The following list shows A4's recent advocacy. This list contains both publications (including briefs and submissions) and communications (letters & emails).

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Coalition government’s ongoing war on autistic Australians

By convenor | Tue, 31/8/2021 - 12:53

Dear Senator the Hon Linda Reynolds,

Subject: Government’s ongoing war on autistic Australian

Autism Aspergers Advocacy Australia (A4) deplores media reports (see Annex below) saying that “The Minister responsible for the National Disability Insurance Scheme has blamed an uptick of Australia’s aged, autistic and obese people for the ‘unsustainable’ rising costs of the service”. Your government’s war on autism is unacceptable. We complained about it before and were ignored. 

Aged autistic people are one of the smallest subgroups in the NDIS: there were just 125 of them in June 2021, just 0.8% of 14K+ NDIS participants in that age group. While their funding level is higher than average for the NDIS, we doubt the numbers in this very small group will increase significantly for some time. We have not found NDIA reporting on obesity; we doubt the NDIS even has reliable data on obesity of NDIS participants. 

FOI 20/21-0660 and FOI 20/21-0835 - NDIA keeps its records with Schrödinger's cat

By convenor | Mon, 26/7/2021 - 15:04

The NDIA claims in its Participant Service Charter that it wants to be "transparent". However, it avoids making public communication and decisions about some key issues. For example, the following show that it does not want its records about commentary from a disability representative organisation (DRO) on advice it received from its IAC released.

The NDIA wrote a discussion paper on early intervention for autistic children.

NDIA's secret report on PEDI-CAT (ASD) and NDIA misinformation

By convenor | Tue, 8/6/2021 - 10:11

On the 12th October 2020, Mr Hoffman, the NDIA CEO, wrote a letter to NDIS participants, their families and carers. In his letter, he claimed that

The tools [for the NDIA's so-called Independent Assessment] have been ... used all over the world for many years.

A4 doubted this was true since no such tool existed for autistic people.

Previously, the NDIS was using the PEDI-CAT to assess autistic children. It is well known that this is not a suitable tool which is why the authors of the tool have been developing a revised PEDI-CAT (ASD) for some time.

diagnoses and advice for autistic children

By convenor | Sat, 9/1/2021 - 12:55
Subject: Fwd: diagnoses and advice for autistic children
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 2021 12:35:56 +1100
From: Bob Buckley (A4 Convenor) <convenor@a4.org.au>
To: Minister.Hunt@health.gov.au
CC: Chris.Bowen.MP@aph.gov.au, Senator Jordon Steele-John <senator.steele-john@aph.gov.au>, The Hon. Linda Burney MP <Linda.Burney.MP@aph.gov.au>, The Hon. Mr. Shorten MP <Bill.Shorten.MP@aph.gov.au>, The Hon Stuart Robert MP <stuart.robert.mp@aph.gov.au>

Dear The Hon G. Hunt MP

Autism Aspergers Advocacy Australia (A4) recently sent this letter to the organisations below. We are very concerned about delayed diagnosis of autistic children and the consequent long-term detriment this brings for them, their families and the community generally.

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