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Much of the local action to help people with impaired vision has been with us for well over a century. You would think, therefore, that its purpose - its essential credo - would now be well established and clear. Not so. In fact its place in the firmament of community endeavour has never been more muddied and muddled. it is under pressure, under attack and insecure. Why is this so? This paper explores how local voluntary action has lost focus; and what can be done to reassert the values and mores that should underpin it.

Considerable change is occurring in arrangements for training rehabilitation workers. Amid signs that employers are finding ad hoc localised and more diverse ways of preparing staff, there is also growing concern to re-focus and rebuild systems of training that will be robust and serve the field better into the next century. The Visual Handicap Group has prepared a Consultative Report which sets the scene for a period of reform which could lead to a larger and more highly trained workforce able to cope with a work setting that is undergoing rapid change.

This article ranges over the wealth of data provided by the RNIB Needs Survey just published, and looks specifically at their significance for the future work of voluntary agencies The survey shows that the character and scale of visual Impairment have been understated In the past The twenty or so national organisations and the two hundred or so agencies working at a more local level, are addressed The output of the Needs Survey so far published (Volume /) will challenge all agencies working on behalf of blind and partially sighted people, practically and philosophically