From: IAN IRWIN [ianjulie@ozemail.com.au]

Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2000 8:27

To: David MASON; Ian w Irwin; julia haraksin

Subject: Fw: ORTA Application for s55 Exemption under DDA

 

Please submit.  Thanks.  Julie Haraksin and Ian Irwin

-----Original Message-----

From: IAN IRWIN <ianjulie@ozemail.com.au>

To: disabdisc@hreoc.gov.au <disabdisc@hreoc.gov.au>

Date: Tuesday, 13 June 2000 23:59

Subject: ORTA Application for s55 Exemption under DDA

 

 

>I write to express my vehment opposition to the ORTA application for

>exemption under s55 of the DDA.

>Granting the reequested exemption would seriously compromise the objectives

>of the DDA because in essence doing so condones failure to comply with the

>Act from the time an applicant becomes (or should become) aware of

>obligations to put in train measures (which do not create "unjustifiable

>hardship") to meet the requirements of the Act.

>

>To grant an exemption now opens the way for future applicants to ignore the

>Act's clear objectives by waiting until time and circumstances have

achieved

>a balance of unjustifiable hardship so as to defeat even the most

forseeable

>acts of discrimination.

>

>I and a great many others have consistently and sometimes forcefully placed

>the facts before NSW Transport Authorities that their plans were tardy, ill

>conceived and inadequate.  For them now to succeed in relying on what I

>argue is considered incompetence would make a farce of the Act and those

who

>would seek to oversight its operation and return us to a stage where

>disruptive transport stopages by people with disabilities were again seen

as

>the only way of ensuring adequate effort.

>

>Clearly people with disabilities will loose now, regardless of the decision

>by the Commission, because despite the representations accessible transport

>is simply inadequate.  But the Commission should not accept that its role

is

>to be an arbitrator here as to which group loses and by how much.  Rather

it

>should allow the penalties under the Act to operate unfettered.  Only by

>doing so will those who fail to take the DDA seriously be forced to bear

the

>consequences of their inactions.

>

>Ian Irwin

>9418.7795

>