Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to acknowledge National Week of Deaf People. Specifically, I would very much like to acknowledge the work of groups such as Deaf Australia, Can Do Group—which is in my electorate—and Australian Hearing. One in a thousand babies are born with hearing loss, either total hearing loss or some form of partial hearing loss. Without the support services of groups like the ones I mentioned, families would be left out in the cold.

Some in this place might be aware many deaf Australians utilise Auslan as their main language and outlet for communication. This is an important way for people with hearing loss to communicate with others. Auslan was first recognised by the Hawke Labor government as a language in 1987. Today, I want to highlight the lack of supported interpreter and translation services. Currently, Auslan—shock horror!—is not one of the listed approved languages for translating and interpreting services. This clearly isn't good enough. The matter was exposed as part of a parliamentary inquiry into hearing by the Standing Committee on Health, Aged Care and Sport. I sit on that committee as the deputy chair. The committee took widespread evidence from constituents and support groups from around the country and presented a report entitled Still waiting to be heard: report on the inquiry into the hearing health and wellbeing of Australia.

While translation and interpreting services remain in place for other languages, including everything from Arabic, Korean and Nepali to Chinese, Greek and Italian, Auslan is currently excluded by the government from interpreter services. This is a huge disadvantage for those facing or dealing with deafness in our society. Imagine if your primary language was Italian and the government did not have Italian interpreting services, that it was not an approved language. This is an outrage, and it needs to be fixed subito—in other words, immediately.

Members on this side of the House also note with alarm that the government attempted to look into privatising Australian Hearing. This effort began with the notorious commission of audit in 2014, despite the committee recommending that Australian Hearing remain in government hands. We remain concerned about the government's intentions relating to the privatisation of Australian Hearing, and we'll be keeping a close eye on this. We don't need further degradation in services to people of the deaf community. So we call on the government to categorically rule this out and to accept the committee's recommendations. I would encourage other members to engage with hearing-related agencies throughout the year, take a hearing test and support those with complete and partial hearing loss in the community.

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