Senator KNOWLES (2:52 PM) —My question is directed to the Minister for Family and Community Services, Senator the Hon. Amanda Vanstone. Will the minister provide the Senate with the latest developments in the negotiations with the states and territories for a third Commonwealth State Territory Disability Agreement?

Senator VANSTONE (Minister for Family and Community Services and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Status of Women) —I thank Senator Knowles for the question. Along with other senators on this side of the chamber, she has a particular interest in people with disabilities and the services we can offer them. Last year the Commonwealth offered the states a further $2.8 billion to assist them with their responsibilities under the Commonwealth State Territory Disability Agreement—$2.8 billion over five years to help them with accommodation, respite and day services. That is nearly $900 million more cash for the states than was provided in the last agreement. The condition was that the states would have to outline their five-year funding commitments in dollars, giving us the growth and indexation—in other words, putting their money where their mouths are.

The states were initially unwilling to match the Commonwealth's growth for all of its Commonwealth, state and territory disability funding, which was about 7.3 per cent. Of course, the growth in our portion of it, for employment services, has been much higher than that; it has been over 12 per cent. But the growth for our whole Commonwealth State Territory Disability Agreement has been something like seven per cent, and the states were unwilling to match that. We expect the states to be improving services for which they are primarily financially responsible. Finally, after nearly a year has passed, I am pleased to inform the Senate that Victoria and Western Australia have signed up, and we expect the Northern Territory, the Australian Capital Territory and South Australia to sign shortly. Queensland has made an offer which looks very positive; Tasmania, sadly, has made an offer which does not. It does not provide a sufficient increase of commitment to people with disabilities from state funding. New South Wales is also still unable to make a reasonable offer, but I will come back to that point.

It looks like the new five-year agreement will provide state and Commonwealth funding of something like $5 billion more than the last one. That looks like the position we will be able to get to, which is a tremendous result for people with disabilities. But there is the matter of Australia's largest state, New South Wales. Disability services in New South Wales do not have the same level of commitment from their government that those in other states and territories have. The first offer I received from New South Wales for growth funding to look after those who need specialist disability services was for 1.5 per cent per annum. That is derisory. It is a disgrace. It was insulting to disabled people and insulting to the other states to think that they could get away with putting in an offer of 1.5 per cent gross per annum, compared to a seven per cent average for us and, as I say, around 12 per cent in our own areas. The latest offer from New South Wales claims to be something like a four per cent increase, but we cannot see it from looking at their documentation. It looks more like only 3.6—far behind the other states. I have told New South Wales it is just not satisfactory.

If we look at what the Institute of Health and Welfare tell us, bearing in mind that New South Wales has a population a third greater than Victoria, they were able to assist just over 6,000 people in accommodation services; Victoria assisted over 7,000. So you have a much smaller state providing more assistance to people with disabilities. New South Wales just does not know how to run itself. Victoria provides 15 per cent more than New South Wales, despite being about 25 per cent smaller. Victoria spent $4,233 per capita; New South Wales spent just over $3,000 per capita. In other words, Victoria is a smaller state but it spends 40 per cent more per capita than New South Wales. And then, of course, there is the $40 million that New South Wales simply lost. (Time expired)