A commonwealth taskforce will be established within social services minister Amanda Rishworth’s department to consider the recommendations of the disability royal commission.
Alongside Department of Social Services staff, the taskforce will have staff seconded from Education, the Attorney-General’s Department, Health and Aged Care and the NDIA. Rishworth said PM&C, Treasury and Finance would also be involved.
Releasing the report on Friday, the minister said the government would not rush to respond to the 222 recommendations.
“The task force will coordinate the Australian government’s response, particularly focused on the recommendations that are directed towards the commonwealth,” Rishworth said.
“The task force will be critical in assessing how the individual recommendations are linked together, understanding the broader implications of these recommendations and sequencing the government’s response.
“This work will be done in close consultation with the disability community and stakeholders.”
Both Rishworth and government services minister Bill Shorten said the breadth of recommendations in the royal commission’s report required time to be carefully considered.
“It’s a large body of work, as you can see here, and we need to take it seriously,” Shorten said.
“We need to work through [the recommendations]. Of course, as I’ve outlined, this is not just an issue for disability ministers. It is a whole of government response.”
Key recommendations for the government included establishing a new Department of Disability Equality and Inclusion, and a new federal disability portfolio and dedicated minister.
The report also recommended establishing a new independent National Disability Commission as a statutory authority.
The report was delivered to governor-general David Hurley on Thursday and tabled in parliament on Friday.
On the day the government made the hefty 12-volume report public, a coalition of representative organisations said the occasion was a “landmark” event for the Australian community.
“It’s the start of our journey to an inclusive future,” the advocates from the Australian Federation of Disability Organisations, Children and Young People with Disability Australia, Disability Advocacy Network Australia, First Peoples Disability Network Australia, Inclusion Australia, National Ethnic Disability Alliance, People with Disability Australia, and Women with Disabilities Australia said.
“Today, however, we choose to hold space for our community’s trauma and grief, in the spirit of healing and restorative justice.”
Intersectional discrimination was a recurring theme of testimony shared with the royal commission, the group said, as were horrific experiences of institutional neglect and abuse.
This included the compounding forms of discrimination and human rights abuses particularly affecting First Nations people with disability and people with an intellectual disability or complex support needs.
The royal commission report was the result of nearly 8,000 submissions – half of which were from people with disability themselves – and 32 public hearings with evidence from 837 witnesses.
“People with disability have given their courageous and often deeply painful testimony in the hope of change.
“We recognise the many people who haven’t been able to give testimony, often prevented by the very systems examined, and mourn the loss of all people with disability who have lost their lives to this violence,” the group said.
“Grounded in ongoing legacies of colonisation, our communities have shared experiences of institutionalisation, incarceration, removal of children and of institutionalised ableism in policies, programs and services.
“For First Nations people with disability, this is further layered with ongoing systemic racism and colonial violence.”
This royal commission, which was established in 2019, was the first of its kind given scope to consider how Australian systems have been designed to exclude or ignore the human rights, aspirations and needs of our communities. The royal commission terms of reference included the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in its mandate.
The group stressed that the path towards a more inclusive society must be built and led by people with disability.
“Nothing about us, without us,” the statement read.
“It is our expectation that the CRPD will underpin the response to the DRC, with people with disability’s leadership at the centre.
“As Disability Representative Organisations, we jointly acknowledge there will come a time when we will need to discuss the response to the final recommendations of the Disability Royal Commission, with the people who have been the most hurt at the heart of this response.
“We will do this in our own time, and our own space.”
Kate Washington, NSW minister for families and communities, and disability inclusion, issued a statement saying that she was grateful to every person who shared their stories.
“Over the past four years, the royal commission has shone a light on the serious abuse, exclusion and injustice that people with disability face across our society,” Washington said.
“The fact that so many people with disability came forward to speak with the royal commission shows that these issues are far too common, and we all have to do better.”
The minister has committed to attending a forum with stakeholders from the disability sector later in the month (October 23) to discuss the report findings. The event will be co-convened by The Department of Communities and Justice (DCJ) and the Disability Council NSW.
“We want to honour everyone’s contribution to the Royal Commission by carefully and methodically considering each of the 222 recommendations,” Washington said.
The state government in NSW will prepare its own formal response to the report within the next six months.
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