Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am happy to support the motion. During the campaign, I had 71 street-corner meetings and invariably at these meetings either people with disabilities or their carers would tell stories that would make your heart melt. There were stories from mothers with autistic children and parents with adult disabled children who were terribly worried about what would happen when they as carers passed away or were unable to care for their children. I visited many schools—such as Elizabeth Special School, which has far more demand than it has space for. This is obviously an issue which affects the whole community and it is bipartisan in nature because one cannot help but be moved by some of these experiences.

My observations are that families are the greatest resource in this area, but they need services close to where they live. That is a big problem in Adelaide, where all the services tend to get put right in the middle of Adelaide rather than in the suburbs. Respite is a problem. I think that families often need to share their experiences with others in a similar situation. I think those networks are important. Schools, GPs and community groups do a good job, but I think that, in particular, awareness, empathy and understanding could be improved. The government has a big role in that. Many of the parents I talked to had to discuss things over and over again with GPs, schools or other institutions just to get their needs heard.

There are some very interesting figures on this issue. In terms of education, 29.6 per cent of people with disabilities aged 15 to 64 who are living in households completed year 12 compared to 49 per cent of people without a disability. In terms of labour force participation, 53.2 per cent of people with a disability in the age group of 15 to 64 are in the labour force compared to some 80 per cent of people without a disability. So there are life-changing incidents caused by a disability and I think the government and the community need to continually look at what they are doing to improve that.

As my colleague the member for Canberra said, there have been some meetings. Jenny Macklin met with her state counterparts on 1 February, and we have eight priorities. We also have a national disability strategy, which is basically the same as this motion in its policy effect. We will be working cooperatively with the states and territories to implement that strategy. It will canvass the full range of issues that impact on disability policy. It will set the direction for future disability legislation policy and standards. It provides the opportunity for innovative approaches, including support for social inclusion and participation. It provides an opportunity for people to work together across sectors and jurisdictions to ensure that there is coordinated and comprehensive policy planning, and the strategy will build on the good work of the disability policy reform that has been undertaken so far. I think that a national disability strategy will provide a foundation for leadership in this area and that will continue for more than one government term.

Bipartisanship requires some responsibility to be taken on the part of all the parties, and I think that some of the opposition’s rhetoric about bonuses—and its seizing on media stories—has been both irresponsible and desperate. It has worried a great many of my constituents. I think that the Prime Minister’s commitments in these areas have been welcome news to those people, but they should never have been concerned in the first place.

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