Independent Liberal Member for Alfred Cove Dr Janet Woollard said it was unacceptable that young children with speech and language difficulties were waiting up to two years to access therapy and intervention programs due to a lack of Government funding.

“It is unacceptable that the Government speech and language therapy services have been eroded to a point where young children 0 to 4 years are waiting up to 12 months for an assessment and another 12 months for access to therapy programs. The waiting lists for school aged children are even longer,” said Dr Woollard.

“Even after waiting so long, children only get five therapy sessions, which is not enough and they are put back on the waiting list again.”

“Early intervention is vital to enable children to communicate effectively with others.”

Dr Woollard said Australian and international research had identified that speech and language disorders can have long term consequences.

“If children with speech and language disorders remain undiagnosed, or do not have appropriate access to therapy and specialised educational services, it can lead to other problems throughout their life, including reduced employment prospects; social, emotional, behavioural and mental health issues, and involvement in criminal behaviour, juvenile offending and imprisonment,” said Dr Woollard.

“A recent study by Dr Pamela Snow of Monash University and Professor Martine Powell of Deakin University highlighted the long term consequences of children not being properly diagnosed and treated. It found that of 50 male juvenile offenders studied, more than half had undiagnosed oral language impairments.”

Dr Woollard said at the moment, speech and language impairments are not recognised as a disability and as a result, children experiencing these problems do not qualify for any of the additional resources offered through Disability Services or the Education Department’s Schools Plus funding.

“The State Government should be expanding services and targeting 0 – 4 year olds to identify problems early. Early identification is beneficial but only if it is followed up by appropriate access to both therapy and specialised educational programs,” said Dr Woollard.

“Medicare only provides for five therapy sessions through its Allied Health Services Plan. If children need therapy, they have to wait for a long time on the public list or pay for private therapy.”

Dr Woollard said the Government provides specialised educational services for children with speech and language impairments through five Language Development Centres, including one at Fremantle that covers this region but a cap of 200 children per centre means there are only places available for a maximum of 1,000 children.

“All Language Development Centres used to provide programs for Kindergarten to Year 3 children but because of the demand, the Government took the retrograde step of restricting the services in most centres to children in Kindergarten to Year 1, leaving even more children without appropriate support.”

Dr Woollard said children with speech and language impairments are not eligible for extra educational resources such as teacher assistant support.

“As a result, many are left struggling to keep up with their fellow students in mainstream classrooms. This leaves few options available because only a small proportion of children meet the stringent entry criteria of the Language Development Centres, said Dr Woollard.

“The State Government has underestimated how many children have a speech or language problem. They say 3 – 5 percent but that is in stark contrast to a national survey covering 4 and 5 year olds, where parents identified 25.2 per cent and teachers identified 22.2 per cent,” said Dr Woollard.

“More Government funding is required. Medicare’s rebate program should cover more Speech and Language therapy, more appropriate educational support should be made available through the provision of teacher assistants in mainstream classes, and the number of places at the Language Development Centres should be increased to meet the growing demand.”