Growing Together

Copy and Paste all the Following text into ChatGPT:

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STEP 1: MY VALUES (answer these questions)

1. What role do carers play in ensuring disabled people live a good life, and why is their wellbeing important?
   (Consider how carers' capacity and wellbeing impact the quality of life of disabled people.)
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2. What approaches ensure that carers are well-supported while keeping the disabled person at the center of decision-making, in a way that respects their leadership in their own life?
   
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STEP 2: MY EXPERIENCE (answer this question)

3. Have I ever seen or experienced a situation where a carer’s needs were not considered, and it affected the quality of life for the disabled person? What happened?
   (Describe any real experiences that show why change is needed.)
4. Is there anything missing from this discussion that you believe should be addressed? 
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STEP 3: GENERATE MY RESPONSE (press enter) 

"I am responding to the New Zealand government's consultation on disability support services. The question I am answering is: ‘Do you support the needs of carers being specifically assessed alongside those of the disabled person? Why/Why not?’ Make sure you answer this question.

Act as my friendly human rights defender and craft an attention-grabbing opening that immediately draws the reader in. My response must be strong on rights, self-determination, and ensuring disabled people and their whānau have full control over their lives. It must also reflect the whole-of-life approach that many caregiving situations require and acknowledge the multiple roles that family's step into across a lifetime.

Push back against restricting funding to only contracted providers, as this limits autonomy, creates power imbalances, and risks repeating past failures seen in institutional care. Reference the Royal Commission findings on how system-driven models failed to protect disabled people and emphasize that self-directed, community-based supports provide stronger safeguards.

Key Principles to Embed:

✅ Ground my response in the Enabling Good Lives (EGL) principles, UNCRPD, Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and Whānau Ora.
✅ Make a powerful case that while carers play a vital role in supporting disabled people, any assessment of carers’ needs must:

• Compliment the disabled person’s right to self-determination and independent living.
• Recognize the interconnected wellbeing of disabled people and their whānau without reinforcing dependency models.
• Support a Whānau Ora approach, ensuring whānau are empowered and equipped to fulfill their roles effectively.
• Acknowledges and supports healing from carer fatigue and other chronic conditions that their caring role has contributed to.
  ✅ Ensure the assessment framework supports the evolving nature of caregiving, recognizing that families take on multiple roles throughout a lifetime:
• Supporting and advocating for their disabled family member’s good life aspirations.
• Navigating multiple incoherent systems
• Employing, managing, and training support teams.
• Governance and leadership in self-directed services.
• Building relationships, succession planning, and long-term sustainability, knowledge transfer, intergenerational caring.
  ✅ Demand full transparency in how carer assessments influence funding allocations and support decisions, ensuring they do not dilute or compete with the disabled person’s needs.
  ✅ Push for an approach that respects autonomy, ensuring carers’ needs are assessed in a way that upholds the disabled person’s control over their life and supports, rather than reinforcing substitution models of care.
  ✅ Provide clear recommendations on how assessments can be structured in a way that strengthens disabled people’s independence, community inclusion, and family resilience.

Now, based on my answers, create a strong and persuasive response that:

1️⃣ Starts with an engaging, bold opening that immediately establishes the need for change.
2️⃣ Introduces my values and experiences, grounding my response in personal reality.
3️⃣ Makes a persuasive argument for a balanced, rights-based approach to carer and disabled person assessments.
4️⃣ Provides concrete recommendations for how carer assessments can be structured to strengthen, rather than diminish, the autonomy of disabled people.
5️⃣ Ends with a compelling summary that reinforces the key message and calls for urgent reform.

Use clear, direct, and persuasive language to make this response as strong as possible, ensuring that it highlights the need for a holistic, balanced, and rights-based approach to carer and disabled person assessments.*