Sydney Surge and Life on the Spectrum | Q+A

should sydney lock down to protect the nation also tonight we'll turn our minds to life on the spectrum and barnaby 2.0 the deputy pm returns welcome to q a [Music] hey there and welcome to the program it's great to be back joining me on the panel tonight ceo of autism awareness australia nicole rogerson public health strategist bill botel in brisbane tonight one of the crowd favorites from love on the spectrum we're delighted to welcome jaden evans also from canberra labour's andrew lee and with us epidemiologist mary louise mcclause and you to join us shortly is liberal senator holly hughes who as it turns out has gone into isolation tonight herself and is awaiting covert test results so she'll join us during the program when she can please make all of them feel welcome and i should also let you know that judah covered uh paralympic athlete madison rosario won't be with us tonight we're going to look forward to having her on the show again soon you can stream us live on eye view and all the socials as always qwanda is the hashtag please do keep it respectful our first question tonight comes from noah smith there have been more cases or similar amount of cases in sydney than there was in the northern beaches in december when they went into lockdown so why hasn't sydney gone into lockdown mary louise mcclaws i know you were going to be in the studio with us tonight you've decided not to explain why it's to do with this question isn't it it is uh given that i've been saying since last week that we should have gone into a short sharp lockdown to keep everybody from moving around particularly those that don't know they're infected i decided that i need to practice what i preach as an outbreak manager has new south wales got it wrong i think new south wales is loath to use lockdowns and mostly every other state does um outbreak managers who've had practical experience understand the adage of going early going hard with very inadequate or imperfect data and then when there isn't any outbreak they get criticized but often they do the right thing so i think that this time they've had a very slow increase in numbers and then a very high peak which is quite unusual for this uh variant of concern but i still think that they should have gone into a sharp lockdown to stop people from particularly wandering over the weekend tonight's question though when the northern beaches went into lockdown there was 38 cases i think linked to that cluster there's 36 cases linked to the bondi cluster 49 locally acquired infections so far in this later sydney outbreak can you help us understand why a decision a different decision is being taken here well i think that with the northern beach outbreak and they had 41 to in total and it took them over a month to get to um zero sorry zeros i think that they uh went into lockdown fast because of the large numbers at the beginning and so that they were very concerned it would be out of control and quite rightly they went into lockdown it was sensible and and they were identified as being very sensible with this one because it went slowly and because they probably missed the boat in stopping people from um wandering on the weekends uh going to new zealand going to uh to to melbourne uh going to a party etc uh it they probably feel they don't want to now or they feel they've got it under control but i'm concerned that that's not necessarily the case yeah do you really think they have it under control in new south wales um well no i mean we've had several cases that are potentially causing more harm down in melbourne we have the hairdresser that has been a missed or mystery link as they call it then we've had the woman that went to new zealand so we're going to see more cases they may not be enormous in number but that's beside the point this is a variant of concern that has a reputation for causing more hospitalization and of course more children because of the large numbers of people they can infect all right let's take our next question it comes from eric coleman uh just leading on from the last question i think it sort of um leads on quite well is the current handling of the new south wales covert cluster by testing and contact raising coupled with proportionate measures such as mass wearing something that the other states can learn from rather than plunging entire cities into lockdown at the first sign of a positive covert community case as we've seen in brisbane and perth bill botel well we're here now uh 18 months fifth into the pandemic and we are repeating we're back to where we were it seems february march last year by now 18 months into this what we should be thinking about is how we could prudently open up uh our borders internally and internationally and we're not and the reason we're not is because there's been a very serious failure of quarantine arrangements particularly in this case at sydney airport and a very poor vaccination rate so we don't have the options that we would have if in australia today 57 percent of people had had double vaccinations only about five percent have so we brought this on ourselves by the decisions that have been taken that have not really kept up with the emergence of the covert delta variant which is much more infectious this was not the case with the northern beaches out episode in sydney or the crossroads it is much more infectious and the premier's right to say this is a very scary moment but you can't have it both ways you can't say it's a scary moment and we must do all of the things that we must do testing and so on and then think well it's business as usual we can we can be comfortable and this word proportionate in our response we only have one weapon in our armoury unfortunately now that works and that's as mary louise said a short sharp lockdown mary louise then if the argument is that what new south wales has done in the past has worked does it still work with the delta strain well that's a very big experiment and not one that i'd be willing to play with with people's lives and you know bill has mentioned that this is highly infectious let me remind you that the alpha strain was 33 percent more infectious than the wild strain than the wuhan this one is double that so in effect it's about 90 percent more infectious than the wuhan strain and of course we're seeing more people going to hospital so it's an experiment that i don't think i would be willing to play with and um yes bill is quite right you know the quarantine system is letting us down we've had 21 000 cases since we developed this mandatory quarantine system because of the 27 breaches that we've had we need to shore that up and we need to roll out the vaccine as soon as possible but not to um the pfizer but not to those that are anyone under 60 to 40 but to the group that are going to be more at risk of acquiring it and spreading it and that's the 20 to 39 year olds they have to be our priority and mary louise the prime minister today dismissed that view and said that the the design of this rollout is based on the medical advice you're now at odds with the prime minister on this well i am so last year who provided me with the kovacs facility framework and i went back to them and said this is a very compassionate framework they said absolutely because you're only going to get three percent then 17 so it has to be for frontline workers and the vulnerable quite right however that was for circulating virus a high level of circulating virus and i went back to them and said but we are different and they said well as a member country you can do whatever you like and so epidemiologists would then say you go where you get most juice for your squeeze and that is the 40 of cases in the 20 to 39 year old they are the biggest group the next group of course is the 40 to 60 and that's only 24 now sure they don't have the same risk of death as those 70 and over but if the young ones don't get it they can't spread it so we really need to protect the young right now jayden i want to bring you in here you are in queensland right now you're joining us from brisbane tonight because of these covert border restrictions you live in a state where there has been some short sharp lockdowns and it seems a greater eagerness to lock borders down does it make sense to you why new south wales isn't doing that right now in sydney particularly no no but i think that as a consequence of my own unawareness of the situation down there in contrast to perhaps my state of being more informed about the situation here in queensland in gimpy more specifically we have been very distant i suppose from the physical consequences of of the status of lockdowns that have occurred it there's only really been oh there was the start of the pandemic with the national lockdown and then later there was a two-week lockdown not quite a lockdown it can be by a two-week period where we were mandated to wear masks so that is all the contact we truthfully have had with the coronavirus so we are quite quite distant from it so having been in that environment i i possess no awareness of of the situation that is occurring in new south wales nicole you're in sydney does it make sense to you well listen you know what i'm not going to be like everybody else on twitter who's not an epidemiologist who gives their opinion on covert because we've got two incredible brains here who can do that i would just say that some of the things to factor in of course we all have to behave and be grown-ups and get our vaccinations as soon as we possibly can all of those things that we need to do exactly what the advice is telling us but it's it's worthwhile just keeping in mind that when we talk about the vaccine rollout yes it has been poor across the board but it's almost been non-existent for those with a disability so that's a really shameful situation that we're in at the moment people with a disability were recognised to be in phase 1b uh and the vast majority of those particularly those living in group housing have not been vaccinated so we're letting a lot of people down here all right let's take our next question before we do we're going to say goodbye to mary louise mclaughs thank you for joining us tonight we really appreciate it uh and our next question is a video from nicholas painter bosworth in bondo junction new south wales we were told that we were front of the queue the envy of the world and the best in class when it comes to covert response we've done so well with covid so far so why is it now that we only have three percent of our population fully vaccinated and our cities are constantly suffering from small outbreaks is it about time that we admit that our world famous aussie optimism is now looking a little bit more like aussie arrogance as we've failed to plan for an extra strategy out of this and friend being left behind andrew lee nicholas you're absolutely right and the fact is that these lockdowns are having a terrible effect on people i can only imagine what it's like for sydney siders now cancelling weddings i think cancelling 21st birthdays not being able to see loved ones but we've seen a succession of these lockdowns and we will continue to see more while 97 percent of australians aren't fully vaccinated i was looking across oecd numbers we are dead last in the rich country oecd wcd group i look back to what the prime minister was saying in january about the rollout timetable that would have had more than half of australians fully vaccinated by now and that's the situation in the united states the reason you're not seeing lockdowns in places like new york and los angeles is because in those places they had the multiple vaccine deals in place which ensured that they weren't strongly reliant on a single vaccine in australia the penny pinching the morrison government in the middle of last year meant that we didn't sign up to five or six vaccine deals and then when problems developed with astrazeneca and the supply of pfizer we were then put in a situation where we weren't able to vaccinate the population a quarantine is a federal responsibility right there in the constitution vaccination is a federal responsibility and so the premiers are now having to clean up the mess of scott morrison and australians are suffering uh costing the economy billions but of course the social cost is the real pain the fact that we won't be reopening the borders until sometime next year the government has now shifted from talking about targets and timetables to talking about horizons which is a bit strange because by definition you don't ever get to the horizon all right i want to bring in senator holly hughes who is joining us from canberra tonight holly uh i think you are isolating self-isolating tonight awaiting uh covert uh tests or um results to come through at the very least is this in part due to the fact that the federal government is actually failing on the rollout no absolutely not and if you look at what's happening in sydney gladys has consistently demonstrated the gold standard of covert management she has absolutely acted with logic rather than panic at every opportunity and i think we're certainly seeing that that's the way she's approaching this again gladys and her government has a very good understanding that we need to keep the economy open we need to keep people's lives as as solid as we can if we look at the mental health issues that are now impacting some of victorians over these rolling lockdowns but the businesses that are being forced to close in the long term economic impacts uh gladys is taking a really sensible approach to it but i will let you know hamish i've already got my negative test results so i could have actually been there with you well we're very happy to hear that result but gladys periodically is pointing out that actually this would be different if there was more access to vaccines that is your government's responsibility isn't it the vaccine rollout is happening you know in in line with all the health advice that was given and if we look at vaccine rollouts that have occurred across the world they've occurred quite slowly at the beginning and then exponentially increased and we saw yesterday 140 000 australians received a vaccine we've seen uh in in the last couple of weeks the time frame between each million people the number of people that are receiving a dose of vaccine uh you know go to nine days between each million so uh by today we should have actually hit seven million people but there is an awful lot of misinformation being given so we hear things about three percent of the population well that's just rubbish because i mean acknowledging what mary louise i think said earlier we're not doing 16 and we're only doing 50 to 70s in some states and only somebody so just just on misinformation i mean the prime minister has been asked to clarify exactly what proportion of the population has had both doses of the vaccine and won't give it all we've been given is the total number of vaccines that have been administered isn't the government actually in part responsible for that confusion yeah no the see this is part of the misinformation hamish and it's really important that australians get clear and correct factual information both professor murphy and professor kelly have been very very clear and quite frankly i'd prefer to take their advice they have been very clear that one dose of the vaccine will provide eighty percent protection yes we want everyone to get their second dose there's a three month lag between the first dose and the second dose of a z so of course there's going to be a lag for that second dose but we aren't so can can you tell us can you tell us what proportion of the population's had both doses i i don't know because you know why we don't have mandatory reporting either we don't have people's health records out and available we do have on everyone's mygov what vaccines you've had but uh as i haven't actually checked mine since i had my first visa a couple of weeks ago i don't know if that's there but we don't have the the recording and quite frankly i i actually would love to see the recording i'm supposed to go to queensland on sunday and can't go and i'll have had my second pfizer shot it's absolutely insanity these lockdowns killing business killing tourism affecting the economy long term with knee-jerk reactions with people that have received the vaccine well how much we can tell you those numbers for the united states 56 britain 60 and i went on to their health health websites to get those numbers in the fact that the and l.a countries hold them up as the bastions and examples of what are great now premieres have done astonishingly well will we really glad will we really keep our borders in victoria of next year the notion that the notion that australia can't roll out a vaccine faster than any other country scary and natural embarrassment absolutely ridiculous it is the fear holly the fear that people are experiencing is a fear of the fact that uh they are not vaccinated that stands in stark contrast with many other advancements if you're in new south wales it's a direct result you can respond failure to sign up to multiple vaccine vaccine agreements astrazeneca can we get a word in here there is an australian immunization register that has all the details of the vaccinations that you seek it's their facts and figures no it's accumulated by the australian government the facts and figures are known now fewer than five percent of australians tonight are fully vaccinated in israel it's 57 right a year ago the australian government declined to follow the lead of the united kingdom government and back every horse in the race so that we might have had an adequate supply of vaccines in australia from whatever source by the beginning of this year and we would have got on with a rapid and urgent vaccination program and by today the 30th of june the overwhelming majority of australians would be vaccinated there are 40 people who have got a diagnosis who should not have had it bill just on that though being a thousand people in the uk were diagnosed with covet sixteen thousand nineteen people yesterday lost their life in the uk we had 11 cases in new south wales that's right 10 of which were closely associated contacts living with already in isolation with previous positive cases okay this is scare mongering and to claim the uk somehow the uk's vaccination rate is having this great impact when 19 people lost their life yesterday 16 000 people were had positive test results can you imagine what dan andrews would do if 16 000 people in victoria had a positive test no one would ever get there again i think right there and then maybe could i interject just to say possibly taking the politics out of this might be wise i you know with great respect to holly and andrew i don't think australians care whether the team a or team b are giving us the advice i think we'd like health advice from brainy people who know what they're talking about man we lost team australia really quickly you know we all of a sudden became you know my premier's better than your premiere and i think all of them have been working 24 hours a day and doing the best job they possibly can to keep us all safe i i think australia wants to hear about what we do collectively rather than us beating the melbournians or or you guys having a fight on tv which is kind of fun to watch but ultimately people sit at home and feel depressed the history of hiv and now of cobit is nature creates the viruses but lousy politicians create and prolong pandemics now that's the that's the lesson of the united states in the united kingdom and here we are well the chief the advice given to the australian government a year ago was let it in let it run the economy was more important than public health that was wrong advice you're okay well i'm preparing to take the advice of the chief medical officer and which is right by how by when will all australians be vaccinated this year well it's not a compulsory vaccine for a start so it's a voluntary program so let's look at the fact that 66 over 66 of over 70s have now received a dose of the vaccine and we do know that makes them 80 protected even if they've only had the first dose we have close to if not more than 50 percent well i'm sorry bill that might be your opinion but it's not the opinion okay the chief medical officer or brendan murphy and i would prefer to take their advice on that note we're going to turn to a very different topic you're watching q a live and sometimes unpredictable now something entirely different our next question is a video from oliver hetherington page in highgate hill queensland as a person on the spectrum i feel my autism is constantly measured against autistic characters in popular culture like sheldon cooper from the big bang theory and the lead doctor in the good doctor both of which are not starring autistic actors or written by autistic people my question to the panel is how important is actually autistic voices in telling autistic stories plays a role in authentic autism representation jayden all right so let's just let's just curious it is very very important because i think characters such as sheldon cooper and the character from the good doctor i have not watched the good doctor so i do not know the name of the character but they in in many ways they embody different different archetypes of of what has been presumed of autism and that in itself can be entertaining in the instance of sheldon cooper and in the instance of the character from the good doctor i believe he is portrayed as a survive which i suppose there's also some veracity in that as well but the individuals i work with they are not they're not quite survived they're not sheldon cooper who is a physicist nor a doctor who has all this access to resources and and energy and and i suppose the brilliance that being a doctor incurs as well the people i work with are quite disadvantaged in their situations they they may not be aware of their diagnosis they may not have access to any to to the same resources as myself and perhaps more more i suppose i would say individuals who are privileged to have perhaps both a mother and a father who are willing to support them in that growth who are willing to make them aware of that diagnosis and to accumulate the supports that are necessary that's not always so with the people i work with they especially in gimpy where i think in general there is i suppose an issue perhaps in in the economic well-being of certain demographics in the community and probably opportunities jayden too i'd say you know it's a really good question and if there were more opportunities for for young people or any age person on the autism spectrum to be able to play a role um in more mainstream shows of course that would be incredibly welcome it's a tricky one right though because actors act right i was fairly sure that matt damon wasn't an astronaut in that film um so like you know it's fair that you're allowed to come on and be something else but but i think but to that point though the nation's fallen in love with jaden and a whole cast of characters from from love on the spectrum i want to ask him about that but i also want to ask you because you were approached about it in the beginning and you hated the idea why jane just block your ears for a minute okay uh yeah so the the producers of love on the spectrum came to me to ask me what the opinion was to make the show and the genius level that i have in my television skills i um i told them it was the worst idea i might have even slightly threatened them actually i said it was just terrible and they weren't to do it but to be fair you thought it was going to be like the bachelor your reality romantic shows aren't necessarily the classiest of shows um so i was the most wrong person on that and jaden and all of his colleagues that have been on the show over two seasons have done an excellent job and australia absolutely fell in love with them and i know nothing jayden what has the reaction been for you what's the experience been like having people from all walks of life know you know your story and and feel inclined to to reach out to you and and try and know you more oh uh well humbling a little bit i i've always approached with responses that i've tried to ensure were as modest as possible uh it it mostly has been through social media thus far in gympie there's only been one person who has noticed me i have grown a beard since my appearance in the documentary series so i think that has impaired the ability of strangers to recognize me but otherwise in the streets i have not ostensibly been recognized on social media there has been some engagement with people who were quite fond of of the role of representation that i assumed in the series and and also i suppose my open exploration as well certain aspects of my identity so people were very fond to have been able to witness that jaden you mentioned earlier that the love life's been experienced a lot of interest from people on social media yes yes and it has been a little flirtatious but i have been able to cope well with that it simply is to respond with as much uh as much sincerity as i can to that and sometimes play around with it a little as well it seems to be a bit fun to play around with it okay don't break too many hearts uh john fernandez dwayne fernandez is in the audience i know you're a fan of the show what what did you connect with so much oh i absolutely love the show i've been watching for the last two seasons um i've been following the journey of michael and and and the entire crew but um jane for you specifically i did want to know um how do you find being part of the show and sharing so much of yourself how have i found that liberating innocence because it it was it was discussed in in the series in the interviews that were done with me that my diagnosis was not something i was always willing to acknowledge and the repercussions of that socially and emotionally were not very ideal so i put myself to the effort of of of studying it a little more because i've always been adverse to to labels i think many people on the spectrum are and that is why all their parents as well and that is why they may be adverse to the recognition of that diagnosis for myself diagnosis is the greek word that means to know to know the thing by which one can know through or no i have put that very wrongly because it is tricky to put greek terms into english terms but a diagnosis through a diagnosis you can see something you can know something you can understand something so for me it was a point of reference where i can read about the patronicity of my mind because even though i firmly believe that my mind and brain is very individualistic i also know that it is a human brain as well and therefore abides by the same the same patterns and neurological habits that everyone else abides by so that has allowed me to find some identity with it but also awareness that the responsibility of having that identity is to know that it's not quite by this dichotomy where i am a neurodiverse person and everyone is a neurotypical person because that can be a bit precarious where you begin to to perceive yourself as different or as a different tribal group from everyone else and that was precarious for me so so that was the responsibility i took on for myself to be aware of of that of that possibility and to be as firm as i can in also associating myself with everyone else as much as possible whilst acknowledging this part of my idiosyncrasy so that the series has offered me a lot in in my perception of that holly hughes yourself i can see you smiling away at jayden's response oh it's just lovely i mean i adore the program i think everyone's just you know it's it's so beautiful for people that don't have uh first-hand experience with autism to get to see the personalities of you know and i think nicole would agree with me here we tend to use the phrase our kids um because we do uh see ourselves as part of a community and uh and and jaden michael all the boys and girls just do a beautiful job uh you know throughout the series um but the beautiful thing i think about not only love on the spectrum but also some of the other shows that uh showcase autism and and one of the ones we didn't mention was everything's going to be okay and that actually does have autistic actors in it and the character of drea is just wonderful but it is important that there's a saying in the autism community if you've met one person with autism you've met one person with autism everyone is very very different and we need to make sure that the whole spectrum is recognized and we don't fall into a trap somewhere that they're being stereotyped into the physicist you know the physicist or the savant because we do have people with autism with very severe autism with nonverbal autism with very very significant challenges holly i suspect most viewers won't know your story or your son's story but what can a an experience or viewing something like this seeing it on a public stage do for a young person living on the spectrum i think my son's at 12 so he's he's probably still not quite grasping it but we've always talked about autism and him being autistic the same way you know as someone has blue eyes or they're funny or you know whatever it might be it's just part of who he is uh it's never been something that we as a family have ever felt that we didn't need or want to talk about and acknowledge and i think that's not the same for all families so i think normalizing it if that's you know no doubt the wrong word but uh showing that people with autism have so much to offer that they are full of love and affection and they are funny and wonderful and some of our favorite human beings on the world in the world i mean they are just never cease to amaze you and bring so much joy to your life and the more people that get to see that the more people that get to experience that and the more people that get to see their minds opened up because if you don't have any personal experience you might not really know what autism is all about and so this can can really help break down any stigmas give families the confidence to to go out if they do have a child with autism and for autistic individuals to own that autism and be proud of it and i think i think too what holly is referring to is the fact that you know there is no one autism you know there's autism it's a very broad spectrum i think love on the spectrum did a a good admirable first go at showing lots of different people at different levels on the spectrum because you know if you watch some of the hollywood shows you know the good doctor some of them are quite silly but um but this was different it showed the spectrum it showed lots of different people at different stages and it showed autistic people speaking for themselves having their own relationships talking about their own desires the parents and the families and the supporters in the background played this bit part of just people who loved them and were cheering them on it wasn't about us as families it was about them as individuals and australia got to see that and and i think that was the success of it you know absolutely all right let's take our next question it comes from chelsea ford thanks hamish my sister has a rare genetic syndrome and intellectual disability and the ndis has changed her life um as they stand as her sister i'm concerned about the introduction of independent assessments i don't believe an allied health professional who doesn't know her or her disability can possibly decide how much support she should get in just an hour or two assessment i'm also concerned on the other hand about the sustainability and longevity of the ndis and i understand that potentially costs may need to be cut somewhere how can we ensure people like my sister are protected both short term and long term nicole independent assessments what are we talking about here not everyone will know this in the way that folks like you do okay great question thank you and what a great sister you are um i guess in short to explain it is that typically people have entered the ndis and the first thing to say about the ndis is it's great it's life-changing in your family it's life-changing in hundreds of thousands of other australians it's really important it was agreed to and was introduced in the bipartisan nature and australians in huge numbers supported so i don't want to go any further about the ndis because i am known to give it a bit of a punch occasionally in saying that it's here um we love it it's changing lives it's giving dignity and agency to people with a disability it's giving lives to their families it's important and it's here to stay that doesn't mean that we can't comment on it make it better continuous improvement and at the moment the current executive of the ndis is suggesting that we do away with the kind of clinical inputs that we've previously had to assess a person with a disability's needs and we replaced that with an independent assessment and that independent assessment would be done by somebody who may or may not have any clinical knowledge of that particular disability um that they will come in for an hour or two they will have they don't know you they're a stranger they'll come into your home they'll do this assessment and the idea i think really i mean i think the government had been caught out with the fact that this was probably just a cost-saving measure because it's not just the ndis executive it's also the government the government have approved this yes the prime minister stuart roberts was all for this yes absolutely so i think the question has to be this rollout has absolutely failed it's absolutely fair to say that people individuals with disabilities in australia and their families have spent the better part of the last 12 months being pretty petrified about what their life looks like very soon and we've had one minister shuffle off to buffalo but right now the responsibility where i said sits with martin hoffman the ceo of the ndis he has come in arrogantly wanting to roll out this program not only failed to do so but has freaked the entire sector out has united the sector in their opposition to it however he seems to still have a six-figure job and christine holgate bought four watches there's a double standard here i'm sorry i'm missing it but the government have got it wrong there's a new minister we're hoping she'll listen but right now we're really unsure andrew lee chelsea chelsea's story is one that we hear all too often there's a story of a nine-year-old girl in a wheelchair who was told through her independent assessment that she didn't have mobility problems and the idea that a stranger can come in and look at somebody for a couple of hours and make an assessment that then changes your life is so wrong-headed you know when bill shorten helped set up the ndis the idea is we should be proud of it as a nation that it was an expression of our generalized love for the whole community but i've worried too much that under the coalition they see success as being cutting the ndis taking money out of it they took four billion dollars out of it at the last election and these independent assessments uh aren't the right way to go ahead uh we need to make sure that we've got uh more and more ndia workers who understand the sector the staffing cap at the moment is hurting i agree entirely that management is a is a real problem right now and perhaps management should be replaced but you know you look at the way in which the government is cutting costs in the ndis assessment and you compare it to the way in which they splash job keeper money around on billionaire shareholders and millionaire ceos you know you just look at jerry harvey solomon lou brett blundy some of those billionaires who took back millions in job keeper at the same time as the government is looking at cutting back support packages now they seem to be toughest on those who are doing it toughest but entertainment and unwilling to see success in australia as being a strong ndis uh that does provide the the supports for people who need the most i'm gonna and i agree hang on a second hole i just i want to say andrew though that i think it is important to go back to your question was really really sensible there's a lot of us that are not sympathetic to the needs of the ndis being sustainable i would argue we are the most invested people in whether or not this scheme is sustainable because it's here for our children and ourselves for the rest of our lives i care about it more than any minister that's going to come into this job for two seconds and stuart is gone and he's got another job and he's got a promotion but guess what we're all still here and they're our families and they're our kids and we're serious about it so we are we can have conversations that are economic we can have them be sensible about what these policies look like don't write us off as families who are just whinges who don't understand it and want more and more it can't be a blank check but we can be smart enough to make good policy that also takes care of the dignity and rights of individuals with disabilities bilbo cell nick nick you are just spot on like nicole you are just spot on we need to have sensible economic discussions around this when it comes to independent assessments i think quite a bit to say to them and i just want to say to all the families out there that have experienced them heard about them read about them i am in your corner they were absolutely appalling throughout the throughout the trial period and that's been acknowledged by minister reynolds she has only been in this role for a couple of months disability is an incredibly complex sector and she's trying to get a head around it the rollout of the independent assessments just seemed to be the agency trying to put a solution out there before they'd even articulated there was an issue the idea of 400 personas whoever came up with that little gem should become a persona non-grata i mean absolutely not holly linda is not here linda is not here tonight i'm sorry but the australian government the australian population if you don't have disability in your life you probably don't spend a lot of time talking about it right we live with it it's really important to us the fact that q a want to have a conversation tonight where we get to come on and talk about the thing we care about most the ndis we're really grateful for it i would have liked to have seen the minister in charge of it sitting next to me having this discussion to be fair we did invite linda reynolds on we also you're here good on your whole bloody holes turned up we also invited anne ruston who's the social services why aren't they here having this conversation you need to ask them for an experience i'm asking ladies we're here we're having the conversation holly has been brave enough to turn up and speak the truth about what she understands about the ndis which is really going to make her probably pretty a bit unpopular with her government tomorrow i think it's okay for us to have the conversation we can nut this out we all want it to be successful we can get there holly hughes why is the government being so hard-headed about this it seems pretty clear that the independent assessments have not worked so far will not work are not popular are not wanted no and linda has said they are not going ahead in their current format she has absolutely said they are not going ahead in the current format that's been recognized she has said she's part of the future of the ndis she said they are part of the future talking about functional assessments and i think what we need to do here we need to sort of divide it into the two conversations independent assessments functional assessments whatever you want to call them we need to ensure that people are getting the supports they need that match their goals at the moment we go in and have conversations about people's deficits and the reason i think we're seeing a decline in people's functionality in the ndis is because we know if you go into your planning meeting and say hey we had a great year they take money away from you we need to start the conversation being in a completely different frame saying my goal for the year is to go back into the workplace is to go and study is to participate in community activities and work out around the supports around them not have a look at can you make a cup of tea or peel a piece of fruit and vegetable because that has nothing to do let alone the questions that were being asked whether you needed assistance with regards to sexual activity they're gone but we can all stand here and scream and nick you you know i know you you understand this we can all scream from the sideline we can play politics we can hit each other over the head with her the reality is linda is committed to coming bringing people back to the table she inherited this she didn't design it we need to be able to go back to the table and say this didn't work but the other part of it nicole you're 100 correct there's no one more focused on sustainability of this game the participants and their families what we're not talking about where are the service providers and the reviews we're looking at them we've got three tiers of management when you're a participant you can be plan managed agency managed or there's this it's self-managed or agency managed or there's this weird little plan management thing in the middle i didn't even know this until recently but if hollywood doesn't get to plan i do want to bring our other panelists in on this bill botel your view look uh my experience of medicare hiv and aids and now covert the heart and soul of this country is the public health system that incorporates and reflects the values of australians and the heart and soul and core of that is the relationship between the uh patient or the the client and the clinician right the clinician understands the the the patient takes the time and effort and energy to get a view of the whole person that person cannot be replaced by an algorithm or 400 algorithms or somebody with a clipboard coming in for an hour and try to fit that patient into some predetermined cost saving category so anything that takes away from that that core relationship with the clinician is something that ought to be rejected jayden i know you're not yourself an ndis participant but you work in your in your job with a lot of people who are what's your view of independent assessors are they well placed to make these decisions about people's lives all right so in relation to autism a person see reading and studying and and i suppose being a professional about autism is quite different to witten autism to being in a state where you are seeing it so one of my one of my duties is to go and and work with people who are on the spectrum and who are also recipients of the ndis and a parameter of that duty is to develop trust with them to develop trust between them and the other providers of support that work for the same company as as myself so the psychologist we work for who works for us rather and and everyone else so that they can all come in and work with them and that development of trust requires a period of of time it can take months before certain intricacies of what this diagnosis is can be revealed what this diagnosis is in relation specifically to this individual so the information that that is needed to make an informed decision about what this person needs in relation to their funding is not going to be divulged in a simple session with an assessor that lasts for a duration of a couple of hours it is not possible 100 and i think jayden's just also highlighted another piece is that jaden is somebody with autism who now works in the sector this is a 25 billion a year industry it has a lot of jobs we are investing in people with a disability but we're also investing in the community that supports them and works to help that happen so i want to bring in monique blakemore who's in the audience tonight there's been a fair bit of discussion about linda reynolds the new minister you had the opportunity to meet with her recently what did you tell her about your own situation well i spoke to linda i was part of a disability peak meeting with minister reynolds and i at the very beginning she didn't um she wasn't familiar with the phrase nothing about us without us which is really the cornerstone of disability rights internationally so it became very clear that she really needed to hear a more personal perspective and so i spoke very openly about what it's like to be have more internal presentation of autism you know a level one they like to refer to it as and what that's like to not have support in the community and to be excluded from the ndis and did she know that you were excluded she didn't she had to she found that out in the meeting so there's a big learning curve for her and we really need we need two things to happen to be honest we need that we really need the ndis to start having meaningful engagement with the disability sector go one step further they need to have meaningful engagement with the autism communities plural and specifically autistic people who sometimes what they want for themselves is not necessarily what others might feel that's needed um but we also need to have a national autism strategy like countries like the uk and malta and learn from their experience because where there is an autism strategy in place you know autistic people's well-being increases but you know back to that that in internal presentation of autism you know while the ndia excludes us from the ndis you know having a diagnosis means that you are disabled you know and it's not a dirty word being disabled um but you don't have access to a pot of money to quickly access when you're in times of crisis but yet level one autistic woman like myself would have a life expectancy decades below um i think it's like 56 or 58 decades below other people and yet we're excluded from support monique thank you very much for your contribution tonight can i just uh respond to the next briefly if you could andrew lee one of the things i'm concerned about about the ndis is that it's turning into a bit of a two-class system where people of means hire lawyers challenge decisions negative thousand cases in the administrative appeals tribunal and people who can't afford that end up missing out and at the same time carers are too invisible disability support agencies don't get the backing they need and we don't have the broader conversations strengths-based conversations around accessible buildings and around improving employment for people with disabilities there's so many skills that people with autism have around attention to detail around honesty and to celebrate that and raise our productivity as well as making us a more inclusive nation i think needs to be the goal fix the ndis and then go further let's take our next question tonight it comes from angel huang forgiveness forgiveness and second chances are fine but barnaby joyce's position is one of great power privilege and pay do you think our country is actually committed to supporting females and progress when barnaby joyce is allowed back into office given his alleged past behavior nicole um okay barnaby 2.0 will it be better than barnaby 1.0 i don't know if you bet the house on that one but um i'm actually not going to comment on barnaby what i'm going to say and again exceptions to andrew and holly because they're such nice people um but is this the best we can do in who we're sending to canberra i don't know that's what worries me when you look at the crop of was this our choice did we have to go back to barnaby you look at and sort of say are our options so low what have happened to our best and brightest going to canberra our smartest australians the ones that wanted to lead not as a job description but as like a verb you know actually leading where are those people and why aren't they being attracted to politics and and that's what i think has to come out of this is not why barnaby but why so few choices holly hughes this was a question about barnaby joyce and whether it shows our country is genuinely committed to supporting females uh do you think he deserved a second chance as deputy prime minister hamish thank you for the question and i uh appreciate the question you're asking it i am not going to comment on the national party and their leadership choice is not just the national party it's the government of which you remember he's now the deputy prime minister your reaction to that well he's the he's the leader of the national party in the national party room made that decision now i'm not going to make any commentary on the decision they made because quite frankly i wouldn't want them to make any commentary on the decision the liberal party made so we respect that across all parties uh andrew would understand that as well it's a matter for each party room if the national party feel that barnaby is the best person for them leave the national party that's their decision and you know it's quite telling isn't it that that's that's all you can say about the new deputy prime minister all right i i know barnaby well i can say lots more about barnaby he certainly injects lots of energy uh into everything he does he's a fantastic retail politician he was elected to to new england with increased majorities consistently i mean he wins so hands down on primary vote and i understand what nicole's saying about is this the choice well the people of new england have made that choice consistently and with a very strong voice the national party have made their choice when it comes to leader uh and that's a matter for them andrew lee hamish i i i think holly is dead right on this she wasn't in that party room that chose barnaby joyce uh she's in the unfortunate position of having to deal with these 1950s views on on child care and i understand she spoke out vocally on that yeah but the fact that i had a little bit one man wrecking ball uh you know it's not just that he wanted to execute pistol and boo and confused his trillions and billions uh it's not just that he wants nuclear power stations in every town uh and and thinks that climate change is a hoax the fact is that he was removed from the job over sexual harassment allegations and in a metoo era he's just not an appropriate person to be the deputy prime minister of the country we need people with judgment at a time of crisis the last challenge was in the bushfires this challenge isn't in a pandemic we need people who think about the nation not just thinking about themselves jayden i know you have done toastmasters yourself you're a fan of of respectful discourse in public life what do you make of our politics in the way it's conducted jaden for canberra no absolutely not no um so i i suppose it is not something that i have ever sustained much interest in and that is because i do not always feel that my demeanor towards civility and and respect between different different groups and and idea groups specifically that my demeanor for that is always represented by the people who who are our representatives and barnaby joyce he knows how to earn a lot of attention and he must be a very charming man but i i am curious about the question of whether whether the ability or inability for one to lead in their own personal life is reflective of their ability or inability to lead in their professional life does that cause them to be a vessel of the morality that we require in the administration of a nation and what do you think on that question jaden i i certainly would like i i'm yet a little undecided on on my answer to that but certainly i have hitherto maintained not too much interest in in barnaby joyce and i think going forth i will continue to maintain no interest rather hello i think that would be great good question wins answer of the year on q a bill beautell are you interested in barnaby well i'm i'm more interested really uh in what barnaby joyce represents uh in relation to climate change uh since 2007 we've had five prime ministers five pro five governments each one of them more or less has been brought down because of an inability to come to terms with the facts and evidence of climate change each prime minister has gone in what 14 years barnaby joyce coming back in represents a return to strong climate denialism a rejection of the facts and evidence about climate change and creates a diabolical problem for the internal unity of the present federal government and you have to say that if this is unresolved and no serious uh proposition can be taken to the meeting that's coming up in glasgow about reduction of emissions much less anything else we have to do then we might well be in in train of seeing the sixth prime minister fall in less than 15 years on climate change we cannot go on like this it's bad for the economy it's certainly bad for the health of australians in the planet and it is time to change and uh barnaby joyce coming back in is just a symptom of a real inability to come to terms with the facts and evidence okay we've got time for one last question tonight it comes from william mccarthy during the prime minister's visit to the uk he visited three pubs when australians are stuck overseas and families haven't seen each other for nearly a year and a half the prime minister is making visits for his own enjoyment does the prime minister think that he's more entitled than us other australians to visit family overseas or is it just that he has better things to do than increased vaccination rates and contain the latest covert clusters andrew lee william being a prime minister is a hard job but i think ultimately you need to recognize that you're making decisions not in your self-interest or the interest of your family uh but in the national interest and in taking a whole day to hawaii during the bushfires or choosing to go to a couple of pubs and follow up on his family genealogy scott morrison forgot that he was there for australians and he failed to make the sacrifices that we expect of a true leader i just can't imagine a john curtin or a gough whitlam having made such a serious error of judgment and it does go to scott morrison's ability to transcend the job and to be a leader of whom we can all be proud when australians are stuck overseas or australians are unable to go overseas to be at the bedside of a dying parent the idea that the prime minister would take a sojourn and a pub or check out a long long past ancestor just seemed deeply wrong to me and out of touch holly hughes look i i understand what andrew's saying but i really think we're missing the point of what the g7 was about when we're worried about stopping for a fade at a pub or half an hour at a grave site at the end of the day the prime minister is more than aware as is everybody else in this country of the limitations that covert's producing but the prime minister went to the uk to represent us when it comes to national security he came he went to the uk to represent us when you look at the economy and trade the uk free trade deal was put together while he was over there and quite honestly i think if everyone's hung up on a trip to a pub and calling into a a cemetery where a lot you know a fifth generation grandfather or something was buried on the way back to the airport um if that's what you took out of the g7 i really think you missed the point you probably need to engage in some of the issues that are happening globally when you look at the indo-pacific when you look at what china's doing in the south china sea what's happening to trade across the world i'm pretty sure our bali producers and our wine makers were more interested in being able to get their product into the uk than whether he stopped for a fading cornwall all right we'll leave it there on that no that's all we've got time for tonight would you please thank our wonderful panel nicole rogerson bill bertel jayden evans andrew lee and holly hughes and taking go easy on the dms in your social media mate it sounds dangerous next week we're live in queensland at the brisbane powerhouse the premier anastasia palestine will be on the panel border restrictions mean that i may or may not be there so please join whoever is hosting the show next week have a very good night [Music] [Applause] you

Channel: abcqanda

Views: 4,978

Rating: 3.3225806 out of 5

Keywords: Q&A, QandA, auspol, australian politics, Hamish Macdonald, politics, abc, abc news, Q+A, Jayden Evans, Love on the Spectrum, Bill Bowtell, Marylouise McLaws, Nicole Rogerson, Hollie Hughes, Andrew Leigh, COVID, Bondi cluster, Sydney outbreak, Autism, Barnaby Joyce, Scott Morrison cornwall, NDIS

Id: Yzx-F7LATHc

Length: 60min 29sec (3629 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 24 2021