Summary

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The Outcomes Framework is a key initiative under Australia’s Disability Strategy 2021–2031 (the Strategy) to measure, track and report on outcomes for people with disability over the life of the Strategy. Annual reporting against the measures in the Outcomes Framework will show what progress is being made on outcomes for people with disability.

The Strategy has 7 outcome areas. These represent those areas that people with disability have said need to improve to achieve the Strategy’s vision for an inclusive Australian society – one that ensures people with disability can fulfil their potential, as equal members of the community.

Outcome areas:

The Outcomes Framework has 85 measures across the 7 outcome areas of the Strategy and 3 types of measure:

System measures

These track the contribution that key systems, such as health care, housing, education, and employment, are making to achieve outcomes.

Population measures

These track the changes in outcomes over time for people with disability.

Community attitude measures

These track the change in attitudes towards people with disability, and how people with disability experience community attitudes.

The purpose of this initial annual report is to provide an overview of the status of the Outcomes Framework measures at ‘baseline’, namely at the closest point in time to the start of the Strategy in December 2021. Baseline data are the data against which updated annual and (where available) quarterly data for each of the measures will be compared over the life of the Strategy.

This report also includes time series analysis (where data permit) for the period up to and including the baseline data point. This provides a context for the reporting of the baseline value and updated results.

How were people with disability faring at baseline?

For this initial annual report, baseline data are available for 47 launch measures, with historical data also available for 45 of these. The number of data points available for these historical data varies from 2 to 10 points in time.

Key findings

Favourable trends before baseline:

 Inclusive home​s and communities

The average time waited for public housing by newly allocated households with a member with disability was 413 days in 2020–21, a decrease from 580 days in 2011–12.

System measure

 Safety, rights and justice

More than 7 in 10 (72%) disability discrimination complaints that underwent an Australian Human Rights Commission conciliation process were successfully resolved in 2020–21 compared with just over 6 in 10 (62%) in 2011–12.

System measure

 Education and learning

More than 2 in 5 (45%) people with disability aged 20–64 had completed Year 12 (or equivalent) in 2018 compared with less than 2 in 5 (37%) in 2012.

Population measure

Unfavourable trends before baseline:

 Employment and financial security

There was no real change in the unemployment rate gap between people with disability and people without disability between 2012 and 2018 (4.0 and 4.7 percentage points respectively, for people aged 15 and over.

Population measure

 Safety, rights and justice

Just over 4 in 5 (82%) specialist homelessness services clients with disability who were experiencing domestic and family violence were provided assistance for accommodation when needed in 2020–21 compared with 87% in 2013–14.

System measure

 Health and wellbeing

Around 1 in 7 (14%) people with disability aged 5 and over had difficulty accessing medical facilities in 2018 compared with 11% in 2015.

Population measure

Was there variation for different groups?

Results at baseline varied based on age, gender and severity of disability.

 Inclusive homes and communities

People with severe or profound disability aged 5 and over were less likely to have participated in community and social activities (90%) than people with other disability status (97%) in 2018.

Population measure

 

 Education and learning

A higher proportion of female than male vocational education and training graduates with disability aged 15 and over were employed on completion of their training (53% and 50%, respectively) in 2021.

System measure

 Employment and financial security

A higher proportion of male than female jobseekers with disability aged 15 and over (using jobactive) obtained a job placement in a 12-month period that was sustained for at least 26 weeks (8.3% and 6.5%, respectively) in 2020–21.

System measure

 

 Health and wellbeing

Almost 1 in 2 (49%) people with disability aged 18–24 were experiencing high or very high levels of psychological distress in 2018 compared with 2 in 5 (40%) aged 45–64 and fewer than 1 in 5 (19%) aged 65 and over.

Population measure

How are things tracking 6 months into the Strategy?

Of the 47 launch measures with data, 11 had updated data since the baseline. Results for updated data are preliminary as they cover only the first 6 months of the Strategy rather than a full year. Many of the changes are small, which should be taken into account when considering the results. The updated measures are predominantly from National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) data collections, as these have the most recent data updates.

 Employment and financial security

Just over 1 in 5 (21%) NDIS participants in the labour force aged 15–64 were in open employment at full award wage in the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2021–22 compared with 20% in the second quarter (Q2) of 2021–22.

Population measure

 Inclusive homes and communities

Just under 2 in 3 (65.1%) NDIS participants aged 15–64 reported spending their free time doing activities that interested them in 2021–22 Q4 compared with 65.5% in 2021–22 Q2.

System measure

 Personal and community support

Just over 3 in 4 (76%) NDIS participants aged 15–64 reported that the NDIS had helped them to have more choice and control over their lives after 2 years in the scheme in 2021–22 Q4 compared with 75% in 2021–22 Q2.

System measure

Future plans

The next annual report with data updates will be released in late 2023. Data updates will also be released quarterly on the Australia’s Disability Strategy Outcomes Framework webpages, with the first release scheduled for March 2023.

People with disability were clear that they did not want the Strategy reporting to be limited to data that were available at launch. For this reason, the future measures in the Outcomes Framework were designed to be developed over the life of the Strategy. For more details on the government approach to developing these measures, including agreed plans for reporting on future measures, see the Strategy’s Data Improvement Plan.

Australia’s Disability Strategy 2021–2031

Outcomes Framework

Our first annual report

Easy Read version

Easy Read summary (6.1MB PDF)

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) wrote this report.

When you see the word ‘we’, it means AIHW.

We wrote this report in an easy to read way.

We use pictures to explain some ideas.

We wrote some words in bold.

This means the letters are thicker and darker.

We explain what these bold words mean.

You can find out what they mean in the Word list.

This Easy Read report is a summary of another report.

This means it only includes the most important ideas.

You can find the other report on our website.

www.aihw.gov.au/australias-disability-strategy

You can ask for help to read this report. A friend, family member or support person may be able to help you.

If you speak a language other than English, you can call Translating and Interpreting Services (TIS).

1800 131 450

What is this report about?

Australia’s Disability Strategy 2021–2031 is a plan to support people with disability in all areas of their life.

In this report we call it the Strategy.

The Strategy will last for 10 years.

It will finish in 2031.

The Strategy includes outcomes.

These are important results governments want to get for people with disability.

There are 7 different outcome areas.

The Outcomes Framework explains the outcomes governments want from each outcome area.

It also explains what data we will collect to keep track of the work governments are doing to get these outcomes.

Data includes facts, information and records.

We will share information about how the Outcomes Framework is going every 3 months.

And we will write a report every year.

This will help us see what changes over time.

What is in the Outcomes Framework?

The Outcomes Framework includes measures.

A measure is data we collect about a certain topic.

There are 3 different types of measures:

1. How services help change the outcomes.

2. How the outcomes change over time for people with disability.

3. How community attitudes:

  • are changing
  • affect people with disability.

Attitudes are what you think, feel and believe.

What data do we have?

We have data from when the Strategy started in December 2021.

And some from before the Strategy started.

At the moment we have data on 47 measures.

We will collect data for other measures in the future.

This is the first time we have shared data about the Outcomes Framework measures.

Every time we collect new data we will compare it to earlier data.

This will help us find out what has changed.

What is going well?

Some data showed that some outcomes for people with disability were getting better before the Strategy started.

The average time households with a person with disability had to wait for public housing has gone down.

Public housing provides homes that cost less to live in.

In 2020–21 households waited 413 days on average.

In 2011–12 households waited 580 days.

More people with disability aged 20–64 have finished Year 12.

In 2018 more than 45% of people with disability aged 20–64 had finished Year 12.

In 2012 it was 37%.

More people with disability are getting good results when they make a complaint about discrimination.

Discrimination is when someone treats you badly because of something about you that you can’t change.

When you make a complaint about discrimination, you tell someone about it so:

  • they find out what happened
  • it doesn’t happen again.

The Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) collects data on who makes a complaint about discrimination.

72% of people with disability got a good result when:

  • they made a complaint about discrimination to the AHRC
  • and
  • the AHRC worked with them and the person who treated them badly.

This data is from 2020–21.

In 2011–12 only 62% got a good result.

What needs to be better?

Some data shows that more work needs to be done to reach better outcomes.

We collected data about people with disability who:

  • don’t have a job
  • are looking for a job
  • but
  • can’t find and keep a job.

We compared it to the number of people without a disability.

We did this for people over 15 years old.

In 2012 this was true for:

  • 8.7% of people with disability
  • 4.7% of people without a disability.

In 2018 this was true for:

  • 9.2% of people with disability
  • 4.5% of people without a disability.

We also collected data about people with disability who:

  • experienced violence at home
  • needed support to find a place to live.

The number of people that homelessness services have helped has only changed a bit.

These services help these people find a place to live.

In 2013–14 these services helped 87% of people with disability who needed somewhere to live.

In 2020–21 they helped 82%

We collected data about people with disability who have trouble getting into buildings for health care.

For example, hospitals and doctor’s offices.

The number of people with disability who have trouble getting into buildings for health care only changed a little.

In 2015 it was 11% of people with disability 5 years or older.

In 2018 it was 14%

What different experiences did groups of people have?

Data showed that some groups of people had different experiences.

In 2018 less people with disability took part in the community if their disability really affected their day-to-day lives.

97% of people with other disabilities took part in community activities.

But only 90% of people whose disability really affected their day-to-day lives.

In 2018 we collected data about how many people with disability had bad feelings that affected their day-to-day lives.

This affected 19% of people with disability aged 65 and over.

But it affected 49% of people with disability aged 18–24.

This happened to them more than other age groups.

We also collected data about how people with disability aged 15 and over find and keep a job.

In 2020–21 less women with disability who took part in jobactive found and kept a job.

jobactive is a government program to help people find and keep a job.

8.3% of men with disability using jobactive found a job that lasted at least 26 weeks in 2020–21.

But only 6.5% of women with disability.

In 2021 more women with disability than men found a job after they finished vocational education and training (VET).

VET is a type of education after school.

It includes:

  • TAFE
  • apprenticeships.

53% of women with disability found a job after they finished VET.

But only 50% of men with disability found a job after they finished VET.

What data has changed?

We also have some data from June 2022.

The Strategy had been going for 6 months.

We found out more about 11 of the measures we have data on from December 2021.

Most of the data only changed a little bit.

The updated measures are mostly from the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

What did we learn?

We learnt about participants aged 15–64.

Participants are people with disability who take part in the NDIS.

Some participants work in jobs with people without a disability.

And they get paid the same as people without a disability.

In December 2021 this was true for 20% of participants.

In June 2022 it was 21%

Participants shared if they spend their free time doing activities they enjoy.

In December 2021 this was true for 65.5% of participants.

In June 2022 it was 65.1%.

Participants also shared if the NDIS helped them have more choice and control.

This includes participants who have been in the NDIS for at least 2 years.

In December 2021 this was true for 75% of participants.

In June 2022 it was 76%

What happens next?

All governments will keep working on making outcomes better for people with disability.

And we will collect more data.

This includes updated data for the measures we already have.

And new data for the other measures.

We will share data on the Outcomes Framework website every 3 months.

We will also share another report at the end of 2023.

Governments also wrote a plan about making data better.

You can find an Easy Read version on the Strategy website.

www.disabilitygateway.gov.au/ads

Word list

This list explains what the bold words in this document mean.

Attitudes

Attitudes are what you think, feel and believe.

Complaint

When you make a complaint about discrimination, you tell someone about it so:

  • they find out what happened
  • it doesn’t happen again.

Data

Data includes facts, information and records.

Discrimination

Discrimination is when someone treats you badly because of something about you that you can’t change.

jobactive

jobactive is a government program to help people find and keep a job.

Measures

A measure is data we collect about a certain topic.

Outcomes

Outcomes are important results governments want to get for people with disability.

Participants

Participants are people with disability who take part in the NDIS.

Public housing

Public housing provides homes that cost less to live in.

Vocational education and training (VET)

VET is a type of education after school.

It includes:

  • TAFE
  • apprenticeships.

Contact us

[email protected]

GPO Box 570

Canberra ACT 2601

https://www.aihw.gov.au/australias-disability-strategy

This Easy Read document was created by the Information Access Group using stock photography and custom images. The images may not be reused without permission. For any enquiries about the images, please visit www.informationaccessgroup.com. Quote job number 5054.

DSS 2778.08.22

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