I recently wrote to the @NHMRC and to the Health minister @GregHuntMP about what I felt was a breach of the disability Act during my application for an Investigator Grant. This is how it played out.
A thread. 1/13
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Let’s first set the scene.
There are two types of discrimination:
Direct discrimination occurs when a person with a disability is treated less favourably than a person without a disability would be treated under the same circumstances.
This doesn’t apply here.
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Indirect discrimination happens when there is a policy that applies in the same way for everybody but disadvantages a group of people who share a protected characteristic.
Here is where I believe the 2020 assessment of my application is unlawful.
3/13

Let’s get another thing straight. Living with a profound disability can be extremely challenging.
It is a Titanic effort just to get me ready to be able to work every day, in that it takes about the same amount of time as James Cameron’s film.
4/13

I have MND and have lost the ability to use my voluntary muscles. So I use eye-gaze technology to painstakingly craft my application.
When the results were released I had missed out. I received a high score but just below the cut off. I fell down in ‘Publications’.
5/13

The assessment of my published work can be summed up by the following from assessor 2:
The track record was promising, however, relative to opportunity, I was looking for more first and last author publication’
6/13

This made me mad. How could someone think that I could physically produce more than what I had done given my disability (and after scoring the impact of my work the highest score, 7)
7/13

It made me wonder if I missed a part where I could explain my permanent disability.
No.
There was nowhere in the application to do this.
This was a policy that applied in the same way for everybody but disadvantaged someone with a disability.
Textbook discrimination
8/13

I asked the @NHMRC to look at the guidelines and to have another look at my application in light of the inadequacies in making reasonable adjustment.
9/13

In response the @NHMRC updated their policy to allow a full explanation of circumstances and their impact on outputs in future applications.
BUT
They determined that due process was followed (i.e. assessors followed the existing guidelines when assessing my application).
10/13

So they were happy because policy was followed. The very policy that discriminated against me and that they changed in response to my letter.

By now I am tired of fighting.
Maybe it is just me.
I asked other academics with a disability how they felt about the process.
11/13

I got responses like:

‘The impact disabilities have on our careers don’t seem to come into consideration’

‘most assessors would not understand’

‘terrible’processes for acknowledging impacts of disability’

and

it doesn't seem to make a difference

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The @NHMRC needs to do better. Much better.

If they cannot recognize and respond to disability discrimination how can the system create inclusion and equity more broadly?

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