Part One: Office for Disability Issues and government news.

01: Message from Hon Tariana Turia, Minister for Disability Issues

When I last reported on the Ministerial Committee on Disability Issues, I talked about developing a new single disability action plan.

While the vision and objectives of the New Zealand Disability Strategy remain as relevant today as when it was released, what has been missing is a set of concrete actions to put the strategy, which takes a whole-of-government approach, into effect.

At the Ministerial Committee meeting on 20 July, we heard how the Chief Executives' Group on Disability Issues has started work on the plan. Instead of recording the large amount of low impact activity undertaken by government agencies, it is our goal to have a disability action plan that focuses on a number of strategic actions. This will help simplify the reporting obligations by agencies.

The plan will be guided by the Ministerial Committee's three priorities of Modern Disability Supports, Accessible New Zealand and Contributing Citizens; and also the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Already underway is the Ministry of Health's new model for supporting disabled people. With the new model approach now endorsed by Cabinet, the Ministry of Health is setting up demonstration projects to put into practice such things as local area co-ordination and encouraging flexible arrangements to enable more choice and control for disabled people. Learning from these projects will inform how the new model will roll out in the future.

As part of developing the action plan, the Chief Executives' Group will look at how the new model approach can be extended to other government agencies' disability supports. This will help promote consistency in how government funded disability supports are provided.

Other items discussed by the Ministerial Committee were:

- proposed recommendations from the Review of Special Education

- the Ministry of Justice plan to improve the government's system for reporting on international human rights treaties

- efforts being made in Auckland to make the Rugby World Cup accessible to disabled people.

We also appreciated the Association of Blind Citizens taking time to present to the Ministerial Committee key access barriers experienced by vision impaired people. These issues will be considered by the Chief Executives' Group and reported back to Ministers.

Mauriora!

Na Tariana

02: Message from Jan Scown, Director, Office for Disability Issues.

In the 2010 Budget several initiatives were announced to ultimately help disabled people achieve a better life. Here is an update on the work the Office has been doing on these initiatives.

The social change disability campaign has started to take shape.

Budget 2010 made funding available to improve the public's attitudes and behaviours towards disabled people. A start up group of disabled people, others with experience of social marketing and disability advocates met in Auckland last week to discuss the new campaign about improving attitudes and behaviours to disabled people.

Price Waterhouse Coopers made their fabulous waterfront offices available for the workshop which was the first step in mapping out the needs and expectations of the disability sector with regard to the campaign. The day produced a wide range of thoughts and ideas about what the campaign might look like. The group will meet again in the near future.

The campaign work is being led by the Office of Disability Issues with Family and Community Services (also part of the Ministry for Social Development), working in partnership with disabled people and others.

United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The First Report to the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) is an opportunity to produce an exciting report that we can use on an ongoing basis to help drive action and change in New Zealand.

We are currently gathering responses from government departments on the UNCRPD articles.

We have also met with the UNCRPD Sector Reference Group to discuss the plan for producing the report, the timeline and actions. We want this report to be an honest reflection of reality, identifying what is being done well, what is not, and how we plan making progress in these areas, but taking in to account the reporting constraints placed on the report by the UN.

Funding was provided in Budget 2010 so disabled people's organisations can also monitor New Zealand's progress. DPA, Association of Blind Citizens, People First, Deaf Aotearoa, Ngati Kāpo, and Nga Hau E Wha (a network of organisations of people with experience of mental illness) have formed the Convention Coalition to do this work.

They have trained disabled people to monitor disabled people's experience of their rights and have completed 100 interviews in four sites around New Zealand. They are now writing their report. The report will be ready in November.

03: $500,000 for new service for vision impaired audiences.

NZ On Air has made $500,000 available for Audio Description for vision impaired and blind audiences. Audio Description describes the non verbal on-screen action in a programme alongside the normal soundtrack. NZ On Air's funding is for a pilot year for a limited amount of TV One programming. After NZ On Air and TVNZ evaluate the success of the pilot, and depending on available funding, it is expected the service will roll out more broadly.

04: Newborn hearing screening rolled out to all District health Boards.

The national newborn hearing screening programme is now in place in all District Health Boards, and it is expected that around ten babies a month born with a significant hearing loss will be identified. Identification is important so steps can be put in place to help babies learn language as part of their usual early development. The Government is investing more than $6.5 million a year in this programme.