Zaiden

Zaiden, whose health issues include fibromyalgia, sciatic arthritis, depression and anxiety, hasn’t been able to work since the mid-1990s. In the early 2000s he began receiving a Disability Support Pension. Then in the early 2010s, he was involved in an accident which left him with permanent injuries.

‘And basically, since then, things have not been at all positive … and actual potential for actually improving the situation has pretty much evaporated,’ Zaiden told the Royal Commission.

At the time of the accident Zaiden was staying with a family member while he looked for his own place. The accident upset that plan, and the stress of finding another home fractured his relationships with family.

‘In the end … I was basically forced to move out at very short notice.’

Zaiden moved interstate and found accommodation he thought was permanent but turned out to be short-term. Eventually he ended up in a refuge managed by a charity, which passed his case onto another service provider.

That provider, also a charity, placed him on a three-year government-funded program that provided him with transitional accommodation and expected him to re-enter the workforce.

Zaiden is now at the end of the three years and will soon be looking for accommodation again. He is unhappy with the quality of support caseworkers provided during that period.

‘From the beginning it was just a consistent pattern of really not taking what I say seriously and not believing me … At one point it became obvious to me, sort of. Things maybe weren't sinking in as to how dire my physical situation was and that I really needed to be placed in permanent accommodation asap rather than put through three years of [the program].’

Zaiden described numerous instances where caseworkers neglected or ignored his needs.

These included a senior caseworker calling Zaiden’s doctor to cancel an appointment they were supposed to attend together. They assured Zaiden they would reschedule the appointment for the following day.

‘You can't just ring up and say shift an appointment from today to tomorrow. At the moment it's a six-week waiting period,’ Zaiden told the Royal Commission.

Other caseworkers consistently failed to show up to weekly appointments with Zaiden, despite his Centrelink benefits being dependent on regular meetings.

‘We were supposed to be meeting once a week and it got to the stage where maybe one in four appointments would be fulfilled.’

Zaiden met with caseworkers to talk about his concerns, but it seemed pointless.

‘Like, okay, we spent an hour discussing, you know, the simplest of things. “That's an hour of support that we gave him this week,” you know, “making him reiterate things that he's told us 100 times before.”’

These interactions affect his mental health.

‘Yeah, at times the attitude and the way they blatantly misrepresent the way things are, just everything basically, actually has me questioning my own sanity. But then I go – no, it's not me.’

‘I said to them early on in this process, I said, “Well it just seems like all you can do, all you're willing to do, is put me in touch with other people” … They kind of said the answer was, “Yeah, that's pretty much it.” But then even that evaporated … And in actual fact, like, just the simple way they operate has amplified my anxiety.’