Disability Access and Inclusion

• 2 submissions were received.
• 10 stakeholder meetings were requested and held.
• workshops were held with stakeholder groups.

Findings

During the past 5 years, the Department implemented many of its DAIP 2018-2023 initiatives and made progress towards achieving better access and inclusion for people with disability.

What the Department learned from the consultations in relation to the effectiveness and impact of the previous DAIP 2018-2023 was that:

• there are a range of activities and initiatives in place to enhance access and inclusion, and awareness of disability.
• there is organisational commitment and resources in place to improve disability access and inclusion approaches.
• improvements are needed to achieve higher rates of employment of people with disability.
• training is required of front-line staff to improve disability awareness.
• an impact and outcome-based reporting framework is required for DAIP initiatives.
• additional support is required for people with intellectual disability to access the Department’s services and information.

Disability Access and Inclusion Plan Reporting

To drive achievement of the outcomes areas and objectives outlined in this DAIP 2024-2029 and elevate their profile and prioritisation within the Department, the Department will align its governance arrangements with existing organisational structures.

These governance arrangements will include:

• the Corporate Executive Committee and Director General of the Department continuing to be responsible for ensuring that the DAIP is implemented in accordance with its outcomes and objectives, setting the strategic direction for disability matters across the Department and allocating resources to achieve these goals;
• establishing a Department of Justice Disability Reference Group as a departmental committee that considers the intersectionality of DAIP 2024-2029 implementation, as well as Royal Commission and NDIS matters. The intention of the Reference Group will be to regularly and routinely monitor and evaluate the implementation of the DAIP, and report performance to the Corporate Executive Committee;
• Linking the People with Disability Champion Group into the governance arrangements and implementation of the DAIP. In particular to ensure that there is representation of people with, or with lived experience of, disability in the governance structure; and
• Establishing Action Group/s to drive specific disability related matters/implementation as required.

An internal DAIP Action Plan will be developed to set out:

• the deliverables against each outcome area and key objective over the next 5 years, with clear accountability for action implementation and what the monitoring and evaluation processes will be.
• The action plan will align and reference other related Departmental strategies and actions such as the Workforce Diversity and Inclusion Strategy.
• Where relevant focus areas and actions will be incorporated into strategic business planning and budgeting processes.

DAIP 2024-2029 Outcomes and Objectives

This DAIP 2024-2029 is aligned to 7 outcome areas as legislated by the Disability Services Act 1993.

Outcome 1 - People with disability have the same opportunity to access the services of, and any events we organise.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring people with disability participating, contributing and being meaningfully involved.

Key objectives

1. Develop an ‘Events and Training Checklist’ that sets out the minimum access and inclusion requirements for events and trainings held by the Department to ensure equitable participation in those events by people with disability.
2. To review the Department’s current procurement of goods and services to identify opportunities to also deliver disability access and inclusion outcomes, including the commencement of procuring goods and services from Western Australian Disability Enterprises.
3. Introduce mandatory disability awareness training for all staff.
4. Explore targeted training programs for frontline and key staff, in areas such as supporting people with complex communication needs, unconscious bias, neurodiversity, and the intersection of disability and mental health.
5. Review existing Department training materials to ensure they appropriately address access and inclusion of people with disability.
6. Implement the reforms provided by the Criminal Law (Mental Impairment) Act 2023 following its proclamation.

Outcome 2 – People with disability have the same opportunity to access our buildings and facilities.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring that its buildings and facilities are accessible and welcoming for everyone.

Key objectives

1. Prior to making any changes or refurbishments to buildings or facilities, the Department will consider the needs of, and consult with, people with disability.
2. Undertake an access audit for all of the Department’s facilities, to identify areas of accessibility improvement.
3. Develop guidance materials to address access and inclusion of people with disability, including trauma-informed practice of victims of crime, people with disability requiring a support person, people with complex communication needs, people with a support animal, people who use mobility devices and people with sensory disability.
4. Ensure there is a process in place that seeks the involvement of people with disability in the consultation and co-design of any changes to buildings and facilities.

Outcome 3 – People with disability have the same opportunity to receive information from us in a format that enables them to easily access the information.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring people with disability are able to access information to make decisions and have choices.

Key objectives

1. Undertake routine web accessibility audits to ensure the Department’s digital contents are accessible and meeting the latest Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.
2. Introduce a clear mechanism set out in a policy or change management framework that ensures that people with disability are engaged and consulted in the development and review of policies that relate to them.
3. Develop a Communications Guide that sets out the requirement for all Department communications, including alternate formats and the enhanced representation of people with disability within communications.
4. Undertake a review to identify opportunities to expand the numbers of easy read publications.

Outcome 4 – People with disability receive the same level and quality of service from our employees.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring that the community has access to necessary services and that those services apply to and equally for everyone.

Key objectives

1. Consider measures to enhance the participation of people with disability within the justice sector.
2. Explore opportunities to improve service delivery by employing people with disability within areas such as victim mediation services due to the high proportion of people with disability in victim cohorts.
3. Promote to Department employees the WA Language Services Policy and Guidelines and establish ongoing reporting of the number of requests for, and usage of, services and information as outlined in the Policy and Guidelines.
4. Assess the sufficiency of resources and processes for people with disability within prisons to receive access to diagnostic services and implement improvement opportunities.
5. Development of better measures to identify and assess people with disability when entering custody, including how best to meet their needs.   
6. Finalise the development of a Workplace Adjustments Procedure and Manager’s Guide to Supporting Workplace Adjustments, and train Managers on their application.

Outcome 5 – People with disability have the same opportunity to make complaints to us.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring that people with disability are treated fairly and with dignity and respect.

Key objectives

1. Undertake a review of the Department’s complaints processes to ensure that they are accessible and inclusive for people with disability to make complaints.
2. Agree and implement a process to share relevant complaints to the DAIP Committee to drive continuous improvement.

Outcome 6 – People with disability have the same opportunity to participate in any public consultation we carry out.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring that there is an opportunity for people with disability to be included and part of the community.

Key objectives

1. Develop a Policy and Procedure that requires all external consultation undertaken by the Department to occur via multiple channels and cater for documentation to be provided in alternate formats.
2. Ensure venues selected for any public consultation is accessible and welcoming for people with disability.
3. Develop a policy that sets out the circumstances when people with disability who participate in Department consultation should be compensated for their travel, accommodation and time.

Outcome 7 – Reducing barriers to people with disability obtaining and maintaining employment.

Strategic Intent: The Department of Justice recognises the importance of ensuring that its workplace is welcoming, supportive, diverse and inclusive.

Key objectives

1. Seek certification as a Disability Confident Recruiter by the Australian Disability Network.
2. Consider establishing a disability traineeship program to specifically target the employment of young people with disability.
3. Explore opportunities to engage with Australian Disability Enterprises to undertake a review of roles that can be customised to support future employment of people with high support needs.
4. Implement the recommendations made by Job Access following their recruitment process review undertaken in 2022.  Ensure there is clear accountability for action implementation, monitoring and reporting for similar actions contained with the DAIP and the Workforce Diversification and Inclusion Action Plan.
5. Introduce access and inclusion questions within the annual employment engagement survey.
6. Encourage people with disability to seek employment at the Department and aim to increase the percentage of people with disability employed by the Department to 5% by the end of 2025 in accordance with the Public Sector Commission’s People with Disability: Action Plan to Improve WA Public Sector Employment Outcomes 2020-2025.
7. Enhance initiatives to remove unconscious bias in recruitment, training and workforce practice.
8. Ensure representation of people with disability on selection panels.
9. Establish partnerships with key disability stakeholder groups that create employment opportunities for people with disability, including those with high support needs.
10. Establish leadership targets for people with disability.
11. Engage further with Disability Employment Service providers to ensure applications are received from those providers for all vacant roles, and that the approach results in job creation and retention.