I’m a big believer in disability inclusion because it’s a mindset that everyone can adopt. In the past all the talk was about access which tended to limit discussions to toilets and ramps. But if we embrace disability inclusion as a mindset then that not only improves physical access but also social inclusion and acceptance of difference and not just of people with disability.
As someone with an acquired disability the concept of disability pride can be quite challenging. I cant really feel pride in my current circumstances as a quadriplegic because I can’t help with comparing it with the privilege of the functionality I enjoyed before my accident. So, the grief of loss conflicts with the pride of disability. I can feel a sense of pride in how I dealt with the trauma. I can feel a sense of pride in how I deal with my ongoing daily challenges, and I certainly feel a sense of pride in carving our a new career for myself in accessible tourism from my changed circumstances.
This is my second term on VDAC and I stayed on because it’s an immense privilege to have a voice to government. I think it’s obviously really important for people with lived experience to give feedback to government because it’s essential for good policy making. Nothing about us without us as the saying is.
I’d like to commend the Office for Disability for having such diverse members of VDAC because it allows for a really diverse and rounded feedback across gender, age and ethnicity and sexuality as well as impairment type.
I’m really grateful for the opportunities that VDAC has given me for doing other really worthwhile work, for example I was a judge on the Victorian Quill Awards for disability reporting and I was a judge on the Victorian Disability Awards, and I also sat on a panel to decide the Universal Design Grant applications.
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