Mr. Bernard Gloster:

There are more than 21,000 people in our disabilities space and 126,000 in our health space. I am sure those in the health space would tell their colleagues in disabilities to stay far away from a pay and numbers strategy because it is a much maligned process. The pay and numbers strategy for disability will be solid because it will do two things. First, it will tell us exactly what our funded workforce is and, second, it will allow us to plan for more than a single year.

To give the Senator an example, we have about 21,000-odd in the disability workforce at the moment. If we secure the pay and numbers strategy, which I hope members of this committee will help with when that comes through to the Estimate process, I believe that progressively, over the next three to four years, we could realistically have a disability workforce in the order of about 25,000. That is for both adults and children. That is significant and necessary because of the demographic that we know is in front of us.