25 January 2013
Committee Secretary
Senate Standing Committees on Community Affairs
PO Box 6100
Parliament House
CANBERRA ACT 2600
Dear Committee Secretary
Submission on National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012 – Exposure Draft
The Spinal Injuries Association, which represents Queenslanders with spinal cord injury, the late effects of polio, and transverse myelitis, welcomes the opportunity to make a submission to the Senate Standing Committees on Community Affairs.
Our submission follows.
Yours sincerely
John Mayo
General Manager – Community Development
Submission on the National Disability Insurance
Scheme Bill 2012 – Exposure Draft
The Spinal Injuries Association welcomes the opportunity to make a submission on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012 – Exposure Draft.
The Association is concerned with parts of Chapter 3 – Becoming a participant, and in particular the Age requirements under section 22:
“22 Age requirements (1) A person meets the age requirements if: (a) the person was aged under 65 when the access request in relation to the person was made;…”
It is assumed that the above clause has been inserted with the intention to leave people that acquire their disability after the age of 65 out of the NDIS – an intention aligned with the Productivity Commission’s recommendations in the Draft Report into Disability Care and Support.
The Association agrees with the Productivity Commission’s assertion that there are differences for people who acquire their disability after the pension age, such as “philosophy, employment goals, the duration of care and support, and the areas of greatest competence”.
However, the Association strongly disagrees with the following quote from the Productivity Commission, which is assumed to be the rationale behind leaving people that acquire a disability after the age of 65 out of the NDIS.
“There are strong grounds for people who have accumulated significant lifetime assets prior to the pension age to contribute financially to their own aged care. This reflects that the likelihood of disability in old age is high, can be anticipated, and people can save to meet those costs.”
We submit this is not a logical conclusion! No one attends work thinking, “I’d better work hard today, because I need to save money – I don’t know if I will acquire a disability later in life.”
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The Productivity Commission offered this quote as well:
“While the aged and disability systems should not be combined, they nevertheless have to interact efficiently and meet people’s reasonable preferences. The critical issue is to ensure that people would be able to use the support system that best met their needs, regardless of the funding source.”
It is the Association’s belief that a person that acquires a disability later in life needs to be able to access the NDIS after the age of 65 if their level of diminished functionality is greater due to their disability than a reasonable person who has aged. That is, the person should be able to “use the support system that best met their needs”.
We understand that people of all ages that acquire a disability as a result of a catastrophic accident will be covered under the National Injury Insurance Scheme (NIIS). Why is this not the case under the NDIS for people that acquire a disability whose needs are greater as a result of their disability than they would have been without acquiring the disability, regardless of their age or other constraints?
Can the Senate Committee please investigate this issue of age discrimination and offer or insist on a legislative solution that is fair for all Australians, regardless of age or other constraints?
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