For how long was it, Hasbeen, that you cared for your mother? A year or two or five? Jean has clocked up forty-two years and she lives in fear of what happens to the person she has devoted her life to when she is no longer here. Even the most caring parent has difficulty continuing in that role when no longer on earth. Did you give up your career, your financial security, your superannuation, your retirement and possibly your marriage to care for your mother? The "bleeding heart dream" has been adopted by just about every other developed country around the globe. Australia is recognized as having the worst disability support system in the western world. It is not that we don't care for our disabled family member or wish to continue to do so. It is just that we should not have to sacrifice every other aspect of our lives to do it. And if the correct supports were in place, we would not have to. Supports such as the aged care facility you were able to place your mother in when her care needs became too much for you to meet. The point is that there is no equivalent place in the world of disability because supports are not in place. This why we must have an NDIS.

Dear Hasbeen
I am sorry for the loss of your mother, but since you raised it, I would like to ask you a question. Who cared for her in the few weeks prior to her death? As I read it, you also reached the limit of your capacity to provide for her.
Aged care is different to caring for a child with a disability. Firstly, because aged care is at the end of life, and by definition, finite.
Secondly, the chances are higher that an ageing person has assets to assist in the financing of their health and support needs. After a lifetime of earning, they are significantly better off financially. Further, they have already had an opportunity to develop skills, have a career, marry, raise a family, live a life.
And finally, it actually does not matter whether the individual being cared for is old or young, frail or disabled. Nobody is saying they do not wish to care for their family member. We are simply saying there are limits to the ability of one individual to do everything - provide full time medical and parenting care, earn a living, attend to household duties, participate in the community, sleep.
Many people do not understand the significant impacts of caring on an individual, and without experience of this, perhaps the best answer is to read the report. The Productivity Commission are fiscally conservative. Even they make it very clear that the current arrangements are grossly unfair.
Once upon a time other members of the community would have been able to assist in such matters, and it would not come down to funding. Now that all of those people are at work trying to pay for the roof over their head, it becomes a matter of dollars. Unless you are going to volunteer a day a week to assist your neighbour, the NDIS is the best way of managing this as a community.

I am astonished at the bile being cast about by Hasbeen and Wakatak at such a reasonable suggestion: more financial support for unpaid carers. Which incidentally I am not, so I cannot even begin to imagine what the life of an unpaid carer is like. But, consolidated revenue gets wasted so often on pointless and redundant pursuits, an allocation to this enormous but largely voiceless sector seems only fair and reasonable. While writing this I have also considered the plight of the underpaid carers as well, e.g. carers working in nursing homes etc. So many genuinely hard working people (unpaid and underpaid) doing so much to maintain simple human dignity for their charges. I cannot understand the mentality of those who think this is not a fair and reasonable thing to get behind.

When are you people going to wake up.

There is no money.

We are borrowing a hundred + million a day to tread water.

If you want to talk about money for something, you should at least tell us what area you want to take it from to use on your project. It is totally pointless bleating that we should do more, when we do not have the capacity to do what we now try to do.

Have you noticed the riots in Grease, France, Spain, & the UK in response to budget cuts. They have been trying to keep all noisy wheels greased with money they did not have for some time. We are heading in the same direction.

My daughter gets to keep just over $3.00 per hour of her income, after paying all the costs, including child care, of earning. There is no fat left in young families to pick up any more costs of the "wouldn't it be nice" desires of people who want to do good.

It's tine to get real people, & do a bit of arithmetic.

If you want to cut something, I'd have no problem with higher education, or the public service personally, but some won't like that, I'm sure.

Oh, for your interest, I had mum for 34 years, & never claimed a cent. It only started getting hard after my third heart attack. Like some with kids, I was worried she may out live me. I suppose I was lucky there. I still don't feel there are too many others who could afford to give me a hand out, to make my lot easier, when they are mostly struggling themselves.

I wholeheartedly agree with this article: the current system of disability "support" is broken and totally inequitable. You are looked after if you are lucky enough to get a disability from a car accident, but not if you are born with a disability or get a disability from some other form of accident: the productivity commission report into this notes that if someone you love falls off their house roof or a ladder in the garden, making them a paraplegic, (not covered by insurance), the best thing you can do for them under the current system, is to put them in a car and drive it into a tree: then and only then will their wheelchair and other necessary equipment be paid for. This system is totally unfair and unjust.
The federal government needs to urgently get on with fixing the system, and if this means increasing the medicare levy by a small amount, then just do it. I would love see to Tony Abbot even attempt to oppose a national disability insurance scheme.
Progress on this is way too slow: carers need to be vocal and demand media attention on this, on behalf of the cared-for (difficult as it is with carer duties).

I know Jean Tops because I am the carer for a ninety years old very fragile person.
If I was not capable of caring for this person, the "system" would have to find a bed and nursing.
Does anyone know who Akataka's carer is? Obviously not paid enough.