Executive summary

Carers and Advocates Villages Vision

Carers and Advocates Australia Pty Ltd will create Villages across Australia in every state that provide sanctuary for people with disabilities. Everyone, from the city to the bush, will be welcome to join our community and family. Each village will reflect the influence and character of those who choose to make it their home—participants, staff, spouses, parents, children, and friends. These individuals will be members of both their village community and their broader state community. Together, we will work to protect and perpetuate this vision beyond the lifespan of each soul who embarks on this journey with us. So, for our great-grandchildren, the horrific stories of today will become stories known to no one living—never again.

Our focus is on quality of life, placing heart back into care, and ensuring that this is woven into safeguarding principles across the nation. Long after I finally rest, this mission will never rest and will forever protect those I promised to protect. This is my life, my purpose, and I live to realise it, so no one ever dies from neglect, or from a lack of love, compassion, or care ever again. I do this not only for others but so that I may one day sleep peacefully at night. This is my pathway and my courage, and I work alongside others who share my vision—one that cannot be seen but must be felt to be understood.

I believe that the status quo around disability was not only untenable financially but ethically and morally. I believe in a compassionate capitalism where the community benefits and is protected by its enterprises, working together towards a shared vision well into the future.

This will be an intentional community structure with a sociocratic foundation based on supported decision-making principles. Each village will be named by its occupants and coloured by their personalities.

Our goal is to prioritise the disabled person as a key stakeholder and to protect their interests for the future by empowering, inspiring, and enabling them to actualise their vision of their best life.

Our caregivers and our culture foster a reciprocal atmosphere where everyone feels safe and empowered. We exist to liberate people from fear and uncertainty and to inspire them to live their best lives as valued members of the community.

We recognise that the lack of social capital and family is reflected in National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) plans, and that the underlying issues of fraud and unscrupulous providers that plagued the previous system persist even with the introduction of the NDIS.

We also recognise that we are facing workforce failure and that the current training pathways do not fit our purpose.

To address these issues, we must level the playing field and encourage competition based on results rather than power, authority, and lack of choice.

We must recognise the importance of family and community support and provide financial instruments that enable investment in personal and private care within the home. We no longer build communities—we build suburbs and dormitory towns with no soul or sense of belonging. Social capital and extended families rarely exist.

This is reflected above all else in our aged care and disability care systems: the profound lack of community. We continue to build more and more houses, but fewer homes. We find ways to work longer hours through precarious, soulless shift work. We are being told it is better to place our children not in well-supported families, but in government-supported kindergartens.

It isn’t just the NDIS that has lost its way.

We all have.

Community is the way home.