Ms Lianne Quigley:

I thank the Senator. Mr. Sherwin has mentioned many times, and there is reference to it in our statement, meaningful engagement with DPOs. It is about sitting at the table. Any policies or strategic plans need to include meaningful engagement with DPOs. They have their own life experience to bring to the table and feedback to give. They know what it is like to work in workplaces.

Self-employment is a particular area for disabled people. Deaf or disabled people in employment get supports but people who are self-employed do not get the same level of support. They get far less support. I do not have any figures or statistics in that regard but we know there are no supports for those in self-employment. The attitude taken towards the two scenarios in which people are employed should be the same. We all thought the recent launch of the work and access programme was great. However, we are talking about up to an allowance of up to 24 hours of interpreting per year for someone who is self-employed. There are 52 weeks in a year. How is it that self-employed people are only get 24 hours' worth of interpretation? Even if someone was only to use an interpreter for one hour per day, we can imagine how quickly those 24 hours would be used up. We need more funding and investment and more meaningful engagement. We need more access to interpreters. It is then that we will see deaf people and people with disabilities progress in the workplace because those supports are being provided. That is going to be a part of the process. While we have this new work and access programme, it is limiting us.

To move into another area, the social inclusion voucher scheme was launched recently through the Department of Social Protection for the deaf community. It started as a pilot project and was then set up. The deaf community was delighted, but there is still a limit to the scheme. A person is allowed five vouchers per year to book an interpreter for five separate occasions. We ask how to problem solve. If we have meaningful engagement from the start, we will have fewer problems to tackle.