PEOPLE with Disability Australia (PWDA) extends congratulations to the Labor Party on your election victory.
As the national cross-disability peak body representing the 5.5 million Australians identifying as having disability, we were pleased to hear your victory speech commitments to fairness, equality and respect, making our way forward together, and leaving no one behind.
With these commitments in mind, we look forward to continuing to work with you and your party to advance disability rights and ensure the full economic and social inclusion of Australians with disability during the term of the 48th Parliament of Australia.
As a Disability Representative Organisation, PWDA undertakes systemic advocacy and provides individual advocacy support to people with disability experiencing a broad range of issues, including issues with the NDIS.
The disability community has told us that the Government responses to key disability reform processes – the Disability Royal Commission and the NDIS Review – haven’t met the community’s expectations, legislative changes have placed NDIS supports at risk, and people with disability are being left behind.
In the next term of government, NDIS funding must be secured, foundational supports must be made consistently available, and income support payments must cover the true cost of disability.
We need accessible housing, stronger human rights protections including for LGBTIQA+ people with disability, better representation in government and an inclusive public sector. These are necessities.
In our pre-election platform shaped by the voices of PWDA’s national membership and the wider disability community, PWDA called on the incoming government to commit to practical solutions in seven key priority areas:
- Invest in the NDIS: Guarantee long-term, sustainable funding, ensure participant control over our supports and prevent cost-cutting that restricts access to essential supports.
- Fund nationally consistent foundational supports: Ensure disability supports outside the NDIS are consistently available and delivered. These supports are essential not optional for the 5.5 million Australians with disability, including the nearly five million who aren’t on the NDIS.
- Raise the rate: Increase income support payments, including the Disability Support Pension (DSP) and JobSeeker, to above the poverty line so people with disability can afford the cost of living and achieve financial security. Increase Commonwealth Rent Assistance to cover the real cost of accessible housing.
- Make housing accessible: Mandate the “Livable Housing Design Silver Standard” in the National Construction Code across all states and territories and commit to a national housing plan that meets the needs of people with disability.
- Ensure disability representation in government: Create a Minister for Disability Inclusion in Federal Cabinet and establish a dedicated Department of Disability Equality and Inclusion.
- Protect our human rights: Strengthen disability rights through a Human Rights Act and improvements to the Disability Discrimination Act. Fully fund individual and systemic advocacy services so people with disability can protect and enforce their rights.
- Support diversity in the public sector: Increase employment of people with disability and safeguard diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in federal public sector workplaces.
At this critical juncture of disability reform, with so much at stake, Disability Representative Organisations and the re-elected Australian Government have an opportunity to continue to work together to ensure people with disability are at the centre of disability policy and legislative reform, to ensure successful reform outcomes – not only for people with disability but for all Australians.
Extract only – for full letter visit pwd.org.au)
