Today’s Guest Hoyden is ANONYMOUS BECAUSE IT’S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS.

I’ve just gone to fill in my ACROD parking permit renewal form. La la la.

They “consulted” (and then largely ignored) us on the criteria and on the format of the new national parking permit. However.

HOWEVER.

I saw no consultation on the questions on the form. And I assumed, naive that I am, that the questions asked would be quite similar to the questions asked on the previous State form: questions about the functional limitations and the need for accommodation.

But no!

Instead, there are intrusive, irrelevant questions about one’s private medical history on the form. Why?

Check it out. This is the Applicant Statement section of the form, after name/address details, and before Doctor/OT’s statement.

It asks about mobility aid use – TICK! Relevant.

It asks “What is the greatest distance you can walk?” TICK! Relevant.

It then asks – “Describe how your body feels when you walk?” Leaving aside the punctuation-choice error, how on earth is this relevant to whether or not I require accommodations? Do they want pain described in flowery detail? Or will they disqualify people offering flowery drama, on the basis that they’re big fakey fakers? What the hell is going on here?

And then, THEN – they ask – “What do you do to manage your condition? e.g. type of pain medication, therapy.”

WHAT THE EVERLOVING HELL IS GOING ON HERE?

How and why do they propose to offer barriers to accommodations based on what medication people are taking? How do they propose that what therapies PWD use are relevant to whether or not those PWDs need accommodations? Are they going to red-stamp it if the norty PWD aren’t going to physiotherapy? Are they going to side-eye people on (or not on) particular medications? Are they assessing non-compliance? Are they making some attempt to assess undertreatment, and if so, what on earth do they propose to do about it? Why is this question here?

And if answers to these two questions aren’t going to change the outcome of the assessment of this application, then why are they collecting this information? It is a violation of Australian privacy law to collect private medical information, which is specifically designated “sensitive information”, without a damn good reason.

PRIVACY PRINCIPLE ONE POINT FUCKING ONE reads:

1.1 An organisation must not collect personal information unless the information is necessary for one or more of its functions or activities.

AND ONE POINT TWO:

1.2 An organisation must collect personal information only by lawful and fair means and not in an unreasonably intrusive way.

Government organisations really should not be collecting irrelevant sensitive information in this intrusive manner. I don’t have a lot of words today – I’m really taken aback. And I feel like I can’t put my real name to any of this, and I certainly can’t refuse to fill it in on principle, because I can’t do without my parking permit.

Is anyone making a noise about this?

Categories: ethics & philosophy, health, social justice

Tags: disability, harmonisation, privacy, social change