Q&A at the National Disability Services Conference
Preparing for the New World
Hilton Hotel, Adelaide
4 May 2012
9.15am
Subjects: National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), Disability Support Pension (DSP)
E & OE
DELEGATE
I’m very interested in the notion of bipartisanship. Does it serve us that there is bipartisan support? Would it not be better if you guys were fighting and scratching and kicking and it was on the front page of the newspaper?
MITCH FIFIELD
I don’t think fighting and scratching would serve the cause of achieving an NDIS. One of the reasons why the NDIS is on the cusp of becoming a reality is because there has been cross-party support. Is because there has been a significant grassroots community campaign. It would be very easy, I think, for an NDIS to be scuttled in a partisan political environment. Having said that, there is still a role for a constructive opposition to be asking the right questions of the government. We would be derelict in our duty if we didn’t do that. But because the NDIS is so important I think we need to find a different mechanism where those questions can be asked so that they’re received in the way that they’re meant, which is to improve the system. The other part of your question is if we’re fighting and scratching would that help keep the NDIS on the front pages. It probably would but I don’t think that that would help us achieve the objective that we want.
DELEGATE
I’m hoping the NDIS can become a model for leadership that we can take across all portfolios and all sectors, and that we begin to see more leadership rather than politics in the future
MITCH FIFIELD
Well I think that this should be a model for other portfolios but it can only be a model in portfolios where we are at fundamental agreement. It can’t obviously serve as a model where we are at a fundamental disagreement. But in those areas where we are in fundamental agreement, yes I think it should serve as a model.
DELEGATE
How is it and what would you as a Coalition plan to do about the fact both detainees in detention centres and prisoners of the state have a roof over their heads, three meals a day, access to basic healthcare and foxtel, when people on a disability pension, after their rent and medications, don’t even have enough to go to the supermarket?
MITCH FIFIELD
I think part of the reason why many people on the disability support pension find it a real struggle is because the DSP, we’re looking at it to do more things than it was intended to do. The DSP is meant to be an income support but because there isn’t proper support for people with disability, people have to use that DSP money to seek to purchase forms of support which they aren’t receiving. So we’re expecting it to be income support but we’re also expecting it to do far more than that. Part of the answer is an NDIS so that people don’t have to try and make the DSP do things that it was never designed to do.
DELEGATE
I am supportive of your model of a joint parliamentary committee to support an NDIS. If you’re elected, will you offer that to the opposition?
MITCH FIFIELD
Absolutely. If this committee is formed now and there is a change of government, we would continue that committee. And if they don’t pick it up, we would put in place this committee in government.
DELEGATE
Thank you very much Mitch for your support for this through the Coalition. Could you tell me a little bit about bipartisanship within the Coalition and across federal and state coalition entities?
MITCH FIFIELD
Federally, the Liberal Party and National Party, we are as one. We want to see an NDIS. We will implement an NDIS in government. If it’s started by the time we get to government, we will continue its implementation. As for states, NSW and Victoria, Mary Wooldridge in Victoria and Andrew Constance in NSW are two of the greatest champions you will find for an NDIS. As is Premier Ted Baillieu and as is Barry O’Farrell. All the other states are committed in principle to the idea of an NDIS. A number of the states, do though, want more detail and want more information. Let’s just take as an example the announcement on Monday. Talking to a number of the states, they said that it was a good announcement but no one has spoken to us about what our share is expected to be and no one has spoken to us about what may be the launch sites in our jurisdiction. To the extent that states, some states may have a reticence, it’s really because they just need more information from the Commonwealth. And the answer to that is more engagement from the Commonwealth with the states.
DELEGATE
We heard yesterday from the Minister that no decision has been made about the exclusion of people who acquire a disability over the age of 65, which of course is good news that there wasn’t a decision. But we know for example from the aged care announcements last week that aged care will not be able to provide the breadth or extent of services that people with disabilities who acquire their disability over the age of 65 will need. We know that Victoria for example excluded the 65 barrier from their disability legislation some years ago. What is your position on incorporating those over 65 who acquire a disability into the NDIS?
MITCH FIFIELD
Look we don’t have a formal position on that. Obviously the more support you can provide for people and the more consistent that support can be regardless of the age at which they acquire their disability the better. But I want to see an NDIS happen. And even if we don’t have the perfect coverage, I think it’s better to start to put it in place than to try and achieve a perfect melding of disability support and aged care support before you do that.