As disabled people, we are too often overlooked, underestimated and dismissed by non-disabled people. Too often we’re met with a “good on you champ”, or there’s a unique type of wide-eye, raised-eyebrow stare that comes when strangers realise the kids you are picking up from school are yours.
In week two of the election campaign, our community has been wheeled under the spotlight with Scott Morrison expressing that he has been “blessed” to have non-disabled children. Hearing these remarks from our Prime Minister was deeply saddening and rage-inducing for me and many in our community.
For millions of us, hearing these words come out of the Prime Minister’s mouth pushed a real big button. It brought to the front of our minds every stare or quiet remark made by a stranger, and it raised the age-old critical self-talk question: am I a burden on my family and loved ones?
It cut pretty deep.
Praise be?
As the only physically disabled person in the Australian Parliament, I’ve seen firsthand just how out of touch Scott Morrison’s Liberal Government is with our disability community’s needs and the harm caused by that lack of understanding.
His use of “blessed” is both another example of his inability to get it and a window into his beliefs about disabled people.
You see, as disabled people, we’ve had a long and chequered history with the concept of being “blessed”.
Parts of the Old and New Testaments have a lot to answer for their views of disability, which have shaped community values about disabled people and how that impacts our social, economic and political participation.
First off, it pushes the belief that disability is a punishment for being a sinner.
If only we’d been more faithful – we would then be born in the image of the divine human being. This ends up with well-intentioned strangers coming up to disabled people and offering to pray our disabilities away.
Rolling down the main street in Perth to head into the office, I am all too regularly met with strangers putting their hands on my back expressing that they’ve prayed for me. Turns out, despite this happening time and time again, I still have cerebral palsy. Just writing about this experience makes me shudder, although I know I’m not alone in this experience.
We’re not done yet!
Some parts of the Bible also reckon that we should be virtuous in our suffering. That our disability is brought upon us to teach us a necessary lesson.
From where I’m sitting, this lets society and decision-makers off the hook. People accept it’s ok that the lives of disabled people should be difficult and that we should be grateful for the good days.
In fact, many of the challenges we experience are because of the way our communities are designed – whether it’s prioritising stairs instead of ramps, capitalism glorifying working 37+ hours a week or our classrooms not being inclusive for kids of all abilities. All of these decisions are political ones, and there are solutions if our governments wanted to prioritise them.
All the cripples are in a group chat, right?
As the #blessed saga has rolled through this week, we’ve seen Scott Morrison try and make amends by picking up the phone to para-athlete and Australian Of The Year Dylan Alcott to apologise.
Don’t get me wrong, Dylan’s awesome and Scott Morrison really needed to apologise. But come on, apologising to one disabled person isn’t going to cut it. It’s not like we’re all in one big group chat (although that would be an *excellent* group chat).
If Morrison really wanted to apologise, he’d let his actions speak louder than his words. He’d raise the Disability Support Pension, he’d support the Greens’ call to make dental and mental healthcare free into Medicare, he’d allow people over 65 to get on the National Disability Insurance Scheme and he’d take action on climate change so disabled people aren’t finding a way to escape their homes while floodwaters rise around them.
In the next term of the Federal Parliament, we need to put disabled people at the decision-making table.
40 per cent of Australians report having a disability or a chronic health condition and yet we don’t have anywhere near that amount of people in decision-making spaces.
There are more people called Andrew than there are physically disabled people in the Federal Parliament.
Disabled people have been shut out of policy and decision-making for far too long in this country. We must commit to centering the needs and voices of disabled people and building a person-centred disability policy that is truly co-designed by the people it affects most.
The fact is the Disability Minister should be a person who identifies as a disabled person. A person who’s proudly part of the disability community. One who has lived experience of navigating this world as a disabled person and the ableism we face.
And of course, that person needs to be actively listening and working alongside people with a range of disabilities, as no one person can project their experiences to all other disabled people’s experiences.
A disabled Disability Minister would know the unique needs of disabled people in crisis zones.
A disabled Disability Minister would know that the NDIS is failing to give many disabled people the support they need.
A disabled Disability Minister would know that appropriate and accessible housing needs serious investment — because there simply aren’t enough suitable homes for everyone who needs one.
Perhaps above all, a disabled Disability Minister would be moved to do something about these issues, because they’d know firsthand what it means to leave them unaddressed.
A disabled person as Disability Minister. Now that would be a blessing.
Jordon Steele-John (he/him) is a proud disabled person and an Australian Greens Senator. Elected as Australia’s youngest ever Senator, he is currently the only person in the Australian Parliament who has a physical disability and used a wheelchair for mobility.
