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Governor General's Speech on WCW
Her Excellency the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson Speech on the Occasion of the Official Launch of White Cane Week 2005 
Pictured above from left to right is: The Ottawa Mayor Representative, CCB Ontario Director Theresa Dupis and the Governor-General
Ottawa, Monday, February 7, 2005
I'm pleased to join all of you today here at the historic Ottawa Curling Club. Around here, the "roaring game" is very much on our minds these days, with the exciting way in which the Jenn Hanna rink from Ottawa won its way to a chance to compete for the national championship. I will also be travelling this week to the Royal Montreal Curling Club, where they are looking forward to celebrating 200 years of playing this deep-rooted, rather civilized Canadian game. We didn't invent it, but we play it better than anyone!
But in particular, I'm intrigued by this remarkable national bonspiel, part of the official launch of White Cane Week 2005. As Patron of the Canadian Council of the Blind, I am glad to inaugurate this week of awareness and empowerment for blind and visually impaired Canadians. For 60 years, the CCB has been the "voice of blind Canadians", and I admire the determination and self-sufficiency that have guided your work since the Council was founded in 1944.
To conceive of such an organization, and to build and sustain it, required vision. That collective insight has resulted in greater feelings of confidence and accomplishment for your community. It has created greater public awareness that blindness is not a cause for pity or grief but simply an obstacle to be overcome. It offers reasons for us to think about the barriers to accessibility that are, often needlessly, erected in our public spaces and in the public mind. In particular, the vision of the CCB has fostered, for 59 years now, the concept of the white cane as a symbol and as a tool of ability. It reminds everyone that the blind are not shut away in a narrow and limited existence. They're too busy living. They're too busy curling!
In building a compassionate society, we walk a fine line. In Canada, citizens are encouraged to care more for the needs of others than for their own wants. We wish to ensure that there is opportunity and assistance for all, but without condescension. All of us have needs, and we simply want them to be part of our society's equation of caring and order.
Those with visual or other impairments are no different in this regard. The CCB has steadily voiced and enabled this desire, speaking not on behalf of the blind but from them. Your motto – "A lack of sight is not a lack of vision" – is a great reminder of what we all know, if we think about it. Having perfect eyesight is no guarantee that someone has genuine understanding, or the ability to solve difficult problems, or the willingness to work for the greater social good. These things belong to the arena of insight, and they are available to everyone. Along with its work for and with the blind, the Council and its members offer Canadians a quiet example of this truth every week of the year.
The great Irish writer Jonathan Swift, best known for Gulliver's Travels, also left behind him this powerful thought: "Vision is the art of seeing things invisible." It is the capacity to notice what is essential in our hearts and minds: wit, kindness, sincerity, fairness. Vision is the gift of recognizing hidden possibilities. This is an art that all of us should spend our lives in developing, an art that the Canadian Council of the Blind encourages simply as a matter of daily routine.
On behalf of all Canadians, I am happy to participate in this inauguration of White Cane Week, and to proclaim its message of ability and interdependence. I wish you an inspiring series of events, here today in Ottawa and throughout the week.
Thank you very much.