Many thousands of hearing impaired people (and others with a cognitive processing disorder) struggle to access cinema showings and theatre performances in their local area due to a lack of performances with subtitles or captions. Often at cinemas the subtitled showings are on a weekday in the middle of the afternoon, which is not accessible for younger, working hearing impaired people. They will also only happen once in a during the whole run of the film. Likewise theatres often don't even offer a captioned performance in a run at all. Captioned or subtitled performances are often also cancelled without notice at cinemas and without viable explanation at theatres.

This means that hearing impaired people miss out on what is for many an enjoyable and valuable social experience or they have to travel many miles to access the performances they want to see, incurring more cost.

I am a parent of a hearing impaired young adult who is a film buff and enjoys the theatre too. She has had many disappointments over the years with missed performances which have left her feeling inadequate and disadvantaged.