In the lead up to the Federal Election on 3 May, Advocacy for Inclusion are calling for a dedicated national disability investment pipeline for improvements to health, housing, education and social infrastructure to deliver our disability strategies and improvements outside of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
AFI’s Head of Policy, Craig Wallace said, “We seem to spend all of our time talking about the NDIS but we also need to focus on insufficient and inaccessible core government interventions in health, housing, and education.”
“There are minimal investments, outside the NDIS, to support the objectives for the Australian Disability Strategy and in turn the ACT’s disability strategies. Without targeted, earmarked funding for agreements within housing, health, and education, these strategies will not be realised and outcomes will continue to worsen. The Royal Commission made the case for dedicated funding streams within all of the funding agreements and we are advocating for this as we head towards the Federal election”
“People with disability use health services, including General Practitioners, screening, medical specialists and hospital emergency departments, but are more likely to face barriers when it comes to access. Disability related health disparities are caused in large part by avoidable disadvantage. It is that disadvantage that we seek to tackle.”
“People with disability are caught in a dual housing supply and affordability crisis requiring more affordable housing and appropriate built form. Yet this has not been adequately prioritised in the National Housing and Homelessness Plan.”
“Within education we’ve seen decades of reviews culminating in the Disability Royal Commission showing the educational disadvantage experienced by students with disability. The Royal Commission identified a need for dedicated strategies and spends within key funding agreements between the States and Territories and Commonwealth in this area.”
“To actually improve outcomes for people with disability, we are calling for the inclusion of dedicated requirements, funding, and reporting within all bilateral agreements, especially those concerned with housing, education, and health. Specifically, we call on the next government to commit to:
- Support more affordable and accessible social and public housing, especially at the Gold Level of accessibility
- A gradual end to segregated education and more funding for students with disability in mainstream schools, and
- Accessible buildings and equipment in frontline health and screening
- Provision disability training for health workers and ensure safe clean air in healthcare.
More detail on coordinated action on health, housing and education for people with disability is at Attachment A. You can also check out our overview on TikTok.
Advocacy for Inclusion’s 2025 Federal election platform includes 9 priorities focused on practical investments for essential services, action on poverty and jobs, Disability Royal Commission responses, NDIS and Foundational Supports, DDA reform and tackling emerging issues like hate speech.
The full platform will be launched ahead of our Federal Election Disability Town Hall from 6pm on Wednesday 16 April 2025 (register now) and you can also catch our election updates on socials including Tik Tok @aficanberra
Media comment: Craig Wallace 0477 200 755
Attachment A
Coordinated action on health, housing and education
What is the problem?
People with disability experience poorer outcomes in key wellbeing areas due to insufficient and inaccessible core government interventions in health, housing and education.
What is the evidence?
Health
It is the right of people with disability to attain the highest standards of health, without discrimination on the basis of disability. People with disability have higher rates of use of health services including General Practitioners, medical specialists, and hospital emergency departments and services. People with disability are also more likely to face barriers to accessing health services. The lack of equitable and timely access to appropriate healthcare, especially preventative and proactive management of health risks and chronic conditions, has been identified as a factor contributing to poor health outcomes for people with disability.
The dominance of the medical model of disability is likely contributing to poorer health outcomes and health inequities for people with disability. Diagnostic overshadowing is also a problem. This is when a medical practitioner assumes that a patient’s complaint is related to their disability. This is a significant risk when medical practitioners do not have specific disability knowledge and training. It can lead to symptom dismissals, underdiagnoses, and misdiagnoses. Disability related health disparities are caused in large part by avoidable disadvantage, and not primarily by underlying impairment. This is a complex and emerging concern that requires work to develop training.
COVID has exposed aps in the health system and we need attention to the ongoing risks and impacts of long COVID.
Housing
Housing plays a major role in the health and wellbeing of people with disability by providing shelter, safety and security. People with disability are at a higher risk of experiencing homelessness, housing insecurity, housing dissatisfaction, poor quality and/or inaccessible housing, and housing unaffordability. The housing situation, both public and private, for people with disability is nothing short of a crisis with multiple barriers preventing individuals from being able to choose where they live, with whom they live, and how they live.
The dominant challenges identified through the Disability Royal Commission include tenancy insecurity, difficulties accessing social housing, difficulty finding physically accessible homes, poor response to high rates of homelessness among people with disability, and substandard housing and living conditions in supported boarding houses. In order to uphold the access and inclusion rights of people with disability, their housing needs must be a priority.
Education
Access to quality education is universally recognised as a key pathway to the achievement of social, economic, political and human rights, especially for children. It is acknowledged around the world that access to education is intrinsically linked to key developmental indicators and milestones from child development to employment. Access to education is not only formative, it underpins other fundamental rights and has rippling impacts felt across all aspects of our lives.
Numerous reviews and, more recently, the hearings of the Disability Royal Commission reiterate that too many students with disability experience educational disadvantage through barriers to education, poor completion, poor attainment, and harm within education settings. In the last decade, the highest level of educational attainment for people with disability has improved but remains lower than for people without disability. Too many students with disability remain in segregated settings, despite there being no evidence that such settings lead to improved life outcomes, attainment or employment for people with disability.
The Disability Royal Commission identified a need for dedicated strategies and spends with key funding agreements between the States and Territories and the Commonwealth in these areas.
What do we want the next Government to do?
Include dedicated disability funding and commitments and improvement goals in each funding agreement for health, housing and education and undertake the following work and strategies:
Health
- Expand the capacity of the health workforce to engage with people with cognitive disability and implement specialised health and mental health services for people with cognitive disability.
- Embed the right to equitable access to health in key policy instruments for health services.
- Fund a program of work to ensure that adaptions and supports are available within all publicly funded healthcare settings. For instance, the acute areas of every teaching hospital should have height adjustable beds, communication boards and other kit within three years.
- Fund a program of upgrades to accessible kit in key general practice, dentistry and diagnostic settings
- Fund healthcare navigators to support people with disabilities in care in healthcare settings.
- Undertake priority work to address violence against women with disability and invest in this through funding agreements
- Maintain and boost the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme
- Include dentistry in Medicare
- Recognise clean air as an accessibility issue, adopt the recommendations of the clean air report, prioritise COVID safety in health settings, enhance funding for long COVID care, research and rehabilitation and stand up necessary supports to people with disability who remain isolated due to the ongoing pandemic.
Education
- Agree a 28-year phase out of all segregated schools
- Institute a legal entitlement for students with a disability to enrol at a local mainstream school
- Support steps to prevent the exclusionary discipline of students with disability and improve policies and procedures on the provision of reasonable adjustments. They also recommended careers guidance and transition support service for people with disabilities
- Lift student with disability funding loadings.
Housing
- Provide Federal Government leadership to ensure national consistency in implementing the National Construction Code across all jurisdictions.
- In line with RIA we support the establishment of a national home modifications program, similar in design to England’s Disabled Facilities Grant, which through a housing appropriation provides the bulk of funding to individuals based on their mobility requirements relative to the home in which they dwell, and is not tied wholly to their eligibility to social care programs such as the NDIS or My Aged Care, or any other qualifying care/support based programs
- The NDIA should incrementally wind back the current SDA program and target individual participants and their housing needs specifically, rather than attempt to address the chronic shortage of suitably designed housing through a broad approach of incentives for private developers.
- Ensure that national work on housing and planning reforms prioritises preferential land release where it includes built form that is both affordable and accessible
- Increase funding for accessible public housing and community housing
- Ensure Federal Funding for homelessness services includes a focus on providing accessible services
- Prioritize accessible housing which meets the gold standard within the National Housing Accord and housing funded through the Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF)
- Fund housing advocates within DPO’s to support with specialised housing advocacy