It's up to all of us to create a less disabling society

Friday, 5 November 2021

The head of the new Ministry for Disabled People must be a disabled person, and there should be strong disabled leaders throughout the organisation, writes Jonathan Mosen.

OPINION: As a blind teenage activist full of optimism and confidence, I contributed to a submission to the 1986 Royal Commission on Social Policy. Its five-volume report made little difference other than perhaps to serve as a useful doorstop in some ministerial offices.

It was the first of many frustrating discussions I and many other disabled people have had, advocating for something other minorities take for granted – a ministry for us, by us, led by a champion with our own voice at the chief executive level of the public service.

This Government has listened, to its great credit, in announcing the creation of a Ministry for Disabled People; I feel cautiously optimistic about truly transformative change for disabled people.

But what happens over the next few months will be critical.

**READ MORE:

Jonathan Mosen: ‘’... all political parties should make a public commitment to putting disabled people in winnable positions on party lists in the 2023 election.’’

* Government announces new Ministry for Disabled People

* Disability community welcomes 'groundbreaking' changes to sector

* New Ministry for Disabled People needs a relevant Māori lens, advocates say

It would be unthinkable in 2021 for a man to make a significant announcement on women’s issues, or for a Pākehā to announce a major Māori initiative. Yet non-disabled people had to announce this new ministry, because disabled people are still having to knock on the doors of non-disabled decision-makers far too often. No current MP identifies as a member of the disability community. Few disabled people are in any senior leadership role or in positions of influence.

The new ministry must be the change it wants to see in the world, starting at the top. Not only is it imperative that the chief executive be a disabled person, but there should be strong disabled leaders throughout the organisation.

The ministry should then use the levers of government to encourage others to follow its example. Procurement should favour organisations that put disabled people in key leadership roles. Few organisations providing services to disabled people are led by disabled people, in stark contrast to services for most other minorities.

This is also a time when all political parties should make a public commitment to putting disabled people in winnable positions on party lists in the 2023 election.

Politicians often reference a slogan used by disabled people, “nothing about us without us”. But without these actions, they will be guilty of having turned an aspiration of disabled people into meaningless political rhetoric.

The consequences of largely excluding disabled people from decision-making roles have been dire, partly because they make up such a sizeable minority, the largest in the country. There are 1.1 million of us, according to the 2013 Disability Survey, and we are confronted by some of the grimmest statistics.

The unemployment rate for New Zealanders as a whole has just fallen to 3.4 per cent, but two-thirds of disabled people are unemployed. Many of us are keen to contribute and could do so with a little more support and a lot more open mindedness.
Disabled people are, on average, paid less than their non-disabled counterparts, more than $100 a week.
StatsNZ's 2018 disability gap snapshot goes on to show that disabled people are more likely than their non-disabled peers to experience discrimination, have poorer education outcomes, rent rather than own their own home, live in an unhealthy home, and simply find it much harder to access key and important facilities.
Disparities remain between entitlements available to those with impairments caused by accident and everyone else.

The list is literally endless, and expectations will be high. If there is one danger of these reforms, it is that the rest of the public service will feel let off the hook. So the new ministry must tenaciously make the point that creating a less disabling society is the responsibility of us all.

We are not the Ministry for Disabled People’s problem; we are New Zealand’s untapped opportunity.

It has been a long, hard, painful slog, but after years of banging our heads against a brick wall, the brick wall finally moved. Now we need to ensure all that effort was worthwhile. It’s time to make “nothing about us without us” a reality at last.

We will be watching.

Jonathan Mosen is chief executive of Workbridge, a national organisation which helps disabled people and those with other barriers find employment. He is blind and hearing-impaired.