Austism Support in Australia

Russell Brown blogs over at humans.org.nz about autism support and the Australian election campaign.

Both Kevin Rudd and John Howard announced significant (read massive) funding packages for supporting families with autistic children.  This got into the usual argument over who is leading and who is following.  But then a useful suggestion:

Amid the bickering about who was cribbing from whom, Rudd made a sensible suggestion: whichever party won the election, both should unite on policy. I think the job for those of us who want to see greater attention to autism and education support here should be look for such a political consensus.

Not a bad idea.  While it is necessary to have policy differences in key areas – to give the public choice, it is sensible to not politicise every single area of policy.  That would be a nice challenge for the major parties in New Zealand – a bipartisan policy on support for families with autistic children.