Manfredo and Lola
Content Warning: These stories are about violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation and may include references to suicide or self-harming behaviours. They may contain graphic descriptions and strong language and may be distressing. Some narratives may be about First Nations people who have passed away. If you need support, please see Contact & support.
Manfredo is his 30s. He is autistic and has intellectual disability and epilepsy.
‘He has congenital brain damage. He's functioning at a level of, if you want to put it bluntly, a three-year-old child with severe disabilities,’ his sister Lola told the Royal Commission.
Things were a ‘struggle for him right from the start,’ said Lola. ‘We were a great believer in the integration system. We didn't want him to go to a school for just disability. When he started school, the principal didn't want him there, he did everything in his power … but we won the day.’
The principal told Lola, who was several years ahead, that she would have to look after Manfredo ‘every recess and every playtime’.
When Manfredo soiled himself, they called her to come and change him.
‘Because they wouldn't do it. One time I wasn't at school and mum got the call. She had to take him to hospital because he'd had third degree burns.’
During a parent-teacher meeting, Lola said the principal ‘produced a grubby looking exercise book’.
‘And he announced that this was for the purpose of recording everything [Manfredo] did wrong, and I was amazed.’
Manfredo came home from school one day indicating his chest was sore.
‘There were marks … It turned out that [a staff member was] you know, squeezing and pinching, twisting his nipples.’
Lola made a complaint and the school sacked the staff member.
Manfredo went on to a special school that did ‘some individualised teaching with him’ when he ‘couldn't cope’ in class.
‘And that really helped him. They taught him to write his own name.’
But he really ‘didn't improve’, Lola said, because his paediatrician ‘flatly refused to diagnose him with autism until he was 18’.
‘He just learnt bad things … terrible language and behaviour.’
The ‘first good thing for him’, was attending a day training centre a few years ago.
‘The manager treated him like a human being. He concentrated on the abilities and [Manfredo] did wonders. He had good support from the carers.’
With NDIS support, Manfredo currently lives in a flat by himself ‘with a great team of carers who look after him’. But the NDIA has warned his next plan will be ‘stepped back’ because Manfredo should ‘improve his capacity’.
‘They refuse to accept that his health condition can’t be improved. He’s losing his skills,’ Lola said.
‘In a lot of cases, they don't even read the reports. Something that gets to me, none of these people from NDIS have ever met him … ever wanted to see him. It's Franz Kafka, that's what it is.’
Disclaimer: This is the story of a person who shared their personal experience with the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability through a submission or private session. The names in this story are pseudonyms. The person who shared this experience was not a witness and their account is not evidence. They did not take an oath or affirmation before providing the story. Nothing in this story constitutes a finding of the Royal Commission. Any views expressed are those of the person who shared their experience, not of the Royal Commission.