Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Families and Payments) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to speak on Disability Services Amendment (Linking Upper Age Limits for Disability Employment Services to Pension Age) Bill 2017. Labor will support this bill. This is a technical but important bill for people with disability throughout Australia. This bill amends the Disability Services Act 1986 to ensure there is no gap between the age that people are able to access services under disability employment services—disability management service and age pension eligibility. Without this amendment, people with disability who are aged 65 or older but who have not reached pension age, and who are on income support with mutual obligations to seek work, could be excluded from receiving support to meet those obligations.

The bill amends the Disability Services Act 1986 to align the upper age limit in section 18(a) of the act to the pension age in the Social Security Act 1991, by removing references to '65 years' and replacing them with the term 'pension age' as defined in the Social Security Act. This will make sure that rehabilitation services and employment support can continue to be provided to individuals under the Disability Employment Service—Disability Management Service program until they reach the age pension eligibility age. The total estimated cost of the bill is $4.6 million over the forward estimates.

The government estimates that, without the amendments proposed in this bill today, there would be around 200 vulnerable people affected and left without support later this year, and those numbers would only increase further in the coming years. This is a bill that will help people with disability, and for that reason it is a bill that we support.

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