Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I understand the question to be: why did we not spend more money on the disability reform?

Senator Kim Carr interjecting—

Senator Conroy interjecting—

Given, again, the Howard government's record on this, it is a bit rich. I am very pleased to say that the budget included a strong commitment to the new National Disability Insurance Scheme, that we made a decision to bring forward the commencement of that scheme by a year, that the government allocated a very substantial investment in the commencement of that program.

Government senators interjecting—

It has been very well received by the disability sector and the community more broadly. It has been recognised that the government has made a very serious attempt to deal with this long-standing neglect in the Australian community and the absence of appropriate support for people with a disability and their families and carers. We were hoping to have a bipartisan approach to this—

Government senators interjecting—