Ms Rachel Cassen:

Okay. I would say that it is a difficult and nuanced point and position to make. When we speak, we often speak from different roles in our lives and in different settings. When my colleague, Ms Fitzgerald-Graham, speaks today, she will sometimes speak as a professional in her own field, but more often, she will speak as a mother. The same applies to me. However, when we speak as mothers, something funny happens and we risk becoming like a bad smell in the room. I do not know how else to say it. We are aware that we have to walk mindfully when we speak as mothers. We want to draw the attention of committee again to our opening statement. I hope it is apparent that from our inception nearly ten years ago, we have worked very heard to align all of our work with children and families with the UNCRPD. Our work is about assisting families to stay on the typical, normative and valued life path.

I will get to my comments. Frequently, government and services deal with individuals. They deal with individuals just as individuals, as if they are not connected to families. There is none of us living a good life that is not connected to other people. Whatever government and services do, they must not seek to separate or alienate people from their family and friends, for it is they who constitute the enduring sources of love and support, however flawed at times, in people's lives.

If the goal of the UNCRPD is inclusion, I ask the committee how that is then achieved and why some people enjoy a rich and meaningful life when many others do not. The disability advocate ally of LEAP, Jeremy Ward, stated:

The reality is that the full and positive lives of people with disabilities that we hear and read about do not happen by accident. These inspirational stories can be told because someone had a vision and belief in what is possible, sometimes against considerable opposition, and planned to make it happen.

That someone is frequently a family member and yet we ask the committee why family-based organisations such as LEAP struggle for funding and to be recognised under general comment No. 7 of the UNCRPD as a DPO? We do not represent our children; we raise them. We are not disability representative organisations but neither are we fully welcome or acknowledged in the DPO camp yet. That is where the committee can help us.