Open letter to John Howard: Walk a mile in our shoes

The problem is that employers, including government agencies need incentives to employ disabled people. HR “experts” and “bosses” need to be a lot more creative in their thinking about how work can be allocated and controlled. Most are too lazy or unimaginative to think about how they could employ a disabled applicant.

The vast majority of advertised jobs are full-time, and employers use convenience as an excuse, refusing to even consider applicants who could do the job but only in a part-time or job-share situation. The Government’s own record in this area is appalling. According to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, employment of PWDs in the government Sector in the last 10 years has dropped from 5.8 per cent to 3.8 per cent. That’s a 30 per cent decline. I call on the Government to lead by example in taking affirmative action for people on DSP.

So John, yes, we do want to work. We want to be paid a fair rate for the work we can do. We want services that really can help. We want to live balanced lives. We don’t want to be forced to jump through meaningless hoops, which aggravate our pain, fatigue and depression. We don’t want to make you happy while watching everything that is important in life like our families and relationships disintegrate. We want recognition for the extra costs that living with a disability imposes on us. We are sick of poverty, yet your own enquiry tells us that 60,000 of the most disadvantaged people in Australia will be worse off under your plans to “help” us.

A hidden tragedy

The tragedy of these changes is that they are completely unnecessary. The financial benefits of DSP automatically decrease rapidly as recipients earn income. For instance, even working as little as 10 hours per week, my benefit drops to about $20. At 15 hours per week I would be receiving nothing. This of course varies depending on what hourly rate you can attract.

The 15-hour threshold is a major disincentive. At present, I personally am inspired to test my ability, knowing there is a significant margin. With the new changes, the instant I cross the 15-hour threshold, I lose the substantial concessions that make living in poverty barely manageable. You can feel the fear in disabled communities as you discuss this issue with them.

A fairer system would be to maintain the eligibility criteria at 30 hours. Compared to an able bodied person, this is still a 25-40 per cent impairment of functional capacity. The sliding benefit scale could be maintained. Ancillary benefits and concessions should be income tested, not “hours” tested.

None of this prevents the Government investing its healthy surplus in programs that really help. Things like:

• Employer incentives;
• Training bonuses;
• Affirmative action programs;
• Better salary packages for skilled job network and other employment consultants would help attract people with the skills to assist disabled people in overcoming their significant disadvantages in the open job market;
• Small business start up assistance;
• Establishing disability focused job co-operatives;
• Domestic and home maintenance assistance;
• Relationship counselling; and
• Coaching and mentoring programs.

Interestingly, Kim Beazley’s view on disability changed significantly when he experienced it, albeit temporarily. My dearest wish is that you could spend 24 hours living the life that we face every day, for the rest of our lives. Perhaps then you might begin to understand.

Sincerely
 
Ken Davis