TRANSCRIPT
FAMILY AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE
Inquiry into social inclusion and Victorians with a disability
Melbourne — 3 March 2014
Members
Mrs A. Coote
Ms B. Halfpenny
Mr J. Madden
Mr D. O’Brien
Ms D. Ryall
Chair: Ms D. Ryall
Deputy Chair: Ms B. Halfpenny
Staff
Executive Officer: Dr J. Bush
Research Officer: Ms V. Finn
Administrative Officer: Ms N. Tyler
Witness
Mr J. O’Brien, state manager, Victoria, National Disability Services.
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The CHAIR — I will just give you the framework for the hearing today. All evidence taken by this
committee is taken under the provisions of the Parliamentary Committees Act 2003, which attracts
parliamentary privilege and is protected from judicial review. Any comments made outside the precinct of this
hearing are not protected by parliamentary privilege. You will receive a proof version of the transcript in due
course. The secretariat will be in touch with you in the event that there are any questions taken on notice from
this hearing. I now ask you to introduce yourself for the record, state the name of the organisation you are
representing and your position, and then provide us with a 15-minute presentation to which we will respond
with questions.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Thank you for the opportunity to present to the committee. James O’Brien is my name.
I am the state manager with National Disability Services. We are the peak body for not-for-profit disability
service providers. We represent across the country about 900 not-for-profit disability service providers; in
Victoria there are about 200. You may be aware of some of our members: Yooralla and Scope are probably
some of the bigger ones, all the way through to small regional community organisations. Our members are
mainly not-for-profit, and in Victoria provide about 50 per cent of DHS-funded disability services through our
membership, employing about 8000 full-time equivalent people across the state.
Thank you for the opportunity to present today. This is a really timely inquiry. We have a sector that is going
through a massive transition at the moment, with a number of reforms that you will all be aware of. The
National Disability Insurance Scheme is the big driver of change at the moment, and that has been running in
Geelong, through the trial, for the last seven months. There are, however, a number of reforms happening which
will impact, from a state government perspective, on our service providers into the future. The government is
still in the early days of the community sector reforms which may emerge from the Shergold work. There are
changes happening within DHS around Services Connect. There is also a large body of work which is
influencing the way disability services have been running. We are going through a massive time of change, and
I think the parliamentary inquiry is really timely to take stock of where things are at in terms of the reform
process in Victoria. It will probably also recast focus back on the implementation of the state disability plan,
which was released by this government last year.
I said at the outset that we represent the service providers. We do not represent people with a disability; people
with a disability are well able to represent themselves. But we certainly provide some advice and perspectives
from service providers and also some reflections on the systemic side of things.
We are very much a sector in transition at the moment. You will be aware, through the work of the Productivity
Commission and many other investigations, that the disability sector has had a number of stresses and
challenges which have confronted it over the years. That has led to the creation of the National Disability
Insurance Scheme, which really will be the next stage in the evolution of our sector and the way our services are
run. The NDIS is an extension in some respects of the transition that Victoria has been under for the last
10 years or so, with the move towards individualised services. The NDIS I think will take that to the next level
right across the country. The trial has started in Geelong. It is early days; we are seven months in. There are
some green shoots starting to show up down there in terms of the development of a new market for disability
services, and that new market for disability services is really driven by the individual choices of people with
disabilities.
In terms of social participation, the NDIS is a fundamental building block for social participation insofar as it
will give people with a disability the basic supports to get out the door. So often we have seen people with
disabilities excluded from the social and economic mainstream because of the lack of supports, the lack of
individualised support and the service rationing which has really characterised the system over the last decades.
The Productivity Commission in their work, which led to the NDIS, characterised the whole system as being
underfunded, unfair, fragmented and inefficient, and a system marked by invisible deprivation and lost
opportunities.
I think that is a really compelling and strong diagnosis of the problems that have beset the system and have
practically impacted on the ability of people with a disability to be included in the social and economic
mainstream. Some of the facts and figures which have come up as a by-product of those systemic flaws and a
number of other factors include very high rates of unemployment for people with a disability. We believe,
because of the close link between unemployment and poverty, that people with a disability are also over
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represented when it comes to the incidence of poverty. Again, money is a critical thing for people to participate
in the community.
Australia does not fare well compared with other countries. We are very much at the bottom of the pack
compared with other OECD countries when it comes to employment participation and also poverty rates. Here
in Victoria the involvement of people with a disability in the criminal justice system is very high; there is a
serious overrepresentation, particularly for people with an acquired brain injury or intellectual disability. As
committee members will know, the cost of a prison cell in Victoria per year is about $94 000, which is money,
in our view, that could be better spent on actions to keep people engaged in the community.
I would like now to talk a little bit about isolation. You will hear people talk about this in front of your
committee over the next couple of months. It is a difficult thing to define, but we have some research from one
of our service provider members —an organisation called Scope — that looked at this notion of isolation. They
captured the views of Australians with a disability and their carers and found that only 9 per cent of respondents
felt that their social contact needs were fully met, only 6 per cent felt their community participation needs were
fully met, only 10 per cent said their need to feel valued was fully met and only 10 per cent said their access to
services was fully met. That is a qualitative snapshot, if you like, of the notion of social isolation, and
anecdotally you will see it once people start appearing before your committee. There will be stories of people
who feel disadvantaged and marginalised because of their inability to get access to basic supports.
In that Scope survey there is some references to the specific social inclusion factors: 89 per cent of people said
that their needs were not fully met to have a social life; 89 per cent said their needs were not fully met to
actually get out and be social in places like cafes, bars and pubs; 87 per cent said their needs were not fully met
when they have a crisis; and 88 per cent said their needs were not fully met for accessing mental health services.
There are a range of reasons for these insights. Certainly community attitudes is a big one. Unfortunately there
still exists a healthy level of discrimination within the Victorian community towards people with a disability.
They are of course cumulative factors, and there is no one way of putting your finger on it. By way of summary,
the Shut Out report, which was undertaken by the National People with Disabilities and Carer Council a couple
of years ago, refers to this. I think it is a good snapshot.
‘People with disabilities and their families, friends and carers reported daily instances of being segregated,
excluded, marginalised and ignored. At best, they reported being treated as different. At worst, they reported
experiencing exclusion and abuse, and being the subject of fear, ignorance and prejudice.’
I have tried, in the first part of my presentation, to talk about some of the challenges that confront people with a
disability in terms of social inclusion. You will be aware of those things, but we are talking about a major social
challenge for the community. Government does have a role in changing some of those attitudes and coming up
with effective policies and implementing those policies, but I would say that there is no one magic bullet which
will solve the problem of dealing with entrenched social exclusion or disadvantage.
In Victoria we have strong policies around supporting people with a disability. We have good legislation. The
state Disability Act, which was passed by the Parliament in 2006, still presents a solid framework. The state
disability plan, which was released by this government in late 2012, is again good policy intent. It has the right
frameworks in place. The National Disability Strategy is again good solid policy, which really talks about
community participation and ensuring that there is equal access to services for people with a disability.
It does refer to the international, federal and state-based legislative obligations the government has, but we have
a view that there is a need — and perhaps that is the role of this inquiry — to see if those state-based
frameworks in particular are doing the job and if legislators have the right tools at their disposal through the Act
to make sure that we can really address some of these entrenched issues around social disadvantage and to
promote social inclusion. We have a view that the state plan is good policy, but the government really does need
to focus very heavily on its implementation.
The NDIS is one thing. The NDIS will assist a cohort of Victorians with disabilities. Once it is fully operational,
around 100 000 people from 2019 will get direct services under the NDIS. However, according to the
government’s figures, through the State Disability Plan, close to a million Victorians who identify with having
some sort of disability, who will still need support through mainstream services. The idea with the state plan is
to get those mainstream services equitable and accessible for people with disability. I am talking about
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transport, housing, education, health and justice — and mental health, of course. We really do need a
whole-of-government, whole-of-community approach. Government cannot do everything — we understand
that — but we think government can send some really positive and strong messages to the rest of the
community sector, the not-for-profit sector, local government and the private sector about building a more
inclusive state.
We have come up with nine strategies. It could be more, it could be less, but we thought for the purposes of this
committee perhaps nine things could be looked at by way of immediate priorities. Certainly the State Disability
Plan is our no. 1 priority in our state budget submission which we released just before Christmas. Again, it is
trying to have some realisation of the objectives of the plan, which is that people with disabilities have the
chance to fully participate in Victoria’s economy and communities.
We know Victoria is not a resource state, but it is a resource state insofar as it has people. We know that there
are many people with disabilities, families and carers who can make a great contribution to our state, but who
need some support to make that contribution. We know certainly through the unemployment rates that there are
people willing to work but who need that support, and there is a long-term dividend to government. The
Productivity Commission has talked about this through the design of the NDIS — getting people back into
work, less people on the disability support pension, more people paying tax and people resuming their careers
and involved in the community.
The second policy priority is to advance institutional closure. Victoria has historically had a largely bipartisan
approach around closing institutions that goes back 30 or 40 years. They are challenging exercises to close
institutions. I think this government has done a good job in terms of advancing the plans to close the Sandhurst
Centre in Bendigo, and we are very supportive of the notion of outsourcing those services to the not-for-profit
sector to support people once they leave Sandhurst. We would now like to see priority given to the closure of
Colanda in Colac, which is part of the NDIS launch site, and also advancing the plans to redevelop the Oakleigh
Centre, which is a small institution run by one of our members.
The third priority is to keep moving with the evolution of disability services in terms of proactive
community-based approaches. Again, all of our services need to evolve. Many of them have in the past
delivered fairly traditional services which probably have not been as attuned to community inclusion as they
could have been, but certainly over the last 10 or 15 years we are seeing really innovative and groundbreaking
practice amongst our not for profits, which is highly focused on engaging people with disability in mainstream
community-settings. We want to see more of that work, and there is obviously a role for governments to support
that.
What are the practical things we think we can do? There may be some cause for optimism as part of the
Shergold reforms. There is a shift in the way government looks at funding and partnering with the not-for-profit
sector and a move towards an outcomes approach for measuring service delivery. At the moment not for profits
are very much focused on the reporting on outputs and activities, with possibly not as clear a focus as there
could be on the actual outcomes for the person with disability. Perhaps there is a way of looking at funding
arrangements to enable that to occur.
We would say that certainly government has a role to play in terms of employment for people with disability. I
am not advocating for targets to be set for public sector employment, but I would say that government has a
leadership role in terms of cultivating environments which are inclusive towards people with disability to
provide plenty of opportunities for young people with disability to come into the graduate schemes for the VPS,
and to look at ways to keep public sector employees who acquire a disability in older age in the workforce and
come up with some flexible and innovative workplace practices to enable that.
I would say — and Andrea will be familiar with this — that there is a need for the government to look at
whether it can increase its level of procurement of goods and services and what government departments buy
from accredited disability service organisations. They are otherwise known as Australian Disability Enterprises.
They provide a range of services that can be utilised by government, and some consideration should be given to
some prioritisation of procurement resources there.
Whilst we are incredibly supportive of the move to the NDIS and have been closely involved in the transition in
Geelong, we want to make sure that we have a seamless fitting between those people who are going down an
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NDIS path and the packages and supports they get versus those people who will still be relying on services from
mainstream government services. There will be some role for traditional block funding — some services are
funded by way of direct grant from government — to do some of the community building work which may not
be easily done in an individualised environment. That could be coordination of volunteers. For example, it could
be preservation of the successful programs like Interchange . There is a lot of community development work
that cannot necessarily be easily individualised, and there is a question of whether there is a role for government
in maintaining some block funding for that into the future.
Moving to the built environment — and I know the former Minister for Planning will be acutely aware of
this — we think government can do a lot more in leadership around universal access for people with physical
disability to the built environment. Social participation and inclusion is one of those things which should be
afforded to all people. Dignity of access is an important thing. Having people confronted with massive
staircases in public places and having money saved or scrimped around design and the notion of access for
people with disability being a bit of an afterthought, we clearly cannot have those things. We have a strong view
which we have detailed in the submission about those planning changes being put into the system which can
enable universal access as much as possible.
Perhaps government needs to keep a very keen eye on what is happening in government buildings and certainly
exercise some muscle when it comes to local government and any other organisations that are receiving
taxpayer-funded dollars not only to ensure that those environments are very inclusive in terms of physical
aspects but also ensuring that staff and employees have a level of awareness when it comes to working with
people with disability to ensure that government departments and any subcontractors and local government are
disability-confident organisations so we have welcoming environments for people with disability.
I will raise another couple of points. Obviously members are aware of the proliferation of internet-based
technologies — an absolute boon for our sector, I must say. In terms of social participation for people with
disabilities, it is very important to have access to web-based technologies. There is obviously a whole bunch of
economics around this which would be beyond the committee’s control, but access to affordable broadband,
access to affordable phones — those sorts of things — are critical for people with disabilities. There is a need
within our sector to have our workers in community-based organisations more IT savvy so they can get out in
the community supporting people with disabilities using smart technology and be able to provide the services
out in the field, so relying more heavily on laptops, iPhones and those sorts of things. Of course there is a cost to
services, but we think that would be a good thing.
The last point, which is kind of related to some of the themes I have come up with, is probably the State
Government thinking about its role in disability as it comes to what happens with the NDIS. The NDIS is going
to change the world dramatically, and we know that. There is a question of what continuing role the State
Government has. We think there is a really strong role around leadership: sending a clear message to the
community that people with disability are valued and ensuring that with the mechanisms which the government
has at its disposal it does all it can to promote socially inclusive practices.
There will be some pressure on government to look at things it funds outside the NDIS. Clearly there are some
areas which will continue to promote community development and community inclusion. They are things like
funding for advocacy services, funding for self-advocates, funding for the very successful rural and metro
access and deaf access programs and a continuing and abiding partnership with the not-for-profit sector, I think,
about how we really best include people with disabilities in our community. That, I suppose, is a short list. It
could be a much more exhaustive list. There are a number of comments and observations in our submissions.
We think that certainly this is an extremely timely inquiry. We commend you for undertaking it. We think there
is a good need to have a look at the system in Victoria insofar as how this general change and shift in disability
services practice with the NDIS relates to state government policies, to ensure that Victoria certainly remains
very much at the cutting edge of driving innovation in disability services and being a very fair and inclusive
state for people with disability.
The CHAIR — Thank you, James. If I can kick off with the first question. You talked about other countries
being well advanced in the employment area for people with a disability. Can you identify for the committee
what they do that actually improves those outcomes for them, as opposed to where we might be able to
improve?
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Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes. Certainly the figures are not good. Australia’s workforce participation rate for
people with a disability compared to other modern OECD countries I think is 21out of 29. I need to check that. I
do not think there is one easy answer to that. There is probably a culmination of factors over time which have
contributed to that. Certainly it seems that some of the European nations are doing better when it comes to
employment rates for people with disability. It is not necessarily a case of government employing more people
or taking a very prescriptive approach to employment. I think it is about fostering inclusive cultures and
probably looking very, very hard at what are some of the practical barriers to employment for people with
disability. I cannot give you an example of the shining light, stellar country at the moment.
The CHAIR — No, but can you perhaps identify a range of things that have actually worked for them,
things that we could be made aware of?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes. Having stronger discrimination laws in place I think is important. I think Australia
probably has them; it is a question of how they are enforced; having access to flexible workplace practices;
trying to understand, certainly with private companies, why some employment rates are lower than they should
be compared to those in other countries; trying to get the private sector in particular to take flexible approaches
to having the ability to retain people as much as they possibly can be; and trying to stop this trend as far as
possible of having people shunted off to the disability support pension and potentially never returning to work.
It is hard to summarise, but it is about having a very proactive approach around government and employers and
ensuring that that culture can be shifted.
Ms HALFPENNY — In terms of the Disability Act 2006, has there been any change in the sector that you
represent? You gave those survey figures of 6 per cent of those with a disability believing that there is any sort
of social inclusion, all that sort of stuff. Has there been any change? Has that legislation created better outcomes
for people?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — It is hard. I do not think there has ever been a measure of that. The Scope survey was a
snapshot in time, a qualitative approach. I mean, the objective of the act is pretty clear. The objectives of the act
are in part 2:
The objectives of this Act are to —
(a) advance the inclusion and participation in the community of persons with a disability.
So the intent of the act is pretty clear. It is a question of: how is that measured and what is the role for
potentially this committee to look at these sorts of things? There is no working definition, if you like, of ‘social
participation’ in the act. Perhaps that is something that the committee might need to look at in terms of just
providing a bit more intent around how this might be done. Certainly, as I said in the presentation, the policy
frameworks are pretty strong and the legislation is pretty strong; it is just a question of making sure that it is
actually implemented.
Ms HALFPENNY — Have you got some practical examples of maybe why, where, how?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes. In recent times I think some of the good reforms by this government have been
particularly in relation to taxi reforms. I know that there has been controversy around the broader taxi reforms,
but certainly for people with disability having a greater level of accountability and service in the way that taxi
companies operate is a good thing — having some dedicated service there. Certainly taxis are a critical part of
the transport network for people with disability. The commitment to upgrade Geelong railway station, for
example, is another good example of the state plan at work. Again, it requires money — that is a $5 million
project — but we cannot have transport infrastructure, for example, not being accessible for people with
disability.
They are two small things outside the immediate DHS portfolio. There does need to be very much a strong
whole-of-government approach, not only around built access but around building these sorts of more
welcoming inclusive environments for people with disability.
Mr D. O’BRIEN — One aspect you mentioned was universal access. I know that has been a significant
long-term concern of many in the sector. I had some involvement with Mr Bernd Bartl for many years in
advocating for that. In addition to all governments, the difficulty, he always explained, was in getting those in
the building industry to realise that it was in their best interests to adopt universal access, at least for commercial
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buildings and for new buildings. Once it became economically sensible for them to do it rather than retrofitting,
the benefits of universal access to all people could be marketed with ground level entry et cetera, particularly in
commercial buildings, and it became a success. Obviously the industry would want things to improve further
with further access provisions, but given that that act was passed in 2011 — in Victoria anyway — to what
extent have you seen an improvement in actual practical improvements but also in social inclusion in the
acceptance of universal access as a normal situation rather than some sort of concession, with benefits to the
whole of society, since legislation has been passed in Victoria?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — It is probably too early to tell, I think, to be fair. It is not something that we are
intimately involved with in terms of representing our service providers, but certainly we will get complaints
periodically from our member organisations trying to take people out in the community about whether they
cannot get into cinemas or other very public places.
Mrs COOTE — Changing rooms.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Changing rooms is one, yes, absolutely. That is a huge issue for people with serious
disabilities about dignified access to changing room facilities.
Mr D. O’BRIEN — And heritage buildings are another classic. At Parliament House, for example, you still
have that problem with those steps at the front et cetera. They are part of the heritage, and there is that debate.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes; that is right. I would probably need to defer to others, and there will be people with
disability who will be able to give you that direct feedback. I have never understood the opposition from some
in the building industry to the move towards universal design. I know there is a cost impact, of course, short
term, but in terms of supporting an ageing population, on which the figures are pretty stark, I think it is a
necessary move and really a no-brainer.
Mr D. O’BRIEN — On a further point, you mentioned Colac in your written submission, for which I thank
you, and there is a lot of talk about Geelong. Could you specifically highlight for us the importance of the
second office being located in Colac and particular issues that you see in that important town?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Colac is part of the NDIS trial. The NDIA, the National Disability Insurance Agency,
has set up an office in Colac. We have a number of members and service providers in Colac. A good thing
about Colac in terms of the whole trial is that the Productivity Commission had a view that when trialling the
NDIS it should be kind of representative of different cross-sections of the community. Geelong provides the
metro and some suburban and through Colac and the Otways, the more rural and regional areas. They are good
areas to test what a kind of competitive disability market might look like in those areas which are more remote.
Some of the challenges for service providers are in getting to people and providing access to services, whether
some of the pricing which the National Disability Insurance Agency has come up with for some of the services
will work in a rural and remote context and whether there is the role for, as I mentioned in the submission, some
different funding mechanism, whether it is block grants or some sort of way to ensure that there is equity of
access for people with disability in places like Colac or beyond.
Mr D. O’BRIEN — Sorry, are you able to tell us how it is playing out there? I am sorry for the interruption.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Okay. There are a lot of stresses at the moment with the scheme, certainly from a
service provider perspective. In Colac there are about half a dozen disability service providers that are now
actively participating in the trial. A lot of those organisations have gone from being reliant very heavily on DHS
funding coming through as a direct grant. They are having to make changes to their business to be more focused
on individualised funding and some level of competition for this new resource which is coming through. It is a
stressful period for many services, and certainly I would not confine this just to Colac, but obviously over at
Geelong as well some organisations are quite anxious and experiencing high levels of stress as part of the
change to the NDIS.
Mr MADDEN — There are two issues I want to raise, James, and thank you for the presentation and
discussion today. They relate to housing and transport. We have heard about access to commercial and public
buildings. Prior to the last election there was some discussion with the building industry about domestic
building and particularly the introduction of some minimal threshold standards for domestic building in relation
to accessibility around the entry doors and toilets and bathrooms, around door widths and around rails in
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bathrooms and other facilities in the house. They did not involve huge costs — I think some work had been
done on it — but it seemed like the building industry saw it as the end of civilisation as they knew it in terms of
affordability and cost.
Some of the issues being discussed here include the need for new housing to have these sorts of elements
introduced in order to accommodate the anticipated demand from an ageing population. I am just interested to
see if you have any general comments around those sorts of things, particularly because a lot of the disability
population, the central cohort, have to rent a house, they do not actually get to build one. If more of the rental
market has those sorts of features, that might make it easier for some of those people to access that sort of
housing outside public housing.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes. In terms of general comments, I will say we are fortunate to have had Andrea at
our forum before Christmas when we looked at the issue of challenges of accommodation in the disability
sector as we move towards the NDIS. Based on the Productivity Commission’s numbers we will see across the
country over 100 000 people nationally who will be eligible for the NDIS, needing accommodation support.
They will get direct accommodation packages, but the NDIS itself will not provide access to the bricks and
mortar; it will not build new buildings.
In Victoria that will be about 20 000 to 30 000 people who will be eligible for accommodation support but will
not be currently living in public housing or will not be in specialist disability accommodation run by the
not-for-profit sector or DHS. So there is a massive need to increase housing stock for people with disabilities.
Universal design is a critical part of that. Theoretically you should have more people being able to rent and
being able to feel that they can move, without being disadvantaged, into a suitable rental property that may
require some modifications and there will not be a major impediment to that.
We know what the figures will be and what the demand will be coming through, but we are not sure at the
moment what the solution will be and how to actually provide some incentives to the private sector, the
not-for-profit sector or whomever to actually build new stock. That is a major challenge.
Mr MADDEN — The other issue I want to follow up on is access to public transport. In recent times
governments have sought to introduce super-stops and all those sorts of things to address needs. But the sense I
get, and what I have seen, is that it is often the low-hanging fruit which is done initially and the more difficult
developments are left until last. I understand there is a cost — and I would be interested in hearing your
comments too — but often the more difficult ones, and I know this from my own electorate, are the ones at
transport hubs. In a sense you may have a whole series of stops that are compliant, but the key ones where you
can interchange at transport hubs around stations — tram stops, railway stations and bus stops — are the ones
that are not getting done at the rate at which they should. I would anticipate they probably need a bit of hard
work done. I would be interested in hearing your comments around those needs as well.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Yes. Look, I could not give you a sense of priority as to which ones should be done
across metropolitan Melbourne, other than to make the comment that certainly as part of the change in practices
of disability service providers we want to be able to provide supports in the community, so transport should not
be a major obstacle. We should not have the situation where the only way that service providers can get people
out in the community is in the white bus. We want to be able to get people out on public transport, through taxis
or whatever it might be. That is the critical thing for community inclusion and mainstreaming services. It
probably does not answer your question.
Mr MADDEN — No, but it is important. You said that rather than just having people in the community bus,
people should have the opportunity to be either assisted by a carer or given some independence themselves in
certain locations where the public gather, whether it be around shopping precincts or the like.
Mrs COOTE — James, thank you very much indeed. I found it, as always, very interesting. We had the
disability services commissioner here earlier, who said that one of the best campaigns for social inclusion from
the community was Count Me In (Every Australian Counts), and I would like to recognise your role in that
program — it was amazing. I am very interested, as you can imagine, in a number of the issues that you have
raised here today. One that I would like to tease out with you is to see how the social inclusion is really going to
translate through the NDIS implementation.
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You mentioned the closure of Colanda, and you know I am one of the greatest advocates for that. But I would
like to see if you or any of your members have any real understanding of the leadership role needed from the
state government’s point of view, working with the national government on the NDIS or the national disability
agency, and how that will able to be implemented. Over time I am certain that it will happen, but we have to
make it happen. What are your members saying to you about how that will play out?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Do you mean directly in terms of the — —
Mrs COOTE — Basically about social inclusion. You have all of these service providers in Geelong and in
the Barwon region talking about how they are going to make certain that people have choice and are in control
of their lives, which is fantastic. You said there were some green shoots of service provision starting, but the
social inclusion is that big call, as in the next step. We can provide the services for them, but what about that
being integrated in the community? The people from Colanda are a classic example: how are we going to
integrate those people, once they have their NDIA packages, into the community, and what sort of leadership
role do you envisage, when you mention it here in this submission, the state government would play in that?
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Certainly. As part of the NDIS trial some issues have come up in relation to how some
of the prices have been developed, particularly for one-on-one supports. There has been some media coverage
about it today. In The Australian our CEO, Ken Baker, has made some comments about the inadequacy of some
of the NDIS prices. One-on-one support typically means being able to have a worker go out in the community
with a person with a disability and ensure that they are safe and feel they are engaged, and there is a level of
complexity within that for which you will need often a higher skilled worker, depending on the worker and the
individual requirements.
There is a challenge there with some of the pricing in the NDIS and how that might impact on the ability to
have people out in the community. We think that can be resolved. We think there is goodwill on all sides to
resolve that. But there is certainly a need in Geelong, and indeed as the NDIS spreads across the state you will
see more people with disabilities in the community, you will see more people out and about participating in the
sorts of things that most people take for granted. There is a need for other public amenities and the private
sector, government, whoever, to be much more inclusive and much more welcoming of people with disabilities.
In terms of the state and their role, it is partially one of community education. I think there have been some good
campaigns in the past. The Bar None campaign, which was undertaken by the previous government, was a good
campaign raising community awareness around the obligations to ensure that people with disability are
supported as they go out and about in the community.
Colanda is a challenging redevelopment, but one which has to happen over time, of course. So, how do you
support people moving from living in an institution for pretty much their whole life to living in a community
setting, providing some comfort for families and carers who may be a little concerned about that change?
Certainly there will be a lot of workers in our sector who need to be supported on that journey as well, but all
the evidence we have seen see from Victoria and overseas points to really strong outcomes for people with a
disability when institutions close.
There is a role for state government. It is one of leadership, it is one of sending the right messages and it is
certainly one of watching very closely the NDIS as it evolves in these early days and being able to influence that
to make sure we get the right outcomes in Geelong.
The CHAIR — James, thank you very much for coming before the committee today and assisting us with
our inquiry. I remind you that you will receive a proof transcript in the near future. On behalf of the committee,
thank you again.
Mr J. O’BRIEN — Thank you very much.
Witness withdrew.
3 March 2014
Family and Community Development Committee
9