By Neena Bhandari
Sydney, 14.12.2021 (Hireup): It was not until his mid-teens that Scott Avery was diagnosed with profound hearing impairment. He now uses a Cochlear implant and tried accessing the NDIS a few years ago, but was bogged down by the complexities and peculiarities of the scheme.
“I had to complete a Hearing Handicap Audit and basically disable myself to prove how “handicapped” I was by my hearing. This was too demeaning so I gave up after a few months,” says Avery, who is from the Worimi country in New South Wales.
He says, “I just wanted to talk with an Aboriginal person for my eligibility assessment because the `medical model of disability’ thinks we are all broken. It’s a modus operandi of `we’ll just fix you’ for a lot of government systems. This has a negative impact on people’s social and emotional well-being.”