MELVILLE council has refused to adopt a replacement for its disability access and inclusion plan which would have roped in First Nations people, those experiencing homelessness and the LGBTQIA community, citing fears of an NDIS-like blowout.

Corrected December 18: The original story only listed Crs Fitzgerald and Wheatland as voting against the motion, while Cr Glynis Barber was also a no vote.

At this week’s monthly meeting, council officers resubmitted the Better Together Melville Access and Inclusion Plan 2023 – 2028 after it was deferred from September.

“The [plan] goes further than the previous Disability Access and Inclusion Plan 2017 – 2022 by including all people who experience barriers to participation in community life,” their report said.

“These include and are not limited to people with a disability and their family/carers, First Nations people, community members from diverse cultural backgrounds, those experiencing housing insecurity or homelessness and people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual and other sexually or gender diverse (LGBTQIA+).”

Better Together Melville was put together with a reference group of people with lived experience of barriers and disability, and the report notes that it received majority support during the public comment phase.

But mayor Katie Mair moved an alternative motion that the City stick with its current plan until a “comprehensive review” had been carried out on BTM.

“If we look at the NDIS, the budget has blown out to be approximately the size of Centrelink, and only a small percentage of that appears to be spent on disabilities services and equal access,” Ms Mair said of her motion.

“The Council could be facing a similar budget blow out with the Better Together Melville Access and Inclusion Plan with a lesser percent of the budget focused on ensuring that people with disabilities have equal access to its facilities and services.”

During the debate Ms Mair said the existing disability plan didn’t specify which disabilities it covered.

Neglecting

“Now, in no way are we ignoring our community by adopting this disability access and inclusion plan once again, or going back to it or adopting this alternative policy. In no way are we neglecting anybody, we are embracing them,” she said.

Ms Mair said that the plan had been drawn up with input from a 15-strong committee and another 190-odd had made submissions.

“If we put those two numbers together, that’s something like 200 people that were consulted, there is a very, very small number of people in our city, when we have 106,000 people that live in our city,” the mayor said.

Cr Karen Wheatland spoke against the mayor’s motion, her voice quavering at times with emotion.

“If you support this alternative motion then you are not willing to support the voices of the community, specifically people that are living with a disability both physical, mental and invisible,” Cr Wheatland said.

“How are they different?

“What are we afraid of here?”

Joss Morgan was invited onto the reference group that helped develop BTM, and said while she had to withdraw due to other commitments related to her advocacy for people with disabilities, she said council staff seemed genuine in the engagement and desire to make the City more inclusive.

She wasn’t sure why the council had dropped the plan, but said it’s not the first time the disability community had been let down.

“Unless the council have got feedback from people with lived experience, I would suggest it is ignorance or fear,” she said.

Cr Jennifer Spanbroek also sited the NDIS blowout in her support for the mayor’s motion, noting that at a briefing councillors had been told adding disability access to 41 of its building would cost $4 million.

“We cannot cater for everyone, we can do our very best, according to what we can do,” Cr Spanbroek said.

Cr Tomas Fitzgerald also spoke in support of adopting the new plan, referring to concerns about the NDIS as “jumping at shadows”.

“Ensuring that those in our community who have a disability, those in our community who have additional barriers to accessing the services that everyone else takes for granted, seems to me to be something that should be pretty near the top of our priority list,” Cr Fitzgerald said.

Cr Fitzgerald, Cr Wheatland and Cr Glynis Barber were the only votes against the mayor’s motion.

by STEVE GRANT