Dissing the disadvantaged

At least in the public service there is an independent public service exam and government departments are required to publicly advertise job vacancies. Whereas private sector service providers funded by the public purse have no requirement to ensure merit-based employment in their internal hiring practices and nepotism is rife. People with disabilities have no recourse to freedom of information laws in that regard as commercial confidentiality clauses are inevitably invoked to avoid scrutiny. Rather than a mature age teacher, retrenched office worker or qualified jobseeker with disabilities being given a chance at these jobs you are more likely to find a well connected Young Liberal gap year kid working as a client supervisor in the privatised job or disability service sector. Often sham job training for clients is provided in-house by staff who are not even required to have teaching qualifications while jobseekers that do are denied the opportunity to work there.

Frank is right on the money though when he informs us: "Like other major employers, the Catholic Church could also lead the charge to ensure there are opportunities for those experiencing disabilities and other barriers." There are perhaps hundreds of thousands of adult survivors of clergy abuse in Australia most of whom are given very little help to move on with their lives. Former Catholic survivors are left with debilitating traumas yet face discrimination in employment at Catholic schools. Any job applicant must show their academic and school record as part of the selection process and former Catholic school pupils identified as 'Catholic' on their school record are automatically expected to supply a reference from their parish priest showing they are in good standing within the church. For survivors of clergy abuse who have been sexually assaulted as children by their parish priest or figures of authority within the church, obtaining a reference is too traumatic and raises an impossible bar.

Paradoxically a jobseeker brought up as a Protestant or Muslim stands a better chance of being employed within Catholic institutions than abused former Catholics, as they are not required to provide a reference from their parson or imam. This accounts for why Catholic schools have never before had such a high proportion of non-Catholic staff because a generation of clergy abuse survivors are effectively locked out. After the pope's World Youth Day apology one such survivor asked a local bishop to exempt clergy abuse survivors from the requirement to provide a reference from their local parish priest when seeking employment at diocesan schools. Since his diocese was one of Australia's clergy abuse epicentres it would have been a practical gesture of reconciliation but his answer was: "Well go to Job Network!" (Or to be precise Centacare job agency). But Centacare like most other job service providers is making headlines for all the wrong reasons for using jobseekers as pawns in their game of rorting taxpayer funds. Cold Comfort Farm there.

Relying on the charitable instincts of churches, charities and businesses is not a particularly effective way of employing disadvantaged groups so rather than self-regulation, the government must ensure publicly funded institutions don't discriminate against people living with disabilities and others. Public subsidies for non-government service providers should be tied to affirmative action obligations to employ the disadvantaged within their organisations. Australia will never be an inclusive, fair society without equitable distribution of paid, secure employment for people living with disabilities and the long term underemployed.