A DUBLIN communications consultant with multiple sclerosis has embarked on an Internet project that could create between 500 and 1,000 jobs for people with disabilities.
Mr Alfred Macnaughton was 49 when MS was diagnosed seven years ago. He had been suffering the classic symptoms, tingling in the fingers, flickering of the eyes. His first thought was that he would have to give up work as a communications consultant. "It was a total culture shock," he recalls. The severity of his illness meant he could no longer work.
Initially Mr Macnaughton saw the Internet as a potential business vehicle, to put himself and clients in touch with customers. His extensive research, however, indicated scope for an all-island project. A business contact, Mr Frank Ridkosil, with State aid, had successfully developed an Internet employment and project management service in the US for people with disabilities known as DisNet. Mr Macnaughton approached Mr Ridkosil with a view to replicating the DisNet model by forming DisNet Ireland.
Mr Macnaughton foresees a situation where every county could have a DisNet Ireland network where people could go for anything, "from the design for a new house to a music score. The limitations are actually very few".
He has had help along the way from Canon Ireland, which provided a photocopier, Alps Ireland, which provided a printer/scanner and "private individuals who provided a computer upgrade and computer/business consultancy for the project". With the assistance of the Dublin Business Innovation Centre (DBIC) he is now in the process of establishing a business structure for DisNet Ireland.
It will enable people like him to use the Internet to break through the isolation barrier and sell their skills to employers or customers. It will also allow teams of people to pool their skills and provide services to industry through virtual Internet groups structured to meet their own needs.
Negotiations are now under way with Enterprise Ireland to fund a three-month research feasibility study, followed by a six-month pilot study. Research so far suggests that there are between 500 and 1,000 people with disabilities who could become economically active over a three-year period if the scheme proved practicable.
Mr Macnaughton, who would be project director, has received a very favourable response from DBIC. It has assigned Mr Paul Monks to advise him on the project. The DBIC consultant believes the idea is "intrinsically sound" and extremely viable if it can be brought successfully through the incubation process.
"We're very short of IT people at the moment," Mr Monks says. "There are direct advantages from a Government point of view as well. If you can enable people with disabilities, they can come off the Live Register and contribute to the economy. There are a lot of different angles that come together with this project."
The disability angle has already been covered by Mr Larry Warren, chief executive of the Cystic Fibrosis Association, who has come on board as company secretary to DisNet Ireland. He sees it as a vehicle not just for IT experts who have developed health problems, but many other people currently isolated from the labour market by their disability.
"It's what's between the ears and motivation that counts," says Mr Warren, rather than previous academic or technical training. His own society is running courses in the European Computer Driving Course and he sees DisNet as a natural progression in the same enabling process. CFA has a "cyber campus" with nearly 20 members and he hopes to see it expand soon to about 50.
