PLEDGE TO BRING SPORT TO MORE
MORE people with disabilities would be linked with sport via a $10.34m expansion of the Sport4All program under an Albanese Labor government.
The program, which currently runs in the City of Greater Geelong and other Victorian council areas, provides schools and sporting clubs tools to provide opportunities for people with disabilities to participate in sport.
The Labor funding pledge will be used to expand the Sport4All program to 80 local government areas nationwide with a focus on regional, remote, and culturally and linguistically diverse communities.
Under the program a disability inclusion coach is employed in a local government area to connect clubs and people with a disability.
Danielle Fraillon, chief executive of Get Skilled Access, which runs Sport4All, said Labor’s pledge would allow the organisation to employ another 100 people, who will have a disability or lived experience of a disability, across four years.
“The point of this is around mainstream clubs and schools, and how do we help them to become more inclusive?” Ms Fraillon said.
“The resources are actually available online to anybody. But what we’re finding is that (people with disabilities) engage better with an inclusion coach who helps them to work through all the resources, learn and understand. It’s really important that the inclusion coach is a person with disability.”
Ms Fraillon said the
expansion of the Sport4All program was welcomed as regional Victoria prepared to host the Commonwealth Games in 2026.
Labor’s spokesman for sport Don Farrell, who visited Bell Park on Wednesday, said the party wanted to give all Australians, regardless of ability, a chance to enjoy sport.
“Expanding Sport4All will help skill up schools and sporting clubs to provide even more and better opportunities for Australians with a disability to participate
in their favourite sports,” he said
Corangamite Labor MP Libby Coker said: “I am looking forward to working with local councils across my region and people in the disability sector to ensure that people of all ages with a disability have opportunity.
“People with disabilities really want to get involved and they should have every opportunity.”
Labor’s National Disability Insurance Scheme spokesman Bill Shorten said: “We know workplaces and
grassroots sporting clubs around Australia are driven to be inclusive and this funding will make that happen.”
The pilot of the Sport4All program has reached more than 120 sports clubs, 30 schools and more than 50,000 people across five local government areas.
Australian Sports Commission research found 75 per cent of people with a disability who play sport want to play more while 83 per cent of people with a disability who are inactive want to get active.