The Preamble reads:
The Essential Questions
In 2008, what are the essential questions that the National Disability Strategy must address?
Do people with intellectual disability have a place in the Australian
community?
Do we value people with intellectual disability as contributing members of
their community, or do we see them as ‘burdens on society’?
Do people with intellectual disability have rights as citizens of Australia, or
are they objects of pity – the recipients of charity and hence to be grateful
for what they get?
In short, what is our perception or expectation of people with disability?
It is acknowledged that perception and expectation are driven by many factors, eg, historical understanding and attitudes of those in authority, and because of this, it is vitally important that those in political power demonstrate leadership.
It is also important that the answers to the above questions are not fine words, but are descriptions of what must happen.
These are not theoretical or ideological questions, they are practical questions that havepractical consequences for people with intellectual disability.
This is not an issue about people with disability. It is an issue about relationships; the relationships that the broader Australian community (represented by its parliamentarians) wants to have with Australians with disability.
And the Executive Summary reads:
The need to develop the National Disability Strategy is evidence that Objects of the Disability Services Act 1986 have not been met: the Act has failed.
This submission considers the needs of People with Intellectual Disability, and makes recommendations for Government to act on them, at all stages of life – through pre-birth, early childhood, school and further education and employment – and in all aspects of life.
Central to the submission are the Articles of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which oblige all States that are Parties to the Convention to actively promote the underlying principles to the Convention.
Those principles include the rights of all persons to make free choices, to be included within mainstream society, and to have their place in society valued.
The 48 page submission examines its priorities under the headings:
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