Last year the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care established MyMedicare – a voluntary patient registration model which aims to formalise and strengthen the relationship between patients, their general practice, general practitioner (GP) and primary care teams.
This initiative works to deliver greater continuity of healthcare, with evidence showing that seeing the same GP and healthcare team regularly leads to better health outcomes.
When a patient registers in MyMedicare, the Australian Government will provide additional funding to assist the general practice provide targeted care based on patient needs – such as longer funded telehealth consultations.
MyMedicare is open for voluntary registration to Australians with a valid Medicare card or a Department of Veterans’ Affairs (DVA) Veteran card.
For more information on MyMedicare, visit www.health.gov.au/mymedicare
Working to deliver a better experience for participants, is best achieved by listening to people with lived experience of disability and their personal experience in dealing with the NDIS.
The Participant First initiative will bring together people who sign up to help improve the NDIS through engagement activities such as:
By joining Participant First, you can help the NDIS make sure the voices of people with disability are central to NDIS reforms.
Participant First will work to prioritise co-design, consultation and engagement activities on the following topics:
To be involved, register your interest by going to:
Once registered, you will receive a newsletter every fortnight outlining new opportunities for you to be involved.
Register your interest for as many of these opportunities as you like.
Some feedback opportunities are paid.
All feedback is confidential and will not be included in your official NDIS participant record.
You can also unsubscribe at any time.
Participants, families and carers with experience with the NDIS are encouraged to register.
For more information, email participant.engagement@ndis.gov.au.
Going by the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ most recent figures (2018), 4.4 million (or 17.7%) of Australians live with disability…
and that means that 3,379,200 Australians have a physical disability…
and that means that physical disability makes up the largest disability group in our country.
So,…
with this being the case,
if you live with a physical disability
(or, if you support someone who does)
why not join an organisation that represents you
and understands your needs.
Physical Disability Australia
is here for you.
To join us go to www. pda.org.au/membership/
You’ll be glad that you did.
PDA will be submitting a report to the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme. This will be included in the annual report that the committee is required to submit to Parliament to outline its activities over the year.
This report covers the implementation, performance, governance, administration and expenditure of the NDIS, and includes submissions around these key areas from NDIS participants, the broader disability community, family members, informal carers and service providers.
As part of PDA’s response, we’d like to know what NDIS issues our members and other NDIS participants think needs to change in the way the NDIS works.
If you want to share your views your experiences with the NDIS, please take part in our survey by going to:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/GJ5CJ55
Submissions close: 14th July 2024.
All the collected information will only be used to provide statistics on NDIS concern areas and anonymous comments about those concern areas.
Information about you will not be shared with any other 3rd party under any circumstances except as required by law, and all data will be deleted once our work has been completed.
On Tuesday (25th June) PDA’s President, Andrew Fairbairn, spoke with WA’s RTRFM 91.2 on “Disability In Action”.
In this conversation with Simon Chong, Andrew shared his story, his advocacy work, the value of universal design, and his passion for access and inclusion.
To hear this interview go to:
Why not make a tax deductible donation to Physical Disability Australia?
These donations will assist in furthering the work of PDA and allow us to support and advocate further for the interests and views of people with physical disability in Australia – and to be heard by decision makers at all levels.
You can give by going to our donate page:
PDA appreciates all donations, no matter how big or small.
All donations to PDA are tax deductible in Australia as PDA has Deductable Gift Recipient (DGR) status.
If you wish to receive a receipt, please let us know by emailing manager@pda.org.au or calling 1800 PDA ORG (1800 732 674)
Thanks so much for your help.
With so much happening around disability at the moment, keeping up to date and informed can be time consuming and overwhelming.
Did you know that PDA offers a one stop spot for disability media?
Don’t wait for a weekly news round-up of too late, out of date stories, articles and conversations, head across to PDA’s Facebook Discussion Group and join for free.
For Australian and international disability related news, interesting stories and the opportunity to share your thoughts, ask for advice and be part of the discussion, this online community is for you.
Join Physical Disability Australia’s Facebook Discussion Group.
We all have stories, advice and thoughts around disability that are worth sharing.
So why not get paid for putting your pen to paper?
To expand blog participation and content, we are calling out to our Members to submit articles that are of interest to our readers, worthwhile and based around living with a disability.
Contributors will receive $100 in payment, based on the following criteria:
* submissions must come from PDA members
* blog topics must be cleared with PDA before writing commences
* blogs are expected to have a word count between 600 to 1,200 (unless agreed by PDA)
* blogs must be previously unpublished
* blogs published become the property of PDA and may not be published outside of PDA’s website by the contributor or other parties outside of PDA
* payment will not be made unless content has been approved by PDA and the final blog contribution has been viewed, edited by PDA as needed (in agreement with the writer) and accepted as being suitable and on brand with PDA.
If you are interested in being involved and having your writing published online, please email promotion@pda.org.au.
We look forward to your story appearing on our blog page.
Did you know that physical disability affects *76.8% of Australia’s disability community?
Also, with the likelihood of disability increasing as we age, approximately half of Australians aged 65 and over will experience some form of physical disability during their later years.
There are many health conditions that can fall under the umbrella of being a physical disability – including those affecting a person’s mobility, physical capacity, stamina, or dexterity.
Thankfully Physical Disability Australia exists to represent and stand up for the rights of all Australians living with physical disability and provide a supportive and welcoming community for everyone with a positive interest in bringing about positive change in our country’s disability landscape.
So whether you have a physical disability, care for someone who does, if you work in the disability sector or just want to see that access, inclusion and fairness for PWD is part of the conversation, sign up for FREE PDA MEMBERSHIP.
To join us go to pda.org.au/membership/
You’ll be glad that you did.
I applied for a job. A small job offering 7 hours a week. That’s all. I did not get an interview and I am not sure why.
Could it be that I am now 59 years old?
Could it be that I have too many degrees and graduate diplomas?
Or could it be the elephant in the room – that I have a disability?
I was upfront in my application that I have a congenital disability (from birth), but my application was solid and outlined my extensive work experience.
A friend told me that she never discloses her disability when applying for a job. So was this my mistake? Should I have hidden my disability like it was something to be ashamed of?
For seven hours work a week they received 50 applicants! Is this an indication of the jobs market now? Has our boom of low unemployment disappeared?
Whatever the economic reasoning, the thing is that high unemployment for people with disability has not disappeared or changed in 30 years.
“People aged 15–64 with disability are more likely to be unemployed than those without disability. They are also more likely to be unemployed for longer.” [as reported by the Australian Institute for Health and Wellbeing in 2024]
On average, it also takes a university graduate with a disability 3 years longer than their contemporaries to gain employment. The percentage of people with disabilities who have superannuation is also minuscule.
So what does this mean for people with disabilities – who are amongst the poorest of minority groups in Australia today and suffer social discrimination? It results in a lack of financial stability, with a flow on effect to the social indicators of disadvantage; poverty, housing stress, food stress and mental health stress. Alongside these consequences, the sense of worth of a person with disabilities is undermined every time they apply for a job and are rejected. When the rejection letter pile reaches the (glass abled) ceiling, that’s when they stop trying.
Even though a person with disability may be highly educated or highly skilled, these social indicators do not move if the person is unemployed. On average, PWD die 10 -15 years earlier than those without disability. This is assisted because we simply cannot rise above the unconscious, or dare I say conscious, bias that people with disabilities are less and thus unworthy.
The benefits of having meaningful employment for PWD has been explored and persued by successive governments for over 30 years and yet, as mentioned earlier, unemployment rates for PWD have not changed.
“Our Government has committed an additional $227.6 million, bringing the total funding to $5.4 billion over the next five years to help more people with disability prepare for and find suitable employment including through a new specialised disability employment program commencing on 1 July 2025.” [Reported by the Department of Social Services in 2024]
This is fantastic news. Finally Government acknowledges the problem and is throwing billions of dollars towards getting PWD into jobs and accessing an under-utilised employment pool. Unfortunately though, this step forward is overshadowed by Government’s very own under-employment of PWD. Did I mention the job I applied for was a state government position?
I am not saying that Government should not spend billions of dollars on a huge social issue that is broader than just job agencies and training courses. What I am saying is that Government should step us and put in place dedicated programs for PWD to gain employment in the public sector. If you are going to talk the talk on disability employment, then walk the walk.
When speaking of Government as a whole, we need to understand that Government is made up of a conglomerate of agencies, both at federal and state levels, and the culture of these individual agencies needs to be accountable for any bias against PWD and work towards correcting these prejudices or oversights.
I am not suggesting anything new here. PWD have long advocated to have more Government jobs dedicated and provided to PWD. If a position is disability related, surely it makes sense to have a person with the most lived experience in that job? I.e. a person with a disability.
However, it is not just Government that has an issue with employing people with disability. Our own disability organisations have horrendous track records of employing PWD within their own organisations. Of all the peak bodies organisation for disability, almost none have a CEO who is disabled themselves. The policy officers who write policy for these organisations, and present them to Government, also predominantly do not have a disability themselves.
Sadly, my disappointment at not being deemed worthy of an interview for a seven hours a week job becomes a drop in the ocean of the disappointment felt by PWD everyday, enduring rejections and building on feelings of unworthiness and trashed self esteem.
In a conversation with a disabled friend, I was told “I’ve just given up. I can’t stand the hurt from rejection anymore and will just live my life as best I can on the pension.”
Australian Federation of Disabilities (AFDO) reported that 53.4% of Australians with disability are employed, compared to 83.2% of non-disabled Australians – keeping in mind that employment can mean as little as 1 hour/week and that the 88% of people on Disability Support Payments are not counted (AFDO, 2024). It’s not rocket science to see that the vast majority of PWD do not have jobs and that the scale of unemployment for PWD is huge and that corrective action is long overdue.
Most PWD want to work, be contributing members of their communities and get paid for it. Volunteering or sitting unpaid on a board is one thing, but actually getting paid for the work you do brings a whole level of life satisfaction and self value.
Australia has a long way to go in truly becoming a welcoming country that embraces and values all its people, and this includes the culture of disability where our great community is portrayed as being less – deserving pity and paternalism. How will we ever reach equality if we are never given opportunities? I grieve that I was not good enough for seven hours a week and this grief is amplified by the millions of fellow PWD who are discarded in the “not-employable” pile each and every day.
1800 732 674
