Category: Uncategorized

Equal Before The Law

Australians who need communications supports, or who have complex and multiple support needs, are not having their rights protected, and are not being treated equally, in the criminal justice system. This must change.

Hence the work of the Australian Human Rights Commission in our report “Equal before the law: towards disability justice strategies”, launched in February. http://www.humanrights.gov.au/publications/equal-law Negative assumptions and attitudes, coupled with a lack of support services often means that people with disabilities are viewed as not credible, not capable of giving evidence or unable to participate in legal proceedings. As a result many are left without effective access to justice.
Since the release of the Commission’s report a number of state and territory governments have acknowledged our findings, and are considering how they might develop Disability Justice Strategies.

Last year we identified five key barriers for people with disabilities. We heard from victims, witnesses, those accused of crime and offenders.

The first barrier concerns programmes, assistance and other community supports addressing violence, prevention and disadvantage, which may not be readily accessible to those with disabilities. One submission told of Sarah, an Aboriginal woman with cognitive impairment, psychosocial disability and health conditions. Sarah began a long pattern of contact with criminal justice and human service agencies at age 12. What became obvious was that there is a lack of appropriate support outside the criminal justice system, and responsibility for addressing her needs was often left to the police and the juvenile justice system. At 18, she was provided with 24 hour supported accommodation through a Community Justice Program. If Sarah had had access to community assistance from an earlier age, she would not have had such continual interaction with the criminal justice system?

Police services are often the fall back position in times of crisis, rather than appropriate community and health services. One submission said ‘The police have become the emergency mental health response … for many individuals and families, and they are ill-equipped for the job.”

The second barrier dealt with the supports people may need, to participate in the criminal justice process. Maria, for example, has cerebral palsy and little speech. She wanted to tell police about a sexual assault, but there was no communication support worker to help with the statement. The police relied on Maria’s parents. Maria was uncomfortable giving personal details in front of her parents, so her evidence was incomplete. This caused problems for the investigation, and during the court process.

Barrier three concerns negative attitudes and assumptions about people with disabilities, which often result in us being viewed as unreliable, not credible or not capable of giving evidence, making legal decisions or participating in legal proceedings. we were told that “When I attended the police station, the police officer thought I was dumb at first, and he didn’t take it seriously.”

We were also told ‘a victim won’t even get their day in court, as the DPP won’t run the case.’

The fourth barrier deals with accommodation and programmes for people deemed ‘unfit to plead’. These people are often detained indefinitely in prisons or psychiatric facilities, without being convicted of a crime. The well-known case of West Australian Marlon Noble demonstrates this. It is one of the Commission’s Twenty Years: Twenty Stories films http://www.humanrights.gov.au/twentystories/video-presumed-innocent.html The last barrier concerns prisoners. Supports and adjustments may not be provided to prisoners with disabilities so that they can meet basic human needs, and participate in prison life. This can result in delays and difficulties exiting prison, or exiting with successful chances of re-integration.

Henry has an acquired brain injury. He wanted to apply for support from Legal Aid to appeal his conviction, and needed help to fill in forms. He found the language complex and difficult to understand. He did not receive assistance in prison to fill out the forms, and filled them out incorrectly. This delayed his application. By the time he filled out the forms correctly, his application was outside the time limit.

And the statistics back up what we heard. 90 per cent of Australian women with intellectual disability have been subjected to sexual abuse at some time during their lives. There are currently at least 20-30 people in our prison systems who have not been convicted of an offense, but have been found unfit to plead, and gaols are the only accommodation option. From 1989 to 2011 105 people were shot by police, and 42 % had a mental illness.

Women, children, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and people from a culturally and linguistically diverse background with disabilities, are even less likely to have equitable access to justice.

So what can be done? The justice system in Australia is large and complex. The Commission report recommended that each State or Territory develop its own Disability Justice Strategy, to deal with all of the issues raised in our report.

The Commission also put together a database of programmes and services which provide a more positive justice pathway for people with disabilities. http://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/disability-rights/current-project s/programs-and-services-assist-people-disability-criminal

Much more needs to be done so that Australians with disabilities are truly equal before the law.

These comments were made by me at an Australian Human Rights Commission RightsTalk entitled Balancing The Scales Of Justice on 16 June. The whole RightsTalk can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXvydqXU08I Captioning is in progress at time of posting.

A Commissioner For Left-Handers

Dear Adam Creighton,

I have seen you on ABC’s The Drum on television. I know that you are economics correspondent for the Australian, have worked for the Reserve Bank and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, and that you studied at Oxford.

I am writing to you about your recent comments regarding whether we need a Disability Discrimination Commissioner. You said “lots of people are discriminated against. Why don’t we have a gay rights commissioner, or a left-handed commissioner, or a short persons commissioner, or a commissioner for people who aren’t good-looking.”

As a person with a disability I am hurt and saddened by your comment. Hurt because you trivialised the significant issues impacting on the day-toDay lives of Australians with disabilities, and the work a Disability Discrimination Commissioner does to address them. Saddened because your comment demonstrates your total lack of awareness of the magnitude of these issues.

I’d like to meet you, and introduce you to some of my friends. Let me tell you about us.

I qualified as a lawyer, and then failed at around 30 job interviews because employers could not understand how a blind person could do such a job. My first job was as a clerical assistant in the public service. That was some time ago, but not much has changed.

Let me introduce you to Josh. He is an excellent app developer, with several successful apps. But he can’t get a job because his autism limits his communication skills, so he is no good at job interviews. I work with government and private employers to change this situation.

The recent budget makes my work harder, because Josh will have his Disability Support Pension re-assessed, and may loose it. But he will still struggle to find a job. The government budget contains a welfare plan, but not a jobs plan for people like Josh.

Then there’s Marlon. He spent ten years in Geraldton prison without being convicted of a crime. He was found “unfit to plead” as a result of his cognitive disability, and the West Australian government regards prisons as appropriate accommodation options for such people. I campaign to change these laws.

I work with Arthur, who has an intellectual disability, but has found a part-time job stacking shelves in a supermarket. He earns enough not to be on the Disability Support Pension. He has a recurring health complaint, which requires regular doctors visits, pathology and other tests. The $7 a time he will have to pay for these visits means he will struggle to pay his rent.

There’s Julia who wanted to catch a bus from Sydney to Canberra, but could not because the buses did not carry people using wheelchairs. I work on laws to change that.

There’s Stephanie, supporting her teenage son through high school. But the budget changes to education mean that the extra funding he needs to be successful in a regular school will not go ahead. I work with government to increase that support.

Then there’s Stella. She’s a journalist, comedian and great communicator who gives people with a disability a powerful voice by editing the ABC Rampup site. It was defunded by the government in the budget, and the ABC cannot pick up the funding. Stella may be left-handed, but she also uses a wheelchair.

There is Pat, in her seventies, and still supporting her two adult sons who have mental illness. The National Disability Insurance Scheme, which the government is continuing to roll out on time and in full, will ease some of that load. But I still need to educate police, so that they encourage her sons to go to hospital when they need to, rather than using brute force.

So that’s what a Disability Discrimination Commissioner does. 37 % of discrimination complaints relate to disability, 45% of people with disabilities live in poverty, we are 30 % under-employed compared to the general population, far more of us are accommodated in institutions or prisons, we experience higher levels of domestic violence, and the government systems to support us are broken and broke.

Gritty Australian cricket captain Alan Border, a left-hander I note, played some very tough innings. But I don’t think he ever faced an innings as tough as the one Australians with disabilities face every day. My job, as Disability Discrimination Commissioner, is to make that innings a little easier.

Mr Creighton, to quote from my friend Rachel Ball at the Human Rights Law Centre, “it is easy to stand atop a mountain of privilege, and tell those at the bottom of the mountain that privilege is irrelevant.”

Graeme Innes

Disability Discrimination Commissioner

(This article was first published in the Sydney Morning Herald)

You can take that to the Bank

Guide dog asleep
Arrow the guide dog taking a well-earned rest

Travelling with a guide dog http://www.guidedogs.com.au is a great way to get around- it removes some of the stress of travel, and can have other advantages. Many is the time I have walked into a room or lift and heard – “Aw, look, beautiful,” or “Sooo cute”. To which I usually reply: “Yes, and the dog doesn’t look bad either”.

I had completed a meeting with some senior bank officials in Brisbane. Walking with my guide dog, I got into the elevator on the 30th floor of their building at the same time as another person. The lift buttons were not marked with raised letters or Braille, so I didn’t know which one to press. Turning to the other man in the lift I said: “Could you press the button for ground please?” I got no response.

Thinking that he may have a hearing impairment – I am the disability Discrimination Commissioner after all – I looked directly at him, so he could read my lips, and said a little more loudly “Could you press ground please?” Still no response.

Puzzled, I reached over and tapped him on the shoulder, and repeated my request.
“Oh,” he said, “Are you talking to me. I thought you were asking the guide dog.”

My dog’s good, but she hasn’t learned to read lift buttons yet!

Graeme Innes travels with a black labrador guide dog called Arrow, and spends some of his spare time thinking up funny responses to such questions as- “What’s your dogs name?”
“Can your dog read bus numbers?” and
“Does your dog have its own mobile phone?”

What funny guide dog questions have you asked or heard? Have you ever said something embarrassing to a guide dog user? Please tell me about it?