Disability Rights and Services

There are nearly 2 million people in Queensland who have a disability. Like everyone else, they have a right to be supported to live full and active lives – but significant barriers still remain in our society. The Greens are fighting to remove the barriers, fix the systems, and eliminate the structural discrimination disabled people face.

Accessible train stations

Right now, many of our train stations statewide don’t meet legislated disability standards. That’s a significant number of train stations where residents in wheelchairs, those with mobility issues, and parents/carers with prams, are unable to access their local train station. Read more about the Greens advocacy for accessible train stations here.

Australian Greens Disability Rights and Services Policy

Disabled people, as well as their families, carers and nominees, should be able to actively participate in policy, service planning and delivery. You can read the Australian Greens policy for disability rights and services here.

Accessible Australia Plan

The Australian Greens 'Accessible Australia plan' provides a clear pathway forward to fix the broken systems disabled people interact with every day, and will enable our community to live fully, and enjoy our lives. You can read about this plan here.

Disability and Disaster Preparedness

With natural disasters, floods and fires becoming more frequent and more intense, we need to be doing everything we can to look after ourselves and look after our communities. People with disability are often more vulnerable to disasters, but they are also experts in the kinds of supports and information they need to stay safe.

On 4 April, 2023, we hosted an online forum in collaboration with Queenslanders with Disability Network and Queensland Advocacy for Inclusion, on disaster preparedness for people with disability. You can head here to see the key resources, tool and links that were shared at the forum.

QDN also have a range of resources on Disability Inclusive Disaster Risk Reduction that you can access here.

Questions in Parliament

We've asked questions in Parliament regarding disability rights and services, including:

Queensland State Election 2024

Labor's recent cuts to the NDIS could not have come at a worse time. After decades of Labor and LNP neglect, our services, our familial and social support networks, and disabled people as individuals, have never been under more pressure.

Cost of living is biting ordinary people hard, but it's not a crisis for wealthy corporations and investors. According to data from the Australian Council of Social Service's annual report on inequality, in the last 5 years the top 10% of households accrued 47% of new wealth. Meanwhile, the bottom of 60% of households, the vast majority of people, let alone disabled people, only accrued 14% of new wealth.

No one is more or less deserving than any other person of living a good life. The truth is, we do have the wealth and resources, the skills and expertise, the work ethic and community needed for everyone to have a good life. What we are missing is the political will to make sure that we all share in Queensland’s collective wealth, that we are all valued for our contributions.

Our 2024 election platform is about building the foundations for every Queenslander to thrive. Below is just some of the things we are fighting for. You can read about our vision for Queensland in more detail here.

Fully funded and genuinely free state schools

Labor's cuts to the NDIS means that thousands of children and their families will be cut off with no other means of accessing the resources and support that they need. It's never been more important that our state schools are properly funded to provide resources and support to children with disabilities so that they don't fall through the cracks.

But right now our state schools are funded $1.7 billion dollars below the national minimum standard. This means less teachers for disabled children, less learning support for disabled children, less classroom resources for disabled children, and more of the costs being shifted onto families in the form of state school fees.

And because all parts of the SRS are ubiquitously underfunded, including loadings for disabled students, children with disabilities are missing out on the most amount of funding. And these are disabled children who are already the most disadvantaged children in every other aspect — more than 80% of children who are Indigenous, who are poor, who come from a low socio-educational background, are educated at state school.

When the average state school is missing out on $3000 per child, per year how can they provide the support that families cut off the NDIS need?

The Greens are fighting to:

Fully fund Queensland State schools to 100% of the national minimum standards, including disability loadings, with $8.4 billion extra over four years.
Reduce class sizes and provide additional learning and developmental support in schools.
Abolish resource fees and all out-of-pocket costs at State schools, including laptops, uniforms & excursions with another $4.4 B in extra funding over four years.
Introduce a universal free school breakfast and lunch program at every public school.

Housing

Since 2015, the last change of government, there has been a 10% decline in social housing relative to our population. There are effectively 10% less social homes for people with disabilities. This has real consequences. There are now more than 40,000 very high needs people on the social housing waitlist, waiting an average 21 months for housing.

Labor and the LNP have sold off public housing, slowed down new investment, and abandoned housing to private developers who make bigger profits the more house prices and rents go up.

The Greens want to get the government back into the business of building housing with a publicly owned property developer to build 100,000 new homes to rent and sell to ordinary Queenslanders.

We’re fighting to

Create a public developer to build 100,000 new homes.
Break the boom-and-bust chokehold that for-profit developers, investors, and banks have over housing supply.
Clear the social housing waitlist in just four years.
Fully introduce and uphold accessibility requirements in the building code.
Create a reliable pipeline of projects to the construction industry.

You can read more about our plan for a publicly owned housing developer here.

Rental rights and affordability

Weekly rents have increased 43% since 2021. And so long as renters can be evicted, for no reason at the end of their lease, they are unable to enforce what little rights they do have. Renters who raise issues are threatened with not having their lease renewed — essentially being told to pack up or shut up. This especially affects disabled renters who are less able to move house, and less able to survive if moved away from the services and community they are connected to.

Disabled tenants have had their rents raised ludicrous amounts, been denied permission to make accessibility modifications to their home, and been forced to put up with substandard accommodation, mold infestations, and lack of insulation and cooling during heatwaves.

The Greens are fighting for

A two year rent freeze followed by an annual cap on increases
A guaranteed right to a lease renewal
A defacto right to make disability modifications
Strengthen minimum rental standards, including insulation, ventilation and ceiling fans

You can read our full plan for renters here.

More affordable mortgages

Right now over $400 from the average monthly mortgage repayment is pure profit for the Big Four banks, who’ve made $30 billion in profit every year as the market exploded. We used to have publicly owned banks, like the Commonwealth Bank and Qld SGIO, but the major parties sold them off in the 1990s.

The Greens will bring back a State Government owned public bank, to offer:

Owner-occupiers interest rates 1.5% below the Big Four banks, saving the average first home buyer $514 every month and helping drive down rates among the Big Four
Savings & transaction accounts, credit cards & EFTPOS with no fees for households or small businesses

You can read our full plan for a Queensland Public Bank here.

Fully funded healthcare

Rising costs of healthcare and medication disproportionately affects disabled people. Labor and the LNP’s medicare rebate freeze and their chronic underfunding of public health has hit disabled people the hardest.

Our plan would be an historic reform on the scale of Medicare for Queensland, creating a new network of publicly-funded GPs, mental health and allied health professionals, and improved public hospital services..

200 free GP clinics

It’s getting harder to afford to see the doctor, with the number of fully bulk-billing GPs in Queensland dropping by 31% in just six years. While GPs are struggling to bulk-bill because the Medicare rebate is still too low, data shows Queenslanders are putting off basic health checks as they face tough choices like whether to pay the rent or see a doctor.

We need to make sure every Queenslander can see the doctor for free.

The Greens will:

Establish 200 free public health clinics across Queensland, focusing on areas with less access to bulk-billing GPs
Invest $4.8 billion to staff the clinics with publicly funded and salaried GPs, nurses, and allied health workers including physiotherapists and psychologists, all providing free patient visits to any Queenslander
Open these free clinics seven days a week and out of hours

Read the full plan for the Greens’ public GP clinics here.

20 free psychology sessions per year

Seeing a psychologist can be life-saving. But since the federal Labor government halved the number of Medicare-subsidised sessions from 20 to 10, more Queenslanders than ever are struggling to access support.

With rents and grocery costs sky high, most people can’t afford to pay $200 or more to see a psychologist. The Greens believe mental healthcare is a basic right, not a luxury.

The Greens will:

Employ 1,000 clinical and registered psychologists at our 200 free public health clinics
Provide 20 free sessions each year for every Queenslander who accesses these psychologists

Read the full plan for 20 free psychology sessions here.

Fully fund public hospitals

Our public hospitals are under-staffed and underfunded. Elective surgery waiting lists are twice as long as two decades ago, and emergency rooms are under pressure.

The Greens will:

Clear public hospital surgery waiting lists and end ambulance ramping with an extra $8.7B over four years
Create 2,000 more hospital beds and two new major hospitals in Queensland

Read our plan for fully funded public hospitals here.