Nolan and Kimberley

Nolan is in his early 20s and is autistic. He also has an intellectual disability.

Nolan did specialist units at school.

‘I wouldn’t probably know what I’m doing if I were in regular classes,’ he told the Royal Commission. ‘I really need, like, help and everything.’

On finishing college, Nolan wanted to get some job skills with a local school leaver employment support service.

‘It was a really dodgy kind of interesting place. There was only one guy who worked there … He was very new and you could tell he hadn’t really had a clue what he was doing.’

The manager gave participants Hangman word games ‘all day every day’.

‘Which is very uncalled for, because what he needed to do is really get us up and running.’

One day his mother Kimberley walked in. She told the Royal Commission, ‘There was no staff there. There was just the people with disabilities huddled in one room with nothing to do.’

Kimberley called the provider who said, ‘The guy is off sick or whatever.’ They hadn’t informed carers and parents as they ‘didn’t want to bother them’.

Nolan went on to another disability training service that he said was ‘much worse’.

Things started out well. The support worker helped Nolan with his ‘comedic ideas’ and for a while ‘he was absolutely a great help’.

‘He was thinking we should go to the natural museum, inspire stuff for my drawing skills.’

But that never happened.

‘And since then, everything just fell apart so quickly. He has the people with disabilities doing nothing,’ Kimberley said.

The guy would ‘vanish’ and have coffee with his mate.

‘We would have nothing on, and we were just these little extras which these guys just keep on and chat by themselves,’ Nolan said.

Nolan registered with a disability employment provider. Staff would take people to shopping centres and parks and ‘walk around with them all day’. The head office did nothing when Kimberley complained.

‘I’d be ringing them all the time saying, “He doesn’t need that,” you know. “He needs to look for a job.” … They just didn’t care.’

Kimberley enrolled Nolan at a vocational education provider with a disability support unit and provided the one-on-one support that ‘the NDIS wouldn’t fund’. He recently completed a certificate in animal studies.

‘But no-one will employ him … nobody will give him a chance … My view is as soon as they hear him speak, they don’t want him.’

Nolan’s been volunteering for years at a couple of major charities ‘but they won’t give him paid work’.

‘I’m down there trying my hardest,’ Nolan said. ‘I’m trying to get a job … And everywhere I went it’s just, like, “No. We’re not going to get someone who has disabilities a job.”’

Kimberley is angry that employers discriminate against her son.

‘There are all these opportunities. Why do they have to close the door for someone with a disability? Why do they have to block him?’

Nolan’s last employment service provider was asking him to apply for eight jobs a fortnight, which ‘is just impossible’, he said. It was also sending his CV off for jobs he ‘couldn’t do’ without consulting him.

The provider also asked him to fill out a form every month ‘to prove that he still had a disability’.

‘It was ridiculous. [He’s] got a lifelong disability,’ Kimberley said. ‘[The provider] kicked him out … they didn’t want him anymore.’

Following this, Nolan decided to launch his own business that utilises his creative talents.

‘Just pay me for what I’m doing … that’s all I’m asking. Even if it’s so little, just try to be fair.’