THE state government has been urged to deliver on all recommendations laid out by a Tasmanian Ministerial Taskforce in the wake of the release of a Senate committee report into disability education.
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The Tasmanian Disability Education Reform Lobby on Saturday released a statement in support of every recommendation included in the Senate committee report.
The TDERL said that the recommendations "aligned closely" with recommendations made by the Tasmanian Ministerial Taskforce into Improved Support for Students with Disability in Tasmanian Schools report released in August.
The Senate committee report identified shortfalls in staff training, and found some public schools were ignoring a legal requirement to accept students from within their local catchment because they were unable to provide for a child with a disability.
The committee recommended the federal government commit to a needs-based funding model such as Gonski, and called for the reinstatement of a dedicated disability discrimination commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission.
"For years students with disability have been the subject of inadequate support and low expectations across the country, and Tasmanian students have not been immune from this," the TDERL statement said.
"A national plan to address the current crisis in disability education needs to be developed and implemented as a matter of urgency.
"Tasmanian students do not receive equitable support compared to their mainland counterparts due to our outdated IQ-based funding approach."
TDERL founder Kristen Desmond said her organisation had no tolerance for a state versus federal "blame game", and called for a needs-based funding and support system.
Education Minister Jeremy Rockliff said the government was considering the Senate committee's report.
"The government has worked hard to get the budget back on track and we are now in a position where we can reinvest the dividends of this hard work into core, essential services of government, such as education," he said.
"The government provided nearly $73 million last year in disability funding and we are committed to ensuring every Tasmanian student can achieve in an inclusive environment that is responsive to individual needs."
