1 Summary

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Service users and service groups

Between 1 July 2003 and 30 June 2004, there were 187,806 people (service users) recorded as using CSTDA-funded services in Australia (Table 1.1). Victoria recorded the highest percentage of service users nationwide (36%), followed by New South Wales (23%), Queensland (14%), Western Australia (12%) and South Australia (10%).

The most commonly accessed service group was community support services (utilised by 42% of all service users) (Table 1.1). Services in this group include therapy support, early childhood intervention and case management. The next most widely accessed service group was employment (34%)-including open employment, supported employment, and dual open and supported employment services. Community access services were used by 25% of service users, and accommodation support services by 18%. A further 11% of service users accessed respite services during the 12-month period. These patterns in service usage varied between jurisdictions.

Notes

1. Service user data are estimates after use of a statistical linkage key to account for individuals who received services from more than one service type outlet during the 12-month period from 1 July 2003 to 30 June 2004. Totals for Australia may not be the sum of the components since individuals may have accessed services in more than one state or territory during the 12-month period. Service user data were not collected for all CSTDA service types (see Section 2.2 for details).
2. Employment totals do not include the 1,004 people categorised as 'independent workers' during 2003-04.
3. Differences in service type outlet response rates between jurisdictions should be considered when comparing jurisdictional data.
4. Victorian data are reported to be significantly understated; errors in the 'date of last service received' as well as a lower than expected response rates have led to under-counting of service users in the current year.

Sex and age

Of the 187,806 service users, 110,777 (59%) were male (Table 3.4). Males outnumbered females in all age groups, except for those aged 70 years or more (Figure 3.1). For both males and females, the highest number of service users was in the 20-24 year age bracket. 

The median age for females was higher than that for males in all service groups (Figure 3.2).The overall difference in median ages was 4.5 years-33.1 years for females and 28.6 years for males (Table A1.9). The smallest difference in median age was for users of employment services (33.8 years for females, 33.1 years for males), and the largest for community support users (23.4 years for females, and 15.5 years for males).

Disability groups

The most frequently reported disability group was intellectual-both as a primary disability (38%) and overall (45%) (Tables 3.4 and 3.7; Figure 1.1). The next most frequently reported disability group was physical (13% as primary; 25% overall), followed by psychiatric (8% as primary; 13% overall). Males were more likely than females to report a primary disability of autism, acquired brain injury (ABI), developmental delay or specific learning/ADD; females were more likely to report a neurological or vision disability. 

On average, service users reported 1.7 disability groups (including primary)-ranging from 1.2 for those reporting psychiatric disability as their primary group, to 2.0 for those with an acquired brain injury (Table 3.6).

Indigenous status

Around 3.5% of all service users reported that they were of Aboriginal origin, Torres Strait Islander origin, or both in 2003-04 (Table 3.8). This proportion ranged from 1.3% in the Australian Capital Territory to 42% in the Northern Territory. 

Indigenous users were more likely to be aged under 20 years than non-Indigenous users (Figure 3.3).
Compared with non-Indigenous service users, Indigenous service users more commonly reported primary disability groups of intellectual, physical and acquired brain injury (Table 3.9). Non-Indigenous service users more commonly reported neurological, vision and psychiatric as their primary disability.

Communication method and need for interpreter services

Almost two-thirds (64%) of service users reported their most effective method of communication to be spoken language, 15% of service users were reported to have little or no effective communication, and 2% had effective sign language (Table 3.12). The majority of service users (86%) reported that they did not need an interpreter (Table 3.13). However, 2.8% of service users reported needing an interpreter for non-spoken communication and
1.8% for spoken language other than English. This data item was missing for 9.8% of service users. Of those service users needing an interpreter for non-spoken communication, 58% had little or no effective communication, and 28% used effective sign language.

Income source and labour force status

Of service users aged 16 years or more, 62% reported the Disability Support Pension as themain source of income, followed by paid employment (9%) and other pensions or benefits (9%) (Table 3.16). This data item was not reported for 17% of service users aged 16 years or more.

Receipt of Carer Allowance (child) was not known for almost half (47%) of service users under the age of 16 years (Table 3.15).

Of the 146,570 service users aged 15 years or more, 35% were not in the labour force, 28% were employed, and 16% unemployed (Table 3.17). A further 21% did not report on this item.

Service user location

The rate of people accessing CSTDA-funded services was highest in inner regional areas (12.4 service users per 1,000 population), followed by outer regional (10.5), major cities (10.2), remote (7.8) and very remote areas (6.0) (Table 3.20).

Presence of an informal carer

Just over two-fifths of service users (42%) reported that they had an informal carer (Table 4.1). The proportion of service users with an informal carer decreased with age, from 79% of users aged 0-14 years to 28% of service users aged 45-64 years (Table 4.1). Respite service users were most likely to report the presence of a carer (85%), and employment service users least likely (29%) (Table 4.2).

Indigenous service users were more likely than other service users to report the presence of an informal carer, in all age groups except 0-14 years, where the proportions were approximately equal (Figure 4.1).

Age and relationship of informal carers

Over two-thirds of carers were reported to be the mother of a service user (69%), followed by fathers (6%) (Table 4.3). Of the 57,815 informal carers whose age was reported, 29,011 (50%) were aged between 25 and 44 years. A further 21,099 (36%) were aged between 45 and 64 years, and 6,472 (11%) were 65 years and over (Table 4.4). There were also 99 informal carers who were children aged under 15 years; these carers were most likely to be the
daughter (33%) or son (31%) of the person they were caring for.

Primary status and co-residency of carers

An informal carer was considered to be a 'primary carer' if he or she assisted the service user in one or more of the three activities of daily living-self-care, mobility or communication.

Overall, 68% of service users who reported having an informal carer indicated that their carer was a primary carer. Informal carers who were reported to be the primary carer of a service user were more likely to be co-resident than non-primary carers (90% compared with 60%) (Table 4.7).

Support needs

Information was collected concerning service users' overall support needs in each of nine life areas, and those areas with the largest proportions of service users always needing support were working (23%), education (21%) and community (civic) and economic life (19%). Life areas with the largest proportions of service users needing no assistance were the three activities of daily living- self-care (30%), mobility (34%) and communication (28%)
(Table 4.8).

When the nine life areas were grouped into three more general areas, the proportion of service users always needing assistance was highest for activities of work, education and community living (33%), followed by activities of independent living (25%) and activities of daily living (21%) (Table 4.9).

A larger proportion of Indigenous users reported always needing assistance in each of these three broad life areas than non-Indigenous users (Table 4.10).

Living arrangements and residential setting

Around 55% of all service users lived with their family, 19% with others and 13% lived alone (Table 4.11). Service users living with others (non-family) were most likely to report always

needing support (percentages ranging from 36% for ADL to 54% for AWEC) and those living alone were the least likely (9% for ADL to 24% for AWEC) (Table 4.12). The most commonly reported residential setting was a private residence (70%). Threequarters (75%) of service users living in a private residence were living with family. Other commonly reported residential settings were domestic-scale supported accommodation (8%) and supported accommodation facilities (6%) (Table 4.13). 

Service outlets

A service type outlet is the unit of a CSTDA-funded agency that delivers a particular CSTDA service type at or from a discrete location. During 2003-04, a total of 8,824 service type outlets were identified as providing CSTDA-funded services nationwide (Table 5.1). Of these, 73% were non-government provided services and 27% were government provided. There was a total of 7,976 state/territory-funded service type outlets and 848 Australian
government-funded outlets in 2003-04 (Tables 5.2 and 5.3).

Most service type outlets operated for either 7-9 hours (41%) or 24 hours (34%) a day, 7 days (46%) or 5 days (40%) a week, and operated for 48 or more weeks (93%) each year (Tables 5.4, 5.5 and 5.6).

Starting and exiting services

Almost half (48%) of all service users were recorded as starting a service during 2003-04 (Table 6.1). Community support services had the highest proportion (56%) of users starting a service during the 12-month period. One-fifth (20%) of service users recorded an exit date in 2003-04-the highest proportions of users exiting a service were for employment (25%) and community support (19%) services.

Service usage

Of those service types that collected hours of service received, respite outlets reported the highest mean number of hours received during both the reference week (564) and a typical week (733). Community support outlets reported the lowest mean number of hours of service received during the reference week (88) and a typical week (94) (Tables 6.3 and 6.4).

Service users of residential accommodation support services (1.01 to 1.04) had a mean duration of service of 314 days during the 12-month collection period (Table 6.5). Of the 187,806 people accessing CSTDA-funded services in 2003-04, almost a third (31%) accessed services from multiple outlets (Table 6.8). Just under a quarter (23%) accessed services from more than one service group. The most common combination of service groups was accommodation support and community access (Tables 6.10 and 6.11).

Government expenditure

Government expenditure on CSTDA-funded services during 2003-04 totalled $3.3 billion, or $3.0 billion excluding identified administration expenditure (Table 1.2). Amounts paid to state/territory governments by the Australian Government are included in state/territory totals for this table.

Accommodation support services received the largest amount of funding in 2003-04, accounting for half of the total expenditure on CSTDA services ($1,638 million). Community access services received $390 million (12%), community support $352 million (11%), employment $301 million (9%) and respite $185 million (6%). 'Other' support services received a total of $95 million (3%), advocacy, information and print disability services $39 million (1%), and a further $282 million (9%) went towards administrative costs.

(a) Australian government-funded community access and respite services are not funded under the CSTDA. They are funded under the Disability Services Act Discretionary Fund.

Notes

1. Data presented in this table are from Report on Government Services 2005 (SCRSSP 2005), for all jurisdictions except Queensland. Queensland data are inclusive of CSTDA-funded specialist psychiatric disability services which are excluded from SCRCSSP reporting.
2. Total expenditure on services quoted from SCRCSSP 2005 includes actual payroll tax for NSW, Victoria (in part), Tasmania and the NT.

Sources: SCRCSSP 2005: Table 13A.37; and data provided to AIHW from Disability Services Queensland.

Outline of the report

• Chapter 2 introduces and describes details of the data collection and how it was conducted, as well as providing key definitions. 
• Chapter 3 gives a detailed description of service user characteristics and services they used over the 12 months, dealing with the majority of service user data items.
• Chapter 4 deals with data relating to informal carers, support needs and living arrangements for service users accessing services during 2003-04.
• Chapter 5 presents data on service type outlets in 2003-04. Chapter 6 relates to service usage, including an analysis of multiple service use, hours received, staff hours and service exit data.
• Chapter 7 deals with data quality issues and response rates affecting the 2003-04 data. Technical issues such as potential population calculations and use of the statistical linkage key are discussed in further detail in the Appendixes.

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