Page 3221 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 17 September 2013
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Initiatives have been developed in consultation with the community and based on what people with disability and their families have told us and on what providers have told us they need to prepare for the implementation of DisabilityCare Australia.
The ACT NDIS task force have developed reference groups and steering groups to assist their work and to guide and advise me as minister. A steering group comprising National Disability Services, the ACT Council of Social Service and the ACT Mental Health Community Coalition is working with the task force to deliver regular forums for service providers across the ACT.
I have talked before about the NDIS expert panel that I convened in August last year to provide advice and the benefit of their lived experience. That advice goes to the task force and the government.
The Community Services Directorate has also funded training and professional development activities for the sector to prepare for the NDIS, including sessions on business development for organisations, values-based leadership development workshops, creating person-centred organisations and person-centred support for self-direction.
As the scheme will impact across the whole of government there are also working groups which include health, education, corrections, youth justice, child protection and housing to ensure that the complexities and the impacts related to the transition to DisabilityCare Australia are identified and worked through. These initiatives build on the local initiatives our government has commenced in preparation for future changes.
Through Disability ACT we have funded a range of activities that will provide learning opportunities for both the community and service providers, such as funding a pilot self-directed funding program called my choice. The findings from the ongoing evaluation of this pilot will create a body of evidence that will be shared with the sector and the community to build capacity and understanding of self-managed approaches in anticipation of transition to DisabilityCare Australia.
Behind the scenes too there is significant activity occurring across the government in the lead-up to formalising the bilateral agreement in February next year. Negotiations are ongoing between officials. I am pleased that the project board, consisting of directors-general from ACT government directorates, will be joined by the General Manager of DisabilityCare Australia, signalling a truly collaborative approach to the implementation of this scheme in the ACT.
As minister for disability here in the ACT, I am proud of the progress the ACT has made and its commitment to be the first jurisdiction to have all people transition to DisabilityCare by June 2016.
Making a difference to the lives of people with a disability is what this is all about. Many hundreds of people will receive some help through their enhanced service offer. Real and lasting change for people with disability will take time, and we know from the experience in other launch sites that we still have a lot to learn. But here in the
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