It came to my attention this morning that NZ Bus have put in an order for 120 new buses from the UK. “Great!”, I thought, having recently traveled and experienced the wonders of automatic ramps (see video below). Given my well-documented loathing for Auckland bus drivers and their complete disregard for disabled passengers, the idea of automatic ramps (saving drivers the evidently gut-wrenching task of unfolding the ramp themselves) seems like a great idea.

But no. Once again, NZ Bus show blatant disregard for the diverse needs of their traveling public, and order 120 buses with the same old manual ramps. If you think I’m being too harsh, or find my tone unnecessarily disparaging, take a ride on a bus with a wheelchair user.

Or at least, try to. You’ll be lucky if the driver lets you on.

• An example of an awesome, wheelchair-accessible bus with an automatic ramp from my travels in Vancouver:

Take 300 young people aged 18 to 25 from 98 countries committed to creating social change in their respective communities, bring them together in Delhi, India for eight days, and what do you get? An amazing mix of colours, cultures, incredible diversity, and the Oxfam International Youth Partnerships Kaleidoscope Conference 2010. From November 21-29, I was one of the very fortunate 300 young people to take part in this amazing, once-in-a-lifetime event in a place I have always wanted to

What a joke. Lazy, apathetic, despicable attitude from the NZQA.

Story from stuff.co.nz:

A blind Christchurch schoolboy is frustrated he has to miss out on NCEA credits because exam organisers say they cannot accommodate his disability.

Hagley Community College year 13 pupil Dylan Neale cannot sit Tuesday’s level-three National Certificate in Educational Achievement (NCEA) drama exam because it requires watching and analysing a DVD.

The New Zealand Qualifications Authority has said it does not know how to enable that to happen for Dylan, 18. The authority has ruled out providing a reader/writer or speaker.

“If I could just do the exam like everyone else, it’d be good, as I’d get more credits and it sounds like an interesting exam.”

With dreams of being a comedian, Dylan said he enjoyed the freedom drama provided. Being unable to sit the drama exam “loaded a lot of extra pressure on the major production we had to do, which was worth five credits, as it meant I really had to get it right and it was stressful”.

The exam is worth four credits and Dylan needs 42 to reach his University Entrance (UE) goal. He still expects to gain UE, but does not want other sight-impaired pupils disadvantaged in a similar way.

read more...

From the NZ Herald:

An Auckland mother and daughter have been sentenced to community detention after admitting to defrauding the Ministry of Health of carer support payments of more than $40,000.

Let me say this, for the record: Everyone bends the rules. Life is tough when you’re affected by disability, be it your own, or a family member’s. For people who receive Ministry of Health funding, life is a hell of a lot tougher than those who receive ACC payments. So it pains me to see people being treated like criminals by Government when in reality, they’re only trying to get some flexibility around what limited support is available to them.

I’ll say it again: everyone does it. Disability support funding is limited, and the constraints around it are incredibly restrictive. For many parents of children with significant disabilities, it means they are unable to work, as they spend most of their time supporting their kid. Of course they’re going to attempt to get a small amount of compensation for this work – in this case, $40,000 over 8 years, of money that they were entitled to anyway. Yet the Ministry sees fit to chase them down and slam them with 5 months home detention.

It makes me sick.

On top of this, I know for a fact they’re investigating families who have been using family members as support staff, as I blogged about the other day. This despite the High Court ruling that family members should be allowed to be paid for providing support services. The Government, of course, are appealing this.

This bullying of innocent families (who, let’s be honest, have enough on their plate) must stop. The Government is relying on the apathy, relative inertia and fear of the disabled community to make life hell for the people who deserve it least. No other group in society is so reliant on the Government from birth as people like myself who are born with a disability. We must support each other, and band together to tell whoever is behind this vendetta against good, hard-working families who are dedicated to their kids, that enough’s enough.

P.S. – The Herald ran with the headline “Fraud brings detention” – doesn’t fraud usually mean people are better off? As a good friend of mine quipped, “In this instance, it probably means they didn’t starve quite so much”.

I get a phone call this morning from IRIS, who manage my support services, and it goes like this:

IRIS: So… Looking through your latest report, it says here your support worker is your sister?

Me: Yes, is that a problem?

IRIS: Well, the Ministry have said that family members living in your home can’t be your support staff.

Me: But when I signed up for Individualised Funding, you said that it would be fine..?

IRIS: Not anymore. We can provide you with a support person until you find another one, but right now she can no longer work for you.

So what am I supposed to do, IRIS? Not get dressed in the morning? Go through the rigmarole of hunting down, interviewing, selecting and training another support person? Cancel an arrangement that’s working so well for me at the moment? Therein lies my biggest frustration, really – my support systems have never been as good as they are right now, and the Ministry want to take that away? I’m sorry, but fuck that.

I checked it out with my sister, and she tells me she’s living at her boyfriend’s for now. So I rang IRIS back to tell them the good news. My case manager tells me she’ll ask her boss if they will “accept this” and get back to me, but would I like them to send one of their staff over anyway?

No, IRIS, I wouldn’t.

This isn’t any old job. This is my life: my wellbeing, my independence, my dignity. Right now, my sister is doing an exceptional job, and she will continue to do so. Why on earth are they so hell-bent on removing what works so well?

More than anything, why do I get this uneasy feeling that I’m “in trouble”? I hate it how, as disabled people, we’re locked into these systems whereby you constantly feel like you’re in danger of breaking the rules, not that anyone really knows what the rules are. It’s the same thing if you’re on an invalids benefit, where you’re never really sure how much you can work in fear of having your benefit cut, so you don’t do anything. All these systems, rules, and other fucking people managing your life keep us in shackles, for the benefit of the bureaucrats who spend taxpayer money on fucking porn movies.

Frankly, I’m over it.

Horrifying news coming out of Indonesia. From the NZ Herald: New traffic laws passed in Indonesia require disabled pedestrians to wear signs identifying them as handicapped. AFP reports that amendments to local Traffic and Transport Law says “handicapped pedestrians must wear special and clear signs which can be easily recognised by other road users.” Politician Ahman Muqowam told the news agency that the laws were designed to protect disabled people. “This is a humanistic act. It’s for their safety on

Apologies for not posting this sooner – some of you may have liked to be involved? Hopefully you are anyway. For updates on the Hikoi’s progress, check out The NZ Herald or search Twitter. CCS Disability Action Northern Region will join the hikoi/march on Monday 25 May in support of IHI Action Group (Iwi Have Influence). This action group is leading the opposition to the establishment of Auckland Super City without reserved Maori seats as proposed by the Royal Commission

Cabinet Minister Rodney Hide’s recent comments regarding building regulations have outraged the disability community in New Zealand. On TVNZ’s Close Up programme Rodney Hide recommended that a Christchurch businessman should break the law and not follow accessibility guidelines in building regulations because it was too costly. CCS Disability Action, the largest pan-disability support provider in New Zealand, believes Mr. Hide’s comments were irresponsible and based on ignorance of critical issues in peoples lives and relegate disabled people to second class

Bloody hell. Take a look at the video below, which chronicles a guy from California who makes a living out of suing businesses who don’t comply with building regulations around the Americans with Disabilities Act. I truly don’t know what to say. Embedded video from CNN Video

As you may be aware, two of the last major acts to visit New Zealand, Westlife and Eric Clapton, have both set exorbitant pricing for the wheelchair section Auckland’s Vector Arena. Both times I was able to lobby Vector Arena on my readers’ behalf, who then in turn spoke to the promoters, and convinced them to lower the wheelchair pricing to a more reasonable level, in line with what other consumers pay. With international rock act Coldplay announcing a one-off