- The Guardian
- Issue #2126
Tactile tablet for the blind. Photo: Kristina Tsvetanova, Slavi Slavev / BLITAB Technology GmbH – flickr.com (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
During a recent Senate Estimates the Australian government released its official response to the report on the Purpose, intent and adequacy of the Disability Support Pension (DSP). People with Disability Australia (PWDA), the Australian Council for Social Service (ACOSS), and disability advocacy organisations have expressed alarm at the government’s dismissal of the report’s recommendations.
They have called for urgent action to address barriers to accessing the DSP, the risk of poverty for recipients, and to reform how eligibility is assessed, and avenues for dispute resolution.
Key recommendations from the report that have not been actioned include:
- Amending claims processes to ensure people with disability or chronic illness who have little opportunity to enter or re-enter the labour force are granted the Disability Support Pension.
- Removal of mutual obligations for people during the process of making claims and making the program of support voluntary, “abandoning punitive compliance measures,” and making employment services more effective.
- Increasing funding for disability advocacy, community legal services, and First Nations organisations to support DSP claimants in their claims process.
- Increasing funding to improve linkages between Services Australia and First Nations organisations.
- Establishing principles in the administration of social security, including proactively assisting people to access support; treating people with respect.
- Adjusting service delivery to meet individual needs.
While changes to the impairment tables in 2023 were a starting point for reform, the failure to act on the systemic flaws in how the DSP is administered and who it is available to has left people with disability without the financial resources necessary to live.
PWDA President Marayke Jonkers:
“It’s unacceptable that this report has sat on the shelf for over two years and received such a lacklustre response. The government has not explained why the report’s recommendations are no longer relevant. We know the Disability Support Pension needs to be higher and available to more people with disability or far too many in our community will continue to live in poverty and not have the financial resources to meet their most basic needs.
“The government must take action.
“This response from the government collides with changes to the NDIS and people with disability facing new or continued gaps in services and fears over how they will pay for things like mobility aides, assistive technology, and support workers.
“Major changes are needed to support the employment of people with disability but these must go hand-in-hand with an adequate social safety net for those who are unable to participate in employment, including people with chronic illnesses. The Disability Support Pension is a lifeline for many that determines whether their support and living needs will be met – and there are too many people who don’t have access, who should.”
ACOSS CEO Dr Cassandra Goldie:
“Everyday people with disability struggle to afford the basic essentials of life due to a system that does more to exclude them than support them.
“Each year, 44 per cent of claims for the Disability Support Pension are rejected thanks to a bureaucratic, stressful, and impersonal claims process. People with disability end up on the woefully inadequate $56 a day JobSeeker Payment, with some forced to do mutual obligations despite having a disability or chronic ill health.
“The government cannot sweep this national shame under the rug. It has a duty to ensure Australia’s social security provides people with enough to cover essentials, including the extra costs that disability brings, and are treated with the respect and dignity they deserve.”
