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With the Federal Election on 21 May 2022, the major parties have been out making promises, promises to voters. Here is a comparison of the disability announcements and policies of the major parties made to date.

However, Dr Charlton now reckons it has far too much independence from government, which has far too little control over its spending. Unlike most other taxpayer-funded agencies, the NDIA sets its own budget and reports to a board, not to a federal minister. “The fatal flaw in the NDIS: It cries wolf but has no shepherd to control its spending,” he wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age last year.

We need more people in Parliament with lived experience of disability; who understand what the disability community needs because they’re literally a part of it. We need the disability minister to be a disabled person.

As disabled people, we are too often overlooked, underestimated and dismissed by non-disabled people. Too often we’re met with a “good on you champ”, or there’s a unique type of wide-eye, raised-eyebrow stare that comes when strangers realise the kids you are picking up from school are yours.

The announcement is welcome news to voters with disability and their families. Currently they face many problems to become an NDIS participant and to keep the support they need.

Australians with disability could look forward to a fairer NDIS should Labor win the upcoming election, the opposition has said. At the heart of the announcement was a promise to co-design changes to the NDIS with people with disability and the sector, and to boost the number of people with disability on the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) board.

Labor has promised an overhaul of the national disability insurance scheme’s appeals process as Bill Shorten launched a stinging attack on the leadership of the agency’s current boss, Martin Hoffman. Unveiling the opposition’s vision for the $30bn scheme on Tuesday, Shorten said if elected the party would hire another 380 agency staff and crack down on rorting providers and the NDIA’s use of consultants and private law firms.

Carers Australia’s election campaign is asking for equitable access to respite, a review of the financial support system for carers and funding of advocacy services to help carers understand their rights, so that all carers can have the same quality of life as other Australians.

Given his physical struggles, Mr Patterson said he was shocked when his application for a disability support pension (DSP) – backed up with doctor’s letters – was rejected by Centrelink in October last year because his impairment did not meet the 20 assessment points required.