Griff and Krystie
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.
Griff has quadriplegia as the result of a motorbike accident about a decade ago.
‘If my brother didn’t have a supportive and relatively confident family to speak up and advocate and speak out about so many different things, we’d hate to think where he would be,’ his sister Krystie told the Royal Commission.
Three months after the crash, the hospital sent Griff to a rehabilitation centre where staff neglected him.
‘Pressure sores that got so bad ... you could see his, like, the bones of his thigh.’
Staff didn’t help him eat or take his medication.
‘Obviously being a complete quadriplegic he had no hand function or ability, particularly at that early stage … [He began] to deteriorate in lots of different ways both physically and mentally, which really delayed his rehabilitation.’
Krystie said Griff’s family ended up feeding him and making sure he took his medication and cleaned his teeth. They relied on security staff to help him get in and out of bed.
‘Most people were too scared to speak out to the head of the facility and so, yeah, what we ended up doing was just trying to manage it as best we could as a family.’
Griff remained in rehabilitation for more than a year because there was no funding to help him find supported accommodation.
‘My parents sold up a heap of their assets and bought another place and had it modified as much as was able to ensure that he could have the facilities there to be able to shower and toilet.’
The NDIS now supports Griff, but Krystie said he still struggles to find good service providers.
‘The NDIS has allowed him the flexibility to be able to try some different providers, but you know, it’s sort of out of the frying pan into the fire … He’s had so much trouble.’
Krystie said this stems from the ‘quality of support workers’.
‘I think that it’s such a transient workforce and there’s a lack of oversight … And don’t get me wrong, he’s got a couple of great support workers who have been with him for a number of years. But for many there’s not any commitment to it being necessarily a career.’
Krystie said the NDIS is a ‘blessing’ that has improved Griff’s independence, but not the quality of support workers. For example, Griff has to adjust his life to fit around his support workers’ shifts. If he’s not home every night by 9.30 there’s no-one to help him get into bed.
‘They just say they can’t do the shift … Or the other thing is quite often he has been left not picked up by [taxis] … Quite often he will say no to going to the football game because he’s just like, “I just won’t be able to get a taxi home.”’
Krystie said Griff spends much of his time trying to coordinate people just to get him in and out of bed each day.
‘He doesn’t want to complain because he doesn’t want it to be worse than what it is … He just doesn’t have the confidence that it’s going to change anything. Or he is fearful that he will lose the good support workers that he has.’
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.