Representing the Autism Community

Representing the Autism Community
Allison & Shane Dix with Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister of Australia
WELCOME TO OUR BLOG. We aim to help educate the community about autism and to share with you our personal experiences. We have three beautiful and capable children on the autism spectrum who were all diagnosed in July 2007. We have been through a lot to help them get to where they are today but we still have a long way to go. We will do what we can to support them throughout their lives and to support other families who are also living with autism.

We believe that the initial journey doesn't need to be as difficult as what it is and so we will work hard to provide you with invaluable information and resources to make things that much easier for families and individuals living with autism.We hope that you enjoy our blog and look forward to reading your comments so we can provide you with what you are needing to know, or would like to know.

Happy Rainbows
Autism Global Network
www.autismglobalnetwork.com

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Our Exciting Meeting with the PM, Kevin Rudd & Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities, Bill Shorten


Allison Dix, Kevin Rudd, PM & Shane Dix

Our one on one meeting with the Prime Minister after the Cabinet Meeting/Public Forum was a once in a lifetime experience. We were very lucky to have been chosen for a meeting and were very excited to have the opportunity to represent the autism community.The PM was very warm and made us feel comfortable talking to him about what we want to see happen in the future to improve autism services and to get better outcomes. He was very attentive and had genuine concern for our personal situation having three children on the autism Spectrum. Kristie who has Asperger’s Syndrome is 10 and our twin sons, Jacob and Aaron, who have autism spectrum disorder, just turned 5.What impressed me the most was that every Minister was committed to following up on the issues raised at the Cabinet meeting. The same applied when we met with the PM. He acknowledged the issues we raised about the Helping Children with Autism package, including therapy not being accessible enough to the children and the very long waiting lists. The PM then invited Bill Shorten, the Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Children’s Services, to have a separate meeting with us where he recognised that there is a lot more that can be done to help families by providing more services. We were extremely grateful because we were given a lot more time than the allocated 10 minutes and were appreciative of the time taken to listen to our concerns.My personal view is that having autism on the political agenda and The Helping Children with Autism Package was a major win for families like mine at the last election. Through the family business ‘Autism Global Network’, we would love to work with the Government in an advocacy role to get more much needed services for families living with autism.

Bill Shorten brought to our attention that he is working to make early intervention funding more flexible and to add more providers to the list. I was told that FaHCSIA has been pursuing this for a while, especially with regard to getting more providers on the panel.I was also given assurances from Bill Shorten that he will help the Rainbow Land Play Time (Playgroup for families living with autism and development delay) committee explore ways to apply for funding through the proper processes because he recognises that the playgroup model is a good idea but hasn’t received any funding to date because it doesn’t fit existing criteria. Funding for children with autism over the age of seven is a significant issue for a lot of families, but I believe the Government has certainly recognised that it is a problem and that this issue is being looked into.Because of the time constraints, the Helping Children with Autism Package was the only issue we had time to discuss. We hope to discuss the significant issues around education for children with special needs with the Government in the not too distant future.




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