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The Disability Advocacy and Complaints Service of SA advocates have worked on 416 advocacy processes on behalf of 412 consumers over the past twelve months. As can be seen in Figure 1 the number of cases is slightly higher than last year, there has been an increase of 5% in the number of people accessing DACSSA's advocacy services. This increase must be seen in relation to a staff reduction of more than one full time advocate.
There were 170 new cases lodged with DACSSA over the last twelve months. This is 91 less than last year. The ratio of cases in relation to clients has significantly changed. Some of this change may be due to consumers having been entered repeatedly. The second reason is that the Service Intake Policy has been more stringently observed, which states that clients and advocates work on the most important issue, and a different issue, if it is not significantly affecting a client's life, must go on the waiting list.
The number of continuing cases was high, which also explains why a higher number of cases were closed this year. The number of cases closed has increased from a low last year of 141 to 233 this year.
The reduction in new cases can be explained with an increase in referrals to other advocacy agencies due to overload, and the introduction of a waiting list, which was necessary as a result of the reduction in advocate hours. In addition the reduction of advocate hours also restricts our ability to promote our services and reach out into the community.
As can be seen in Figure 2, the average length of time it took to resolve cases has been reduced over the last twelve months. The length it still takes to resolve issues is in part due to staffing issues in the organisation and reflects the large number of Unmet Need cases that are dragging on far too long.
1. Gender of Consumers
In the past DACSSA advocacy services have been used by more women than men. Historically the proportion of women to men using DACSSA was comparable to the profile of people with a disability in South Australia - 55% female to 45% male. The last previous two years and this year there are more males accessing DACSSA than the State profile would suggest. The figure is, however, down from last year when more men than women accessed the service.
Figure 4 gives the percentage of total consumers from each age group. These figures have remained constant over the past five years. This year they have been reported differently and in accordance with the FACS Census requirements and the national data collection.
DACSSA is a generic disability advocacy agency. As indicated in Figure 5, DACSSA provides advocacy services to people with a range of disability types.
When compared to the South Australian population of people with disabilities the DACSSA consumer profile in Figure 6 shows an over-representation of consumers with a physical disability and an under-representation of consumers with a psychiatric disability and those with intellectual disabilities.
There has however been a noticeable decrease in the number of consumers with a psychiatric disability accessing DACSSA. Last year 28% of DACSSA consumers reported having a psychiatric disability, this represented 88 people. This year the figure has declined to 67 consumers. This may have been the result of the significant reduction in staff hours.
With the introduction of the new database we closed many files where consumers had lost contact, even before the end of the last business year, many of whom had a psychiatric disability. Therefore, there may have actually not been a decline in consumers with a psychiatric disability. In addition, eleven consumers identified psychiatric disabilities as their secondary disability, which eliminates the significance of the reduced access by people with psychiatric disabilities somewhat.
Trends over the past three years reveal a dramatic increase in the request for assistance with complaints relating to unmet need. Unmet need remains a serious problem that needs to be urgently addressed by both the State and Commonwealth Governments. Between 1999-2000 and 2003-04 most other issues being lodged with DACSSA have remained fairly static. This year has seen an increase however, in the number of discrimination cases being lodged with the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission under the Disability Discrimination Act, and cases dealing with accommodation and education. The five year trends can be seen in Figure 6.
Most issues during 2004-05 had to do with service provision, access and discrimination. There continues, however, to be a wide range of issues brought to the organisation by consumers. Figure 7 below shows the overview over the issues.
As well as the 416 cases that DACSSA advocates worked on, DACSSA staff also handled a further 190 inquiries for assistance.
All new cases taken in were originally inquiries and if added, we had 360 inquiries, of which 170 were taken on as clients.
The 190 remaining inquiries asked for information about our services, about advocacy issues, where the clients were pursuing the issues themselves, or where no action could be taken, and about disability issues.
Figure 8 shows an overview over the percentage of the different kinds of information provided.
Consumers were also asked how they found out about our service.
Figure 9 shows that the 'other' category is the highest, and descriptions listed under 'other' are reactions to promotional events, such as the expo at the Tauondi College, personal contact with advocates, and some forms without any indication how people heard about us.
Figure 10 shows that of the 190 people enquiring, 129 were referred to other services. The majority of enquiries were referred to government agencies, usually to sort out a problem in service provision, which did not require lengthy intervention.
Another major component of the enquiries were legal issues, 33% of enquiries were referred to legal services.
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