1 . One common
enrolment policy
Students with a disability
must have equal rights with able-bodied
students: the right to attend their nearest
local school without any conditions or provisos
whatsoever. The lines "where this is possible
and practicable and in the best interests of the
child" in the department’s current
enrolment policy must be deleted.
Furthermore, enrolment
must not be subject to sufficient resources
being provided, thereby allowing either the
school principal or the department a clause to
escape from their moral and legal
responsibilities.
A child with a disability
has the right to be enrolled into a regular
class and the right to be given full support to
ensure the integration is a success.
When a child with a
disability seeks enrolment at their local state
school the principal must accept the child, and
the resources and modifications necessary must
automatically be provided.
The department's legal
defence under the Anti-Discrimination Act
of claiming “unjustifiable hardship”
merely gives the department an excuse at the end
of the complaints process to refuse to enrol a
child with a disability. The onus is then on the
complainant to prove that the department can
afford to modify a school or provide resources,
and the department knows it is almost impossible
for a parent to access sufficient information to
do this.
The lengths to which the
department has been prepared to go to defend
morally and ethically indefensible positions (by
going all the way to the Supreme Court) tell
this Council that the department is not
committed to the inclusion of students with
physical disabilities in regular classes. It
espouses the rhetoric of equality in its
policies, but fails to provide equity at the
coalface.
If the department was
truly and enthusiastically committed such legal
action would not be necessary by either
party…however, often times the department
dogmatically refuses to grant reasonable
requests by parents of students with a
disability.
2. An accelerated program
to modify schools to provide wheelchair and
physical access must be introduced
immediately.
The current allocation of
$2.5 million per annum for retrospectively
modifying existing schools is totally inadequate
and fails to modify schools to keep pace with
demand. In the meantime students are denied
access to their local schools and are enrolled
at a designated school in their area. This
practice is inequitable and unacceptable to the
Council.
The allocation from
capital works must be dramatically increased to
at least $10 Million per annum...otherwise it
will take at least fifty years for all schools
in NSW to be accessible. Access audits of all
schools ought to be conducted immediately to
establish the level of funding needed to make
all schools accessible. Involvement of community
groups such as Access.
Committees of local
councils, P&C Associations and other
community organisations is needed in such an
exercise, together with creditable consultants
in the field.
The department should be
embarrassed by the funds currently being spent
by other government departments to make railway
stations and buses wheelchair accessible...while
it does little about making existing schools
accessible.
The method taken should be
needs driven: when a child requests enrolment,
the department should modify the school, without
arguing "unjustifiable hardship" and forcing
parents to complain to the Minister, the NSW
AntiDiscrimination Board and HREOC. The
department must accept that all schools will
eventually will have to be modified and in this
way they will progressively be done, and meet
the need along the way.
Our research across NSW
indicates that the general public thinks all
state schools are wheelchair accessible (old as
well as new schools). When we have advised them
otherwise, the reaction has been one of
surprise, disbelief, and criticism of the
government. Were the facts to be exposed to the
public, both the department and the government,
as a whole could be greatly
embarrassed.
3. Increase in funds for
teacher's aide times.
Parents across the state
have long complained that they struggle with the
department to get enough aide time for their
children. Whilst last year there were some
improvements in this area the department must
ensure that sufficient money is available to
provide enough aides and have them working
enough hours to cover the needs of the children.
In 1998 we hope to hear fewer complaints from
parents and schools on this matter.
4. A guarantee that
funding for each child stays with the child
until s/he leaves school, with an annual review
only to assess the needs of the student, and not
to determine whether the funding will be
stopped.
Parents of children with
disabilities are already stressed. They do not
need the department and the local integration
officer hanging over their head the possibility
that integration funding and teacher's aide time
funding may be stopped at the end of every year.
This does not happen to parents of able-bodied
students, and if done would be considered
outrageous. This is a procedural matter, not a
financial one in our opinion, and we see no
reason why this practice cannot be announced
immediately for 1998. After all, children who
are physically or intellectually disabled do not
suddenly get better... they must have assurance
of assistance until they leave school.
Quarantined funding and
development of an in-school attendant care
support program guaranteeing funding all the way
through school is essential.
5. Students with
disabilities must be provided with wheelchair
accessible buses so they can go on
excursions.
We are aware of cases
where no arrangements have been made by schools
for children to be transported and they been
left behind. This is totally unacceptable and in
breach of the Disability Discrimination Act.
We call on the department
to urgently begin discussions with the NSW Bus
and Coach Association to hire wheelchair
accessible buses so that students with
disabilities can go to an excursion in the same
transport as their able-bodied peers.
Alternatively, the department should arrange for
the Urban Transit Authority's new wheelchair
accessible buses to be available for hire by
schools in every case where an accessible bus is
not available from a private bus
operator.
6. A significant increase
in funding to enable the McRae Report to be
adopted in full.
Without a dramatic
increase the recommendations will not be able to
be adequately implemented and it is possible
that even worse problems will be created than
currently exist. Furthermore, parents and
students and the Teachers Federation's level of
mistrust in the department will be heightened.
The government must make
more than just a policy statement.... Its policy
will be perceived as hollow rhetoric unless a
financial change is made and placement is based
on parental choice with a guaranteed level of
resource support.
7. An independent
complaint mechanism or body must be
established.
As a result half more than
sixty complaints we received in 1997, the need
for a change in the way the department handles
dispute with parents became obvious. Parents
should not be forced to argue with the school,
then the Department Superintendent, then the
Director of Special Education, then the
Director-General, then the Minister, then the
Anti-Discrimination Board, and then HREOC.
Parents feel completely
powerless against the enormity of the
department's bureaucracy and are often given
curt responses, sometimes never even given any
response, are fobbed off by principals, and
generally given the runaround in their quest for
equity for their child. The writer has
personally experienced the lengths to which the
department will go to argue its case.
A parent must at an early
stage be able to take a complaint to a totally
independent person who has the power to
investigate the case and the power to make an
order against the department that must be
followed. We understand you will be discussing
this matter with the Parents and Citizens
Association, and we would be happy to join those
discussions
The above matters are not
comprehensive...there are many other matters
which need redress, but we have placed on the
table with you the main issues in our agenda for
reform so that thee department can better
understand our expectations.
27 February,
1998
