Who was Mike Devenney?




Guardian Obituary - Michael Devenney

When he was two years old, Michael Devenney, who has died of bronchial pneumonia aged 45, was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. Specialists suggested that he would never be able to walk or talk and he would be completely uneducable.mike devenney guardian obituary

In 1987 in Islington, Mike became the youngest person in the country to chair a social services committee. He was 28. In 1988 he became an Islington Labour Councillor. In 1996 he won gold at the British Diversity Awards for the best awareness raising video. This year he took a PhD at Clare College, Cambridge. With his thesis - challenging representations of disability - he aimed to give disability the same academic profile as gender or race.

Most people could only understand Mike's speech through a third-party facilitator - but this did not detract from his communication skills. At a 1992 Rotterdam conference Mike asked if I would stand in as his facilitator. This involved Mike giving a few sentences at a time and then me repeating them to the audience. He began and I couldn't understand him, so he provided a repeat - but I still couldn't understand him. The third time around someone in the front row called out: "He's speaking in Dutch!"

By now back in English, Mike said: "Two lessons there. The first is you should never underestimate someone because they are disabled. The second is that all too often disabled people are only limited by the poor quality of resources available to them!"

In 1998 Mike was an associate member of the employers' forum on disability and from 2000 to 2004 he was a Commissioner with the Disability Rights Commission Act.

Michael John Vittorini Devenney, disability consultant and academic, born June 2 1959; died November 16 2004.

 



The Mike Devenney Scholarship is part of The Charities Aid Foundation (CAF). Registered Charity 268369
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