Powerd NewsWrap 4th March 2026

Vision Australia ID  0:00  
Welcome to a Vision Australia radio podcast. Love our podcasts. Why not listen to us live? Tune in anywhere, anytime, ask your smart device to play Vision Australia radio or visit va radio.org

Speaker 1  0:21  
on the Vision Australia and reading radio networks. This is the Powerd news, rap, G'day.

Sam Rickard  0:27  
I'm Sam Rickard. It's the fourth of March. Where has this year got to we're reading articles from the Powerd dot media website, and of course, joining me is the writer of most of these articles, at least, Emma Myers. G'day, Emma, good morning. Stan, we've got a mixed bag again. The first article we're reading, I think anyone with a disability who was listening will probably roll their eyes and go, duh. But Well, I did find certain aspects of what the Disability Discrimination Commissioner had to say rather interesting. Anyway, you didn't actually do this interview, though. Did you No?

Emma Myers  1:04  
So it was one of our correspondence with an rth agent that actually did this interview, but in saying that we did collaborate on what we were going to ask the Disability Discrimination Commissioner, and as you said, Sam Rosemary chaos, pretty much agreed with everything we've been touching on since this whole podcast began in that, yeah, things need to change. Things need to improve.

Sam Rickard  1:38  
The big thing that I got out of this, and it was something that hadn't quite dawned on me, really, was that, I mean, when she talked about the fact that, yes, the you have community centers and maybe a single disabled individual battling against a company or a department, and the companies come all lawyered up, and yes, there's that, there's a there's a discrepancy there, which, okay, that's obvious, but the simple fact that it ends with a payout and nobody learns any lessons after that is just okay, we'll, we'll allocate this to our budget.

Emma Myers  2:09  
Yeah, it's pretty much like that. You did explain in more detail during the half an hour interview that you know the Discrimination Act is meant to be a lever that we can pull to enact our rights to pretty much be treated as anyone else, then saying that it's also the only lever that we've got to pull. And she said it doesn't really work half the time.

Sam Rickard  2:41  
Well, what I'm gathering now is that if you're prepared to pay enough money, then you can pay pay for the right to discriminate, and that does not make things better, no?

Emma Myers  2:51  
And I mean, I do think then that that's the case with a lot of situations, be you have a disability or not, it's, it's a case of, if you've got the money, you can do whatever you want.

Sam Rickard  3:08  
Indeed, indeed. All right, so we will go to the article read again by a talented young

Unknown Speaker  3:15  
reader called Sam Ricard. Probably

Sam Rickard  3:17  
not, No, probably not. He's in his mid 50s and trying desperately to try and read something, and probably need to edit the interview afterwards, quite heavily as well. Anyway, we'll cross to me, and then we have a new news reader who is the incomparable Lee Martin. Many Australians living with disability would likely be feeling stressed about the array of government sanctioned disability reforms presently taking place which could have a direct impact on their day to day lives. Powerd one RPh correspondent Sarah guys sat down with Disability Discrimination Commissioner Rosemary kayers to discuss the current state of disability politics, including calls for a unified approach to accessibility in education, employment and justice, when asked how she would describe the current environment for people with disability, Ms kayers says it is frustrating we seem to have got to a point where we don't seem to be able to take the next step. Education is becoming a real thing of tension. She explains, the Royal Commission found that we need to heavily invest in exclusive public education, yet what we see in most states is an investment in special education. Inclusive pedagogy has developed so much, and the way we could be teaching in an inclusive way is still far off. The commissioner claims that although the Disability Discrimination Act, DDA has been around for nearly 35 years, and the NDIS has been in place for over a decade. There hasn't been enough upgrades to the systems. I think everybody thought the NDIS would solve all the problems. Much of the general population, and especially the political classes, didn't understand specifically. What the NDIS was to do and what work was required, they've now found that's a very expensive gig. And what hasn't been happening is all that mainstream change that needs to happen when speaking about the Disability Discrimination Act, Miss cayers explains how the DDA has been trying to do all the heavy lifting, describing the act as the sole lever for many cases to achieve systematic change, but claiming it hasn't led to significant systematic change. We've got a system where it's on the person with a disability to take on the system, and it's a heavy load, time wise, emotionally, financially, we take it to the federal court, and the burden of proof on proving discrimination overwhelmingly falls back on the person with a disability. She explains, it's not uncommon for some departments and companies to come filled up with barristers and legal teams against the Community Legal Center at a person with a disability. A payout makes it go away, but we still get no systematic change. That's why I think it needs to be reviewed. Touching on the recent hate speech debate, the commissioner was asked whether the government should have taken the opportunity to see how similar things applied to people with disability. We should recognize that hate speech just isn't contained to antiSemitism, and if you are going to provide justice to people, you provide it to all people, not that I am saying that antiSemitism couldn't be protected. All hate speech should be protected in the same way. She went on to explain how the disability community experiences hate speech and vilification in a variety of ways. It's like a spectrum. There's a casual derogatory comment through to the guy that shot a person with a disability over a disability parking space. There's lots of systematic stuff that happens between valuing of people, sometimes they could be considered a form of vilification to incite hate. You're taking up oxygen, costing us a fortune. The commissioner gave an example, pointing to the power of social media, claiming platforms elevate negative commentary. I feel like in the disability space, it's something the general community doesn't necessarily recognize. Things like saying, Oh, should taxpayers pay so much for the NDIS? You can follow that thought logically through too. There's a value we put on life for dignity, and we are not prepared to pay for that for some people, but I'm not sure people realize that by saying one thing, they're effectively saying the other thing, Miss kayers, believes the attitudes of the government and the public stem from the eugenics movement last century. These people are taking up valuable food for other people, the workers, the true people, the real people. And it was reinforced during covid. It won't affect many people. It won't affect most people, it's just the people with underlying conditions. She says the fact that 98% of Australians have underlying conditions was irrelevant. They're those micro aggressions that people put up with every day that wear them down and wear them down. It's like Noel Pearson talks about in the race context, the soft bigotry of low expectations looking forward to what she hopes for in the disability agenda over the coming months. Ms, kayers says she would like to see a stronger DDA, I'll put all my energy into trying to ensure that happens. I would like to see the NDIS come out of it at the end of all this pain for people still having a connection to its human rights principles and genuinely giving people with disability an individual package that meets their individual needs.

Speaker 1  8:29  
Australians with disability could lead the next wave of disability research as the Albanese government gets set to splash an approximated $5.4 million investment via the National Disability Research Partnership, the $5 million figure is proposed to empower researchers to explore ways to strengthen the safety of people with disability, increase accessibility and build more inclusive communities, following key recommendations made by the Disability Royal Commission, according to a statement published by Minister for the NDIS, Senator Jenny McAllister, the minister claims that the funds will help create and navigate clear pathways for emerging researchers with disability, Ensuring disability expertise is valued and embedded in the future of Australian research. We're building the evidence base to design services that promote safety and independence centered around the needs of people with disability. Jen Hargrave is a community researcher living with disability. She explains how she has seen firsthand, how people with lived experience driving research can impact the types of programs that receive funding, which, in turn, can influence which policies are passed. What makes it different is that it's promoting disability leadership from the beginning of. The project, which I think shapes projects in a really different way, so that you're setting up a better methodology. She says it makes the impact stronger, because people with disabilities are going to see themselves in the work more, and it helps answer some really big knowledge gaps that we have about Australians with disabilities. Professor Christine Eames is an occupational therapist and research director at the University of Melbourne's healthy trajectories Child and Youth Disability Research Hub. She is also part of one of the teams to have received early funding via the National Disability Research Partnership, that opportunity means that young people with disability and their families are driving the direction of the research about psychological safety, so that we focus on building contexts that are supportive of the well Being of all young people. She explains. Professor IMS believes the funding boost is a valuable opportunity. It's a really good opportunity for the community to learn how to authentically engage and work together, to do research that's focused on the priorities of people with disability. However, Professor IMS did question whether the overall $5.4 million amount allocated towards disability, led research could be higher given the number of Australians living with disability, which happens to be 5.5 million people nationwide, if we think about that five and a half million In the context of, say, health research, where there's nearly $6 billion allocated, it's not a lot, she says, however, community researcher Jen Hargrave says she has not seen this level of funding given to the disability research sector. I have not seen such a big investment in disability led research ever before. I've never seen anything like this, so I hope it's a sign of trends changing. Grants that support disability led research give us opportunities, as people with disability, to build up skills. It's creating opportunities and career pathways for people with disabilities in the industry, Ms Hargrave claims, according to the statement released by Ms McAllister, the federal government is also backing a new leadership program to support the next generation of disability researchers. 14 participants will receive up to $30,000 each to help fund their postgraduate research, build peer networks and strengthen connections with the disability sector organizations. Mary say as CEO of the National Disability Research Partnership, or ndrp, Australia's first independent research organization, co led by people with disability, believes the investment will support research projects led by and designed for people with disability. This funding recognizes the expertise that comes from lived experience and invests directly in building the leadership capability and influence of researchers with disability to inform real world change. She says it's a significant step towards a more inclusive and impactful research system that delivers better outcomes for Australians with disability. Applications for the research fund are open until April the 20th. If you would like to know more, go to www.ndrp.org.au/research

Speaker 1  13:53  
the link, of course, available in the podcast notes of this show.

Unknown Speaker  13:58  
Emma, what did you take from this? It's

Emma Myers  14:00  
nice to see the government investing in lived experience research of disability, because then the findings from the research can go on to inform policies that get made regarding our lives. However, one of the people I spoke to pointed out that the figure itself is $5.4 million of funding. However, there's 5.5 million people living with disability in Australia, so it's not even really $1 per head.

Sam Rickard  14:35  
So essentially, what that means is, when I'm buying lunch for myself, I'm actually spending 10 times more on me, then the government is on this research, yes. So I suppose that puts in things into perspective, really, considering the amount of money that goes out there for other research projects as well. So it's nice to be thought of, but maybe a little bit more would be would be nice as well,

Emma Myers  14:58  
considering there. Are so many people who will be impacted by disability in their lifetime, whether it be acquiring one or someone else that they know living with their condition, it's Yeah. You would think that there'd be more funding. However, another person that spoke to, said that she had never seen this amount of funding allocated to disability research before. So make of that what you will

Sam Rickard  15:30  
baby steps, as it were. Well, that is a wrap for this wrap. What have we got to look forward to in the near future?

Emma Myers  15:37  
I am hopefully going to be speaking with a couple of winter Paralympians, and I'm in the middle of writing an article about Accessible Adventures.

Sam Rickard  15:50  
Well, that sounds interesting. And the Winter Paralympics, good luck in your sport, and good luck getting home, and good luck to us. Bye, for now, bye.

Speaker 1  15:58  
You can find these articles and more by going to Powerd, spelt P, O, W, E, R, D, dot media, along with the podcast of this show, the Powerd news rap was brought to you by disability media Australia. This show was produced by Sam Rickard in the Adelaide studios of Vision Australia radio.