Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 26, 2013 12:50:10 GMT 7
Any major changes would have to pass through the parliament and Senate first though right? I don't think Labor and the Greens and even Palmer would be too impressed by this l don't think Palmer lies awake at night worrying about Disability pensioners and look what Labor did to the single parents and all the harsh changes they made to the DSP themselves, the greens are probably the only really on our side, l wouldn't count on the senate blocking it
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randy
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Post by randy on Dec 26, 2013 13:19:20 GMT 7
Would those with indef portability be saved?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 26, 2013 14:09:43 GMT 7
After the cost of all the assements and all the appeals and if most people just end up on Newstart who get rejected , wont end up saving them much money at all, l wonder why they put people through all that stress for, maybe its driven more by right - wing ideology rather then economic reasons.
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Post by voiceofthevoiceless on Dec 26, 2013 16:52:52 GMT 7
They could be testing the waters to establish which of their proposed cuts will cause them political damage. In light of this i would encourage everyone to contact their local federal MP and express your displeasure. Has to be worth a try
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Post by Banjo on Dec 26, 2013 18:00:16 GMT 7
Regional Aussies vulnerable to Disability Pension changes REGIONAL Australians could be the most vulnerable to large-scale changes to the Disability Support Pension being considered by the Federal Government. Disability advocates warn the tinkering will make little positive difference. Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews has flagged changes to the pension that would focus on helping some people, particularly younger people, back into the workforce. In New South Wales and Queensland, 431,621 people receive the pension. Mr Andrews may create a two-level system to separate those with permanent disabilities from those temporarily affected. People with Disabilities Australia president Craig Wallace said it could lead to those who get put on temporary pensions being shunted to the Newstart allowance that pays less. Given the costs required for support, medication or disability aids, Mr Wallace said it could put even more pressure on a group already facing massive disadvantages. "We don't think changes to the pension in the past have been a good way of moving supporting people into work," he said. "Most people with disabilities can and do work and want to work. "They find substantial barriers in the community." The consequences for those outside metropolitan areas could be compounded because there is often a shortage of key services. "People in regional areas could be far worse off because they have limited job opportunities already," Mr Wallace said. Mr Wallace said if the government was serious about helping those with disabilities back into work, it needed to look in the mirror. Since the mid-1980s, the number of people with disabilities employed by the government has gradually eroded, he said. "The public service employment for people with disabilities has steadily declined - since 1986 it has more than halved from 6.6% to 3.1% last year. "They're not walking the talk and it means it's really hard to ask business to walk the talk," he said. Mr Andrews's office said a review would be done into the Disability Support Pension. www.mydailynews.com.au/news/regional-aussies-vulnerable-to-disability-pension-/2124462/
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Post by dinky on Dec 26, 2013 19:23:10 GMT 7
The public service employment for people with disabilities has steadily declined - since 1986 it has more than halved from 6.6% to 3.1% last year.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Well that answers the Question
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Post by dinky on Dec 26, 2013 19:53:57 GMT 7
THE GOOD FIGHT: Jacqui White says 'we help people when they need it'. Photo: Melissa Adams Jacqui White, the 51-year-old disability pensioner challenging the Abbott government over its plans to restructure the support payment, says recipients are no different to any other Australians. The only thing that sets them apart is an encounter with ill-health or other misfortune. A single mother, Ms White sings the praises of her 16-year-old son who, she says, acts as her legs, keeps her going and combines being an unacknowledged carer with his school studies and part-time work. It is less than a decade since she began ''leaving normal''. Until then she was married, in regular employment and largely taking life for granted. A move from Canberra to Brisbane in 2005 contributed to the emergence of symptoms of what is believed to be a long-standing case of multiple sclerosis. She moved back in 2010. Advertisement ''A lot of people with MS are heat intolerant,'' she said. ''My neurologist says I have had the condition for at least 10 years and possibly up to 20.'' Plagued by dizzy spells and migraines, Ms White eventually had to leave her job as a financial planner. ''My employers were great; they adjusted my hours and really tried to make it work, but you just reach a point where [because of your illness] you aren't reliable enough to hold down the job.'' Refusing to give in, she signed on with a cleaning contractor but, after a time, even that proved too much. ''It was horrible … I had always been an outdoors, active, healthy person. This is not what I expected or planned,'' she said. Ms White, who paid taxes or contributed to the community through volunteer work for 30 years, said she never begrudged that money being used to help people in need. ''[The DSP] is a safety net,'' she said. ''It is part of the social contract; we help people when they need it.'' She has contributed to society in other ways. The mother of four children, including grown twins, is a former president of the Canberra Multiple Birth Association: ''I've had one for mum, one for dad and two for the country.'' The disability support pension, which pays just under $400 a week compared with about $245 a week for Newstart, has been vital. ''For a lot of people it would be the difference between eating and not, between having a roof over their head and not, or even just survival or not,'' Ms White said. ''What human price is this country prepared to pay to save some money?'' Read more: www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/disability-support-pension-part-of-the-social-contract-20131225-2zwnz.html#ixzz2oaKod3uD
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Post by dinky on Dec 26, 2013 19:54:32 GMT 7
Jacqui White of Symonston. Photo: Melissa Adams Ms White, who has been on the disability support pension since 2010, is horrified by the Coalition's plan to slash the disability support pension. Advertisement She said the move had created uncertainty and fear for her and the estimated 822,000 other people dependent on the hard-to-get pension, which amounts to an annual cost of about $15 billion. ''It took me two years just to qualify to apply,'' she said. ''I believe it's even harder now.'' Finance Minister Mathias Cormann has confirmed the disability pension was in the cross-hairs of the government's Commission of Audit in an interview with Sky News. ''This [the disability support pension] is one of the fast-growing areas of government expenditure,'' he said on Sunday. ''The Commission of Audit is looking at this whole area for us … and is expected to make some recommendations on how that can best be achieved by the end of January.'' Mr Cormann, who seemed unaware of Mr Abbott's pledge not to change pensions, said no poll promises would be broken. ''If your question is whether we will stick to our election commitments, yes, absolutely,'' he said. But Ms White said the two positions were incompatible - either the government would break its word and go ahead with the cost-cutting changes, or it would keep its word and leave the pensions alone. Ms White fears ideologues in the Coalition are pushing for changes along the lines of those now in force in Britain. ''Is it ideological? Absolutely. This seems to come straight from the Tea Party-style of right-wing thought.'' Speaking in March, six months before his pledge not to change pensions, Mr Abbott told Queensland Chamber of Commerce and Industry he wanted a two-tier system, modelled on the British one, which paid people with disabilities different rates depending on whether their condition was permanent. Not enough was being done to bring people with disabilities back into the workforce, he said. ''With just over 1 per cent of disability pensioners moving back into the workforce every year, and with nearly 60 per cent of recipients having potentially treatable mental health or muscular skeletal conditions, a reform of this [British] type should be considered here,'' he said. ''It's about ending the practice of parking older unemployed people on the disability pension rather than helping them to continue to participate economically as well as socially.'' Ms White said this was not the case with her. When her MS had advanced to the point she could no longer hold down her office job, she signed on with a cleaning company, until that, too, became impossible. She questioned Mr Abbott's understanding of the system, saying one of the principal reasons people did not re-enter the full-time workforce was that they could work up to 30 hours a week while maintaining eligibility. Read more: www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/tony-abbott-breaks-pension-pledge-on-disability-support-pension-20131225-2zwny.html#ixzz2oaKyETeb
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Post by dinky on Dec 26, 2013 19:59:58 GMT 7
Good news looks like Ms White an educated person going into bat for us (not that I am not educated ? )
She would be there for the present opposition educated and putting her case forward and I must say she done it very well
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Post by dinky on Dec 26, 2013 21:53:12 GMT 7
IT'S the season of good cheer, yet, the baleful visage of Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews glowers over the land. The same Andrews who gave us WorkChoices, was instrumental in removing the right of Northern Territorians to end their lives with dignity, decided on the guilt of the innocent Dr Mohamed Haneef, who gags at the prospect of women having control over their own bodies, opposes stem cell research and decreed that Africans were unfit immigrants to Australia now wants to cull the ranks of those on the disability pension.
He is looking at a two-tier system to separate the temporarily and the permanently disabled, with a review mechanism that will home in on the under-40s.
It has been coyly flagged as a "major overhaul" on the back of figures showing 820,000 Australians of working age (about 1 in 20) are on the Disability Support Pension scheme.
DSP, it seems, is costing us what the more hysterical media reports termed a "staggering" $15 billion a year.
It is a hefty sum of money, although the degree to which you might be "staggered" probably depends on your sense of budgetary priorities.
Some might think it is a sum that a society should be proud to invest in the support of those with disabilities.
Or, as Mahatma Gandhi said: "A nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members.''
WHAT DO YOU THINK? LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS BELOW
But, the implicit outrage in these reports is based on the mean-spirited and envy-driven premise that an inordinate number of recipients are undeserving at best or fraudulent at worst.
The language of reporting has noted that people receive DSP "without even looking for work", which seems to redefine the very notion of disability.
However, for all the anecdotal claims of the web-warriors and the natural cynicism that lurks within most of us, there is not a lot of real evidence to support those suspicions or to turn tittle-tattle into fact.
Jon Kudelka cartoon featuring then-Federal Oppositon Leader Tony Abbott. Jon Kudelka cartoon featuring then-Federal Oppositon Leader Tony Abbott. Source: News Limited
Of course there are malingerers, bludgers and rort merchants cashing in on a huge and bureaucratically eggbound organisation.
To expect 100 per cent honesty is a bit like demanding full-time integrity from politicians.
However, I have to accept that the overwhelming majority are deserving of the magnificent $800 a fortnight they receive because entitlement to a DSP is clinically and cold-bloodedly regulated under strict guidelines and a points scheme that scores disabilities like Foreign Affairs does passport applications.
For every bludger limping around holding a sore back, there is probably at least one person nursing a genuine injury or disability and bemoaning the heartlessness of the Government.
How tough is the Government? In 2010-2011 just over 40 per cent of DSP claims were rejected, which probably sorted out a few deadbeats but equally probably disadvantaged more than a few deserving people.
And the rejection rate for younger people - those in Andrews' sights - was nudging as high as nearly 70 per cent.
The main reason for rejection was that the medical condition at issue was considered to be short term, which makes Andrews' ambitions of a two-tier scheme sound superfluous.
The other figure that has excited critics is that the number of people on DSP has grown by 22 per cent in the past decade (at a time when the population grew from 20 million to 23.3 million).
The strange fact is that since 1972, annual fluctuations in DSP numbers have ranged between negative 3.2 per cent and positive 10.4 per cent for no apparent reason and with no obvious correlation with the party in government.
Andrews himself concedes his department does not have the resources to constantly review all those on DSP, but if it must boil down to a cost-benefit analysis, why should the Government enjoy the presumption of righteousness and the disabled bear the burden of establishing their innocence?
At a time when cost-cutting is all the go, why should the Government wave an axe over the necks of the disabled while forging ahead with parenting welfare for the middle class, lifting the indexation rates for well-off self-funded retirees, subsidising private health insurance, restoring the licence to pillage for financial advisers and closing the windows of transparency for so-called charities?
Instead of decrying the number of people who receive government support - and tearing our hair out over the burdens of an ageing population - it's about time we accepted those facts of life, along with our collective responsibility, with somewhat better grace.
But, if we must tinker with the DSP, can we find someone warmer than Andrews to do it?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2013 3:41:05 GMT 7
They could be testing the waters to establish which of their proposed cuts will cause them political damage. In light of this i would encourage everyone to contact their local federal MP and express your displeasure. Has to be worth a try The problem is the next election is years away and they probably think they will win it anyway as incoming governments almost always win the second election, so l guess the liberals think they can do pity much whatever they like. If they save a couple billion bucks kicking the disabled onto newstart l bet they will just end up wasting it , maybe buying more of those useless fighter jets and second hand heleopters that don't work properly from the Yanks just to make them happy. Australias the second richest country in the world, Its not the case that's theres not enough money to pay the DSP, its just that they would rather spend the money on other things, maybe giving more billions to those wealthy private schools that charge $20,000 per year fees, where the parents car park resembles a prestige car show , so they can build new Olympic sized swimming pools, sports halls, and rowing sheds for the rich kids.
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Post by Banjo on Dec 27, 2013 7:26:48 GMT 7
Public service sheds disabled employees at 'shameful' rateThe public service is losing three times as many people with disabilities as it is hiring, with numbers hitting a 20-year low. While the overall number of public servants has dropped in the past year, the number of people with disabilities has been falling almost continually since 2007. In 1994, the Australian Public Service employed 8063 people with disabilities. In 2013, there were just 4450, the lowest number in two decades. Public servants with a disability were also more likely to resign from their jobs and less likely to retire compared with other workers. The figures came one year after Australian Public Service Commissioner Stephen Sedgwick launched a disability employment strategy, As One, to increase the number of people with disabilities in the public service. Advertisement Mr Sedgwick said last week not enough progress had been made on bringing people with a disability into the public service. ''It remains a serious concern that the representation rate is not rising of those who identify as indigenous or as having a disability,'' he said. ''We need to be vigilant, especially vigilant, to be sure that we maintain the diversity of our workforce as we downsize in the years ahead.'' The latest State of the Service report showed although the number of people with disabilities joining the service rose sharply in 2012-13 to 2.1 per cent, it still dwarfed the number of those leaving their positions, which were at a seven-year high of 5.1 per cent. Australian Disability Discrimination commissioner Graeme Innes said the public service's record for employing people with disabilities was shameful. ''This just reinforces my serious concerns about this issue. The public service can't tell private employers to employ people with disability when it's got such an appalling record itself,'' he said.Mr Innes called for changes to the public service, which he said had until now just been playing around the edges of the problem. Targets tied directly to department secretary's pay bonuses were among measures he believed necessary. ''There's no significant commitment towards changing the situation and without that at senior levels it's just not going to happen,'' he said. President of People with Disability Australia Craig Wallace was a member of the public service for 15 years, during which he said it was sometimes difficult to get even the most basic accommodations. He said the new numbers did not surprise him at all. ''I really think the public service needs to take a long hard look at what its policies and practices are supporting and keeping people with a disability in the public service,'' he said. From his experience in the service, public servants were more likely to be urged to resign than retrenched or terminated. In 2012-13, of all the people with disabilities who left the public service, 64 per cent resigned, compared with 46 per cent of all other public servants. ''What they will normally try and do is ease people on a resignation pathway,'' he said. All figures mentioning people with disabilities in the report are people who have identified themselves as having a disability, which may include mental illness and work-related acquired disabilities. Read more: www.smh.com.au/national/public-service-sheds-disabled-employees-at-shameful-rate-20131226-2zy54.html#ixzz2od9E6s6V
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2013 7:57:40 GMT 7
Public service sheds disabled employees at 'shameful' rateThe public service is losing three times as many people with disabilities as it is hiring, with numbers hitting a 20-year low. While the overall number of public servants has dropped in the past year, the number of people with disabilities has been falling almost continually since 2007. In 1994, the Australian Public Service employed 8063 people with disabilities. In 2013, there were just 4450, the lowest number in two decades. Public servants with a disability were also more likely to resign from their jobs and less likely to retire compared with other workers. The figures came one year after Australian Public Service Commissioner Stephen Sedgwick launched a disability employment strategy, As One, to increase the number of people with disabilities in the public service. Advertisement Mr Sedgwick said last week not enough progress had been made on bringing people with a disability into the public service. ''It remains a serious concern that the representation rate is not rising of those who identify as indigenous or as having a disability,'' he said. ''We need to be vigilant, especially vigilant, to be sure that we maintain the diversity of our workforce as we downsize in the years ahead.'' The latest State of the Service report showed although the number of people with disabilities joining the service rose sharply in 2012-13 to 2.1 per cent, it still dwarfed the number of those leaving their positions, which were at a seven-year high of 5.1 per cent. Australian Disability Discrimination commissioner Graeme Innes said the public service's record for employing people with disabilities was shameful. ''This just reinforces my serious concerns about this issue. The public service can't tell private employers to employ people with disability when it's got such an appalling record itself,'' he said.Mr Innes called for changes to the public service, which he said had until now just been playing around the edges of the problem. Targets tied directly to department secretary's pay bonuses were among measures he believed necessary. ''There's no significant commitment towards changing the situation and without that at senior levels it's just not going to happen,'' he said. President of People with Disability Australia Craig Wallace was a member of the public service for 15 years, during which he said it was sometimes difficult to get even the most basic accommodations. He said the new numbers did not surprise him at all. ''I really think the public service needs to take a long hard look at what its policies and practices are supporting and keeping people with a disability in the public service,'' he said. From his experience in the service, public servants were more likely to be urged to resign than retrenched or terminated. In 2012-13, of all the people with disabilities who left the public service, 64 per cent resigned, compared with 46 per cent of all other public servants. ''What they will normally try and do is ease people on a resignation pathway,'' he said. All figures mentioning people with disabilities in the report are people who have identified themselves as having a disability, which may include mental illness and work-related acquired disabilities. Read more: www.smh.com.au/national/public-service-sheds-disabled-employees-at-shameful-rate-20131226-2zy54.html#ixzz2od9E6s6V They say theres too many people on the DSP and they want to reduce the numbers but where will the jobs come from for the people they kick off?
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Post by zingzingzing on Dec 27, 2013 8:14:53 GMT 7
www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/we-should-accept-our-collective-responsibility-for-disabled-citizens-with-better-grace-shouldnt-we-kevin-andrews/story-fnihsr9v-1226790217148The same Andrews who gave us WorkChoices, was instrumental in removing the right of Northern Territorians to end their lives with dignity, decided on the guilt of the innocent Dr Mohamed Haneef, who gags at the prospect of women having control over their own bodies, opposes stem cell research and decreed that Africans were unfit immigrants to Australia now wants to cull the ranks of those on the disability pension. He is looking at a two-tier system to separate the temporarily and the permanently disabled, with a review mechanism that will home in on the under-40s. It has been coyly flagged as a "major overhaul" on the back of figures showing 820,000 Australians of working age (about 1 in 20) are on the Disability Support Pension scheme. DSP, it seems, is costing us what the more hysterical media reports termed a "staggering" $15 billion a year. It is a hefty sum of money, although the degree to which you might be "staggered" probably depends on your sense of budgetary priorities. Or, as Mahatma Gandhi said: "A nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members.'' But, the implicit outrage in these reports is based on the mean-spirited and envy-driven premise that an inordinate number of recipients are undeserving at best or fraudulent at worst. The language of reporting has noted that people receive DSP "without even looking for work", which seems to redefine the very notion of disability. However, for all the anecdotal claims of the web-warriors and the natural cynicism that lurks within most of us, there is not a lot of real evidence to support those suspicions or to turn tittle-tattle into fact. Of course there are malingerers, bludgers and rort merchants cashing in on a huge and bureaucratically eggbound organisation. To expect 100 per cent honesty is a bit like demanding full-time integrity from politicians. However, I have to accept that the overwhelming majority are deserving of the magnificent $800 a fortnight they receive because entitlement to a DSP is clinically and cold-bloodedly regulated under strict guidelines and a points scheme that scores disabilities like Foreign Affairs does passport applications. For every bludger limping around holding a sore back, there is probably at least one person nursing a genuine injury or disability and bemoaning the heartlessness of the Government. How tough is the Government? In 2010-2011 just over 40 per cent of DSP claims were rejected, which probably sorted out a few deadbeats but equally probably disadvantaged more than a few deserving people. And the rejection rate for younger people - those in Andrews' sights - was nudging as high as nearly 70 per cent. The main reason for rejection was that the medical condition at issue was considered to be short term, which makes Andrews' ambitions of a two-tier scheme sound superfluous. The other figure that has excited critics is that the number of people on DSP has grown by 22 per cent in the past decade (at a time when the population grew from 20 million to 23.3 million). The strange fact is that since 1972, annual fluctuations in DSP numbers have ranged between negative 3.2 per cent and positive 10.4 per cent for no apparent reason and with no obvious correlation with the party in government. Andrews himself concedes his department does not have the resources to constantly review all those on DSP, but if it must boil down to a cost-benefit analysis, why should the Government enjoy the presumption of righteousness and the disabled bear the burden of establishing their innocence? At a time when cost-cutting is all the go, why should the Government wave an axe over the necks of the disabled while forging ahead with parenting welfare for the middle class, lifting the indexation rates for well-off self-funded retirees, subsidising private health insurance, restoring the licence to pillage for financial advisers and closing the windows of transparency for so-called charities? Instead of decrying the number of people who receive government support - and tearing our hair out over the burdens of an ageing population - it's about time we accepted those facts of life, along with our collective responsibility, with somewhat better grace. But, if we must tinker with the DSP, can we find someone warmer than Andrews to do it?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2013 11:06:25 GMT 7
The new laws are to apply to people under 40, l was wondering if someone is actually 40 years old does that mean they are exempt and overage or are they included?
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