To start with, it is my pleasure to continue ‘Pursuing the Vision' in a newly styled British Deaf News. As I had announced in last month's article, to start the New Year we are returning to the magazine's original name.

Please do provide us with feedback, as the BDA is as always a democratic organisation owned by the Deaf Community, and thus we hope that throughout 2008 we will continue to improve the magazine. One of the new features is that each month we will feature each board member so the BDA is more familiar, open and approachable.

Our thanks to Murray Holmes for writing the obituary in this month's issue on Arthur F Dimmock, a very well known and important Deaf giant.  The BDA shares the sadness of this loss to the Deaf Community and the joys of having his contributions, as touched on in the obituary.  I am sure the readers will appreciate the role of Arthur, and his inclusion in the first issue of the new BDN being appropriate for us to be able to look back and move forward in the New Year.

Also featuring in this issue is the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, and on the BDA's Draft Response statement to raise the concerns of the Deaf Community at the implications of the bill for the liberty and quality of the lives of Deaf people. Due to the nature of the magazine being prepared just over a month in advance, before the publication and being in your hand; at the time I am writing this it is the beginning of December and barely a few days after the draft response was first distributed.

The BDA as we know, is simply representative of the Deaf Community, and therefore it is just and right that we should be able to raise any concerns our Community have and we know that in the medically- oriented world we live in, where treatments and cures are still being given considerable weight compared to the diversity and acceptance of BSL as a social norm as a example.

The BDA letter raises two important ethical concerns in response to this bill:

1. Who is not permitted to reproduce?

2. Who is prevented from coming into existence?

I remain open minded that the concerns may be proven unfounded and that safeguards are in place to protect our liberty, but we cannot ever or should ever take it for granted. We must be able to continually challenge any backward steps of our hard won progress. Even then, we still have a long way to go with regards to normalisation of BSL in everyday life. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill is just one single aspect of the larger picture facing the Deaf Community's place in today's world.

I have to say I am very pleased with the amount of passion, enthusiasm and determination from many people.  At the time of writing, I had to wade through huge amount of emails and had a massive network of support falling into place very quickly in a matter of hours and days! We recognised immediately that the subject is complicated and required a wider consultation and calling on those experienced in the area.

This is not to say we should leave it to the experts, no, we have the right to be able to ask questions, however difficult and be able to get informed answers. We know from past historical evidences that eugenics had been practiced even in a so called civilised society. Again with the dominant medical point of view we continually need to reassert our views and to win acceptance.

Our concerns with potential implication of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill is not only restricted to the Deaf Community, and has an impact on the wider Disabled Community as well as just being a chapter in the debate of genetic selections.

Last year at the Southport Congress we announced that campaigning would be an important part of BDA's long-term goal. This opportunity came up, although we are currently thin on campaigning resources, this battle cannot be won by the BDA alone. It is important that we work with many other organisations and also the importance of having the Deaf Community and supporters involved actively will be ever more critical and valuable.

We look forward to the rest of 2008 with much anticipation, and our sincere thanks to those who have amazingly in a short time raised the awareness and passion on this issue.  By the time you are reading this, we will have more information on our website, as well as links to relevant websites.