sight are much more difficult and/or expensive to achieve.

I feel uncomfortable in very much the same way I did when I heard an RNIB spokesman promoting the employment of registered blind people simply by emphasising that only a tiny minority - some four per cent - actually have no vision at all.

And, of course, I see what he was doing, countering the popular perception that "registered blind" equals "totally blind" (though, only when I checked this out for today's column did I discover that even that was misleading, based on the difference between "official" total blindness and what those words mean to the public at large. It would have been more honest to say 25 per cent of registered blind people have no useful vision!). Anyway, it didn't make me feel very good.

And I also remember when I applied for a job at the RNIB only to be told they weren't looking for a totally blind person!

Unfortunately, instances like these take their toll over the years. So maybe it's no wonder that a totally blind person, such as I, doesn't feel quite comfortable with the report.

Will the new message simply shift attention away from those of us with severest sight loss? Starting with the RNIB.