Shayne
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.
‘It was really a terrible workplace, I was never involved. Others could take time away from the machinery, but I was forced just to work hard.’
Shayne is Deaf and in his 60s. He worked in a factory for two decades and it was a ‘terrible experience’, he told the Royal Commission.
‘It would be 22 years of horrendous talking down to from the people around me in my workplace. I was never offered shift work … And they were strict with me and they were much more flexible with others. And then if I was to leave a few minutes earlier or something or other, I would get a talking to. But the other staff who came and went as they pleased never got a talking to, so I felt like I was being singled out.’
For all those years as a ‘really hard worker’, Shayne felt he had ‘absolutely no-one’ to turn to for support.
‘I was just ignored. I was a fast worker … I was doing all the right things, but I constantly felt like, you know, that my colleagues would ignore me if I needed some help or some assistance. Like I'd say, “Oh can I get your advice on this or that?” And they'd go, “Oh we haven't got time for this, you're gonna have to work it out for yourself.”’
Shayne said his boss was ‘absolutely horrible’ to him. He refused to make any adjustments to help him and held him back.
‘He just was not fair in the workplace. He was very abrupt, very rude … When there was some training being offered, that, you know, others were getting a qualification for, I wasn't given that opportunity. I was just told to work at my station.’
Shayne felt excluded because the company wouldn’t provide an Auslan interpreter even during important meetings.
‘I would ask them to engage an interpreter for me. They refused and I said, “Look you must. I think you'll find that there are laws saying that you should be providing an interpreter for me.” But they insisted that they didn't have to and that they wouldn't.’
His employer never gave Shayne a promised pay rise.
‘I think that my income was not right, and I didn't understand a lot of that … I eventually raised it with my boss, and then all of a sudden they lost my paperwork.’
With legal help, Shayne got a few thousand dollars as a ‘lump sum that was to go somewhere to compensate for that’.
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.