Page 248 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 10 December 2008
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With this in mind I would like to speak about a wonderful initiative that goes to the heart of the social inclusion of people with a disability. This is the business leaders innovative thoughts and actions program, or BLITS as it is known. Its core objectives are threefold: to identify, support and promote new and innovative partnerships, projects or products that increase the participation of people with disability in the community, to find new and innovative projects and events to showcase business opportunities in the disability sector and to improve the perceptions of business operators towards people with a disability in the workforce and the community.
It is a wonderful initiative, and I would like to draw member’s attention to the BLITS champions. The champions are members of the business and general community who share the BLITS values, aims and objectives and generously support our efforts in myriad ways and in their daily life, and they come from everywhere. We have got Doug Edwards, the Chief Operating Officer of Prime Television; Christine Faulks, CEO of the Canberra Business Council; Jeremy Lasek, and we all know Jeremy; Eoghan O’Byrne, General Manager of Canberra FM; Chris Peters; Simonne Shepherd; Ivan Slavich; and Fiona Wright. So, you can see from that that it is a broad spectrum of people from all over the place.
We can see that the ACT Labor government has already put into place initiatives to make the ACT community a welcoming and socially inclusive one. We will continue to further our work in this area. The ACT Labor government will work closely with the Rudd government to ensure the success of this new employment model. This is a very positive step, and I would encourage Canberrans to read the discussion paper, which is available at www.workplace.gov.au, and contribute to the development of this important initiative.
I thank Ms Porter once again for bringing this into the public arena. Disability is something that I would like to have not discussed at all. It should just be that being red-headed or being left-handed is a big deal. I want to see physical and intellectual disability treated the same way—just part of being us—and the normalisation process that goes with it, and I think we are a long way down that track.
Mr Doszpot: Mr Speaker, I seek leave to speak again; I am addicted.
MR SPEAKER: On what grounds do you seek leave?
Mr Doszpot: To seek clarification from the minister. It is a minor point, but I think clarification is required.
MR SPEAKER: Is leave granted?
Mr Hargreaves: Without precedent.
Leave granted.
MR DOSZPOT (Brindabella): Minister, the only question I have got is: when you started your response you mentioned that the national disability agreement will come into force on 1 January 2010. I think that is probably a mistake.
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