Ministerial Speech
Senator the Hon Joe Ludwig
Minister for Human Services
13 August 2008
- Check Against Delivery -
OPENING SPEECH BY MINISTER FOR HUMAN SERVICES, SENATOR THE HON JOE LUDWIG
National Employment Services Association National Conference, Cairns Convention Centre
I would like to acknowledge and pay my respects to the Yidinji people, the traditional owners of the land on which we meet today.
I would also like to acknowledge the distinguished guests here today, including:
- Mr David Hudson, Creative Director of Tjapukai aboriginal Cultural Park; and
- Mr Seith Foirmile of the Yidinji people.
- Ms Crystal Kosa, from the Aboriginal Human Resource Council of Canada;
- Ms Lesley Ann van Selm, from the Khulisa Crime Prevention Initiative in South Africa;
- Professor Jane Millar, from the University of Bath;
- Associate Professor Els Sol, from Amsterdam University; and
- Mr John Allen from Work and Income New Zealand.
In particular, I would like to acknowledge and thank Ms Sally Sinclair, Chief Executive of the National Employment Services Association (NESA) and the team at NESA for their hard work in organising this week in Cairns.
Introduction
It is a pleasure to be here to be part of your discussions about the future direction of employment services. The Australian Government is proud to play a part in achieving a more inclusive and skilled nation by partnering with organisations such as NESA and its members.
The Rudd Government recognises your role in connecting people to employment, support and services. This is critical work in our Social Inclusion Agenda. An agenda based on participation, productivity, and access to Australia’s social and economic future.
As the Minister for Human Services, I am responsible for a number of agencies that deliver government policy in employment services. These include the Department of Human Services, which administers the JCA program; CRS Australia, which is a key service provider for rehabilitation services; and of course, Centrelink.
Centrelink delivers policy on behalf of more than 25 agencies and policy departments. It administers more than 140 Commonwealth government payments including activity tested payments such as Newstart Allowance. In addition to the decision making and payment functions Centrelink is one of 18 providers conducting Job Capacity Assessments.
In addition to the key role of Human Services, the policy settings within this area are also vital. Minister for Employment Participation Brendan O’Connor and Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Children’s Services Bill Shorten have both been heavily involved in the development of the Rudd Labor Government’s agenda for the future of employment and disability employment services.
Today I want to talk to you about two things.
The first is the Job Capacity Assessment Review we have conducted since coming to Government.
The second is the Rudd Labor Government’s commitment to supporting people a with disability to engage in the economic and social life of the nation.
Both these issues are intimately connected to the Rudd Government’s commitment to Social Inclusion.
For the Rudd Government, Social Inclusion is not just about the moral imperative of providing people equal access to the benefits of our community - it is also sound economics.
As a nation, we can’t afford to leave our human capital under-developed. Giving people the right support to enter and stay in the labour market makes them more financially secure and contributes to increasing the skills of our workforce.
Increasing skills will ultimately lead to increased standards of living. Ensuring that all parts of the community are able to take advantage of higher living standards is an essential part of the Rudd Government’s inclusion agenda.
Job Capacity Assessment
For those not in the room the JCA ensures that jobseekers receive the right support to help them get and keep a job. It is an assessment conducted, by an allied health or medical professional and is designed to identify issues preventing someone from getting into the work place.
These assessments are used to inform Centrelink decisions about payments and stream individuals to the best employment support services.
On 12 February this year, I wrote to stakeholders seeking their views on how Job Capacity Assessment services could better meet the needs of people with barriers to work, services providers and the Australian community.
Many stakeholders have agreed to the release of their responses to the Review. These will be available on the Department of Human Services website.
These responses represent the views of a wide range of organisations, including advocacy groups, associations representing allied health and health professionals, Job Capacity Assessment providers, employment services providers, and review and complaints bodies such as the Commonwealth Ombudsman.
Together with these responses, I have also released a summary paper, which sets out stakeholder views on key issues of appropriateness, effectiveness, quality and efficiency, and provides additional data and analysis of the JCA program.
This paper also considers stakeholder views expressed through consultation processes for the Employment Services Review and the National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy.
Stakeholders told us that, while current JCA arrangements are soundly based, there are a range of practical issues, mostly relating to the complexity and inflexibility of current policy and program settings.
These relate both to the JCA and Job Capacity Account programs and to broader income support and employment services arrangements.
Since I wrote to stakeholders in February, both the Department of Human Services and I have met with a range of groups, including NESA, to discuss issues raised and practical approaches to address the concerns.
Improving communication
The responses we received identified good communication with employment service providers and with the customer’s doctor as critical to ensuring quality outcomes.
As a first step, the DEEWR June systems release has made it possible for the first time for the Job Capacity Assessors to read the employment service provider’s exit report for their customers.
The Department of Human Services is currently working with DEEWR on possible systems changes to alert the Job Capacity Assessor if a customer is linked with an employment service provider, and to notify them if an employment service provider wants to query a referral.
In terms of improving communication in the other direction, changes in the March and June systems releases have also made significant improvements to the Job Capacity Assessment report, enabling more information to be entered and allowing print preview functionality to ensure comprehensiveness and consistency.
These changes are designed to improve the usefulness of the JCA Report for employment service providers and Centrelink decision-makers.
But the system can only facilitate communication between people, not replace it. I cannot overstate the value for Job Capacity Assessors and employment service providers maintaining active and open communication.
Picking up on the theme of this afternoon’s panel discussion, we are all partners in getting the best outcomes for people with barriers to work.
New JCA Performance Measurement and Quality Assurance Frameworks
On the back of the review and following extensive consultations we implemented new quality assurance and performance measurement frameworks for Job Capacity Assessment and Job Capacity Account services.
These arrangements were developed with providers and will give clear and quantified monthly feedback on a range of issues, including technical correctness, sufficient justification and comprehensiveness.
These frameworks will improve accountability and ensure that both program and contract performance is assessed comprehensively, fairly and with an appropriate balance between quality, effectiveness and efficiency.
In particular, the new measures ensure that JCA providers are recognised for keeping sufficient JCA sessions open in advance, to meet demand from Centrelink and employment service providers.
They will also be recognised for making the effort to meet with customers face-to-face, even where this might add a few days to assessment timeframes in some remote and rural communities.
They will also be measured on the time from JCA interview to report submission, which is more clearly within their control than the current indicator of time from the initial referral to report submission.
In relation to this, providers will not be penalised for taking extra time to submit a report where they are waiting for medical evidence, such as specialist assessment or to clarify information with the customer’s doctor.
These are practical improvements aimed at making the process fair for providers and accurate for customers.
Training
The Department of Human Services is also currently improving at the quality and effectiveness of the training of assessors. This is being done collaboratively with providers and other stakeholders.
The training material available on the DEEWR Learning Centre is being comprehensively reviewed.
The Department of Human Services is working with stakeholders and other agencies towards a less reading-focused, more competency based approach to training. This approach would make better use of the skills and expertise of our senior Assessors, and better complement the internal training which JCA providers already deliver.
One example of this approach is the new DVD on the role of Job Capacity Assessors in social security review and appeal processes, which highlights the skills and processes required to deliver a fully evidenced, comprehensive JCA report. This DVD will hit your mail boxes soon.
We are also exploring the suggestion made by NESA and some other stakeholders of a professional accreditation and qualification arrangement for Job Capacity Assessors, giving work capacity assessment recognition as a professional discipline in its own right.
Scheduling of Appointments
Currently, JCA appointments are filled by Centrelink or employment service providers, by selecting the next available appointment on the DEEWR EA3000 system.
This ensures rapid connection to services, but does not allow a customer to be referred to a particular Assessor or combination of Assessors who may be best placed to assist them.
Together with DEEWR, Centrelink and JCA providers the Department of Human Services are currently considering new diary arrangements which would allow the referring organisation to select a JCA provider, based on their market share.
The JCA provider would then be able to arrange an appointment with the most appropriate Assessor, or combination of Assessors. They could arrange an appointment time which allowed the customer to gather their medical evidence and arrange for a support person, such as a mental health worker, to attend if required.
This would also provide more flexibility to arrange appointments in rural and remote communities, so that the Job Capacity Assessor could visit and conduct a number of assessments face to face.
Subject to further work with other agencies and JCA providers, I would like to see these important changes implemented by December.
Remote and regional Australia
The JCA program has been important in ensuring that people in remote and regional communities do not have to wait long periods for assessment and connection to employment services.
Through the Job Capacity Account, it has also provided access for the first time for Job Network customers in many rural and remote communities to publicly-funded allied health professional services, such as counselling and pain management, where they need these services to become job-ready.
JCA providers have gone to great lengths to provide services in these communities, often at considerable cost in time and travel. The Government recognises that this work is vital and needs to be viable.
The Department of Human Services is currently working with JCA providers on an Employment Service Area basis, examining current arrangements and negotiating changes to improve viability.
These include site-swaps between providers, to allow them to target particular communities to achieve greater economies of scale and more face-to-face assessments.
Future tender arrangements
With a view to June 2009 the Government is carefully considering future tender processes for the JCA, taking into account the work on the Employment Services Review, the National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy and the Disability Employment Services Review.
Work is currently progressing on a number of other issues identified in JCA Review submissions, which I expect to influence future tender arrangements.
As a fiscally responsible government funding for any new initiatives is far from certain, but we are working hard to deliver sustainable outcomes.
United National Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
The refinements we are making to the JCA are of course linked to the boarder disability policy work that is being conducted by the Rudd Government.
In July this year, the Australian Government was one of the first Western countries to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
In doing so, it joined 29 other countries around the world in promoting a global community which recognised people with a disability as equal and active citizens. National Disability Strategy
At home the Rudd Labor Government has wasted no time in pursuing a National Disability Strategy.
The Strategy will set the direction of future disability policy in Australia and will seek to maximise inclusion and deliver outcome focused initiatives that respond to the needs of people with a disability, their families and carers.
Led by my colleague the Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Children’s Services, Bill Shorten, we are currently finalising the consultation process for this Strategy.
Employment for people with disabilities is not possible without appropriate support in the community. That is why the Rudd Labor Government, in partnership with the State and Territories has announced its intention to deliver a $1.9 billion funding boost to disability support services across Australia.
This $1.9 billion will deliver more than 24,500 additional disability places, including:
- around 2,300 in-home support services;
- 2,300 supported accommodation places;
- 9,900 individual support packages; and
- 10,000 much needed respite places in a range of forms across Australia.
Supplying stability and support to families, carers and people with a disability through this increased expenditure is just one more piece of the puzzle.
We can’t fix more than a decade of neglect overnight. But we can support this group of Australians to enable them to have a greater chance of achieving sustainable employment outcomes.
National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy
The Rudd Labor Government has committed to the development of a National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy as a key part of our response to increasing employment opportunities for people with a disability and/or mental illness who wish to work.
Recognising that the changing employment needs of this group of Australians have been ignored for 12 years by the previous government we have also embarked on the development of a National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy.
Many people have contributed to the development of this Strategy – which is a first for Australia.
The Rudd Government will work in consultation with people with a disability, employers and mental health experts. The strategy will look at ways to create direct links between employers and people with a disability and mental illness while exploring innovative ways to support people to find and retain work.
Disability Support Pension volunteers
One of the areas where we could no longer wait to act was in the field of disincentives for people on DSP to enter the work force. As soon as we came to government, Brendan, Bill and I began talking to each other and to the public service about ways we could reduce the administrative barriers.
The JCA review along with the consultations conducted by Brendan and Bill on the National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy made it clear that access to employment services for people on DSP was being hampered by the requirement that people undergo a full eligibility review in order to access support.
Brendan, Bill and I committed to act and already, significant progress has been made. On 21 July, we announced that, from 8 September this year, people on Disability Support Pension who want help to find work will no longer have to worry about putting their pension on the line. The Australian Government is introducing a new ‘pre-employment Job Capacity Assessment’ for people on Disability Support Pension who want to look for work.
Under the new arrangements, Job Capacity Assessors will only collect information for referring people to employment and related support services. They will not review pension entitlement.
So I can announce today funding for an extra 5,000 JCAs every year to assist those on DSP who want to access support to enhance their capabilities.
This cost of $5.2m in the DHS Portfolio is funded in the 2008-09 Budget. This is about supporting those in genuine need who show initiative and want to try to access employment and employment services.
It’s a great example of mutual obligations working: income support recipients seeking to access services to enter the workforce if they can and Government cooperating to remove barriers to participation.
It’s Labor's approach of social inclusion working in practice to improve the wellbeing and participation of some of the most marginalised in the community.
People with undiagnosed mental illness
Another issue we are working to confront is people who - for a range of reasons - either, don’t, won’t or can’t disclose their medical conditions and are therefore not eligible for exemptions from activity testing or eligible for specialist disability employment services.
By their very nature, we have no data on how many of these people are currently with employment service providers.
As the Minister for Human Services, my responsibilities for service delivery make me acutely aware of the issues faced by Centrelink, Job Capacity Assessment and employment service providers in assisting these people.
I have asked Centrelink to work with the policy agencies on how we can better meet the needs of this group within current funding and legislative arrangements.
The outcomes of the National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy and the review of Disability Employment Services will provide the main planks in the future of service delivery in this area.
Participation requirements
Compliance arrangements are an essential component of the broader participation framework, helping to ensure that job seekers remain actively engaged. These arrangements are enshrined in legislation, but they can sometimes lead to real hardship for vulnerable people. Of particular concern are vulnerable job seekers whose engagement with the system is not assisted or facilitated by lengthy non-payment periods.
The current eight-week period can have the opposite effect of disconnecting people from employment services, and offers no incentive for people to reconnect.
The Rudd Government has been working hard to maintain a strong, effective compliance regime. However Centrelink has implemented strategies and systems improvements to assist in the identification of vulnerable job seekers and to ensure that decisions about the reasonableness of a job seeker’s excuse are made with appropriate reference to individual circumstances.
Centrelink has implemented a Serious Failure Alert, for people who are facing non-payment periods. Under this process, evidence is reviewed, new evidence gathered of the personal factors and circumstances of the customer, and a Specialist Officer is consulted before a decision is made.
Of particular interest to Job Capacity Assessment providers, Centrelink introduced a new referral code in June, to enable staff to flag to Job Capacity Assessors that a customer is at risk of participation failure and to seek a professional assessment of their capacity to comply.
Centrelink and the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations will improve the use of Vulnerability Indicators, to ensure that vulnerable customers are protected from unreasonable compliance action.
From July next year, the Government’s new participation compliance model will provide a direct and rapid message to those who are wilfully non-compliant, encouraging them to re-connect as soon as possible while putting in place more effective protections against loss of payment for people who are vulnerable.
Conclusion
I would like to thank you all for your work in this year of significant activity and change.
Special thanks to you all for the considerable time you have devoted to assisting the Government with the JCA Review, and in the employment arena with the Employment Services Review, the National Mental Health and Disability Employment Strategy and now the Disability Employment Services Review.
I am encouraged by the work that has been commenced by the Rudd Government both in the broader employment services sector and specifically in the disability area.
With a great deal of work still ahead of us I am keen to continue to work with the Sector to developing a sector to achieve greater social inclusion in Australia.
Downloads
- Responses and the review summary paper are available on the Human Services website.
- View related Media Release
- Download Speech in PDF format
(34k)
Media Contacts
Joe Scavo — 0413 800 757.
Note
- To view PDF documents you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader.