Disability policy: ACC, Social Welfare to Ministry of Health
Advocacy was also behind the development of the Accident Compensation Corporation external (now ACC).
Members of Parliament and others who knew about the impact of war injuries and disability on earning potential were behind the establishment of the Woodhouse Commission external in 1967 which recommended the no-fault compensation scheme.
By 1974, the ACC was up and running for those workers whose disability was caused by accident.
The 1975 Disabled Persons Community Welfare Act external aimed to provide community support for those whose impairment was not caused by accident.
The Act also legislated compliance for the recently developed New Zealand Standard Building Accessibility Code 4121 external. This Standard marked the first-time society had had to change for disabled people, not the other way around.
Organisations such as IHC and CCS received government grants to provide services.
Woodhouse intended that there eventually be one system for disability and income support. However, 50 years later that has not yet eventuated with considerable disparities between disability support through ACC and the Ministry of Health, depending on the cause of the impairment.
Disability policy has always been problematic.
Despite the 1988 Royal Commission on Social Policy advocating more support for disabled people, the National Government’s 1991 ‘Mother of all budgets’ external chopped welfare and cut ACC provisions.
The Minister of Social Welfare and the Minister of Health promised new disability policy within financial constraints. Support for Independence for People with Disabilities – A New Deal external was incorporated in the 1993 Health and Disability Services Act 1993 external.
From 1994, most disability support services were transferred from Social Welfare to the Regional Health Authorities and funded by a capped and ring-fenced budget from within Vote: Health.
The 1975 Disabled Persons’ Community Welfare Act was repealed with its main provisions being retained in the new Act.
During the 1990s, the market was brought into service provision. A service provider tendered for the service via a contestable, competitive contracting process.
Previously free services were now purchased by ‘clients’ from the state through Regional Health Authorities and service providers.
Support was no longer a statutory right but dependent on available budgets, and disability became an individualised health problem.
Access was through a new Needs Assessment and Service Coordination process, with strict eligibility criteria comprising only physical, intellectual or sensory (vision, hearing) impairment.
The growing numbers diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome (autism without intellectual disability) were one group to miss out (and this was not rectified until 2014).