AUSTRALIA is not doing enough to support its disabled citizens who remain invisible members of the community, the nation's greatest ever Paralympian says.
Kurt Fearnley believes a change of public perception, as well as greater support through policies such as the National Disability Insurance Scheme, are necessary to fix the country's "broken" system.
Delivering the 2013 Australia Day address on Tuesday evening, Mr Fearnley cited "damning" statistics that illustrate how tough it is be disabled in Australia.
"If you have a disability in our country, you're more likely to be unemployed, more likely to be living in poverty and more likely to be less educated than if you didn't have that disability," Mr Fearnley told a 200-strong audience in Sydney.
He said Australia compared poorly to other rich nations within the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
"In Australia, 45 per cent of people with a disability live in, or near poverty, more than double the OECD average of 22 per cent," he said.
"We rank 21st out of 29 OECD countries in employment participation rates for those with a disability.
"We rank 27th out of 27 in terms of the correlation between disability and poverty.
"Our system is broken, it isn't doing enough."
Mr Fearnley, who has won wheelchair racing medals at the past four Paralympics, said the introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme would go some way to addressing the disparity.
He said politicians should stop arguing about how to fund the scheme and instead concentrate on making it work.
"Pride in a socially just country has no price tag and it needs to happen.
"The introduction of the NDIS won't be an instant success and fix all wrongs, but it will help."
Mr Fearnley said government support through funds and schemes was essential, but would only succeed if accompanied by greater public awareness of the disabled community.
"The large roll-on comes through the education of the business world and general public.
"We're marginalised by our invisibility... too easily overlooked and ignored.
"Without empathy and support from within my community I would have never found my way to the life I get to live now."
Having just returned from his fourth Paralympics, Mr Fearnley said the London Games were "the best Paralympics I've participated in" because of "the level of public and corporate recognition" that the athletes received.
However, he said the Sydney Games in 2000 also changed Paralympic sport for the better, because they "were less about participation and more about competitive excellence".
"The Sydney Games made every paralympian feel like a respected athlete.
"London made us feel like superstars."
However, he was in no doubt as to what represented the toughest challenge of his life.
He said the 11 gruelling days he spent crawling through the Kokoda Track in Papua New Guinea in 2009 gave him a greater understanding of the sacrifices made by Australian troops, and instilled a greater sense of national pride.
"The choices that were made by our soldiers during the Kokoda campaign taught me more about who we are as Australians than a dozen years racing for my country."
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