Not The NDIS!

During the original Pink Panther movies, the unfortunate Inspector Dreyfus was gradually rendered insane by the repeated shenanigans of Inspector Clouseau. One of the closing scenes showed a giggling Dreyfus wearing a straitjacket rolling on the floor writing "Kill Clouseau" on the wall with his toes.

This week, I have almost been reduced to a similar fate by multiple dealings with the National Disability Insurance Agency, which administers the equally tongue-twisting National Disability Insurance Scheme. The NDIS was designed to cover the lifelong needs of all Australians with a disability. A noble idea that has often been underwhelming in delivery. Slow, tedious, confusing, inadequate have been some of the adjectives used to describe the scheme's rollout. As a cynical friend noted today, "somebody is making an awful lot of money out of the NDIS and it isn't people with disabilities"...

Terry Wilson, Alex's exceptional LAC through Disability Services, will be out of a job once all the plans are transferred to the NDIA. Naturally, a whole new structure had to be created rather than modifying what was already there, with staff who had, more or less, worked out what they were doing...

So, about ten days ago, with some trepidation, I set out for my meeting in the Big Smoke with Alex and Maria, our new Local Area Co-ordinator with Mission Australia. Rather amazingly, the meeting went without a hitch. Maria had previously been employed at Alex's former funding agency, so she had more than a smidgeon of knowledge about the system.

Within a week, Alex's plan had been approved. I was gobsmacked. This didn't equate to the shambolic organisation I had feared. Maybe, I was about to be pleasantly surprised.

Needless to say, smugness proved to be my downfall once more. Firstly, I began to receive a veritable forest of documentation. Alex's plan, with "i"s dotted and "t"s crossed, had been signed off by an unseen and unmet person within the juggernaut of the NDIA. I suspect that some of Centrelink's virtual heads may have been cloned to grace the corridors of the Agency, bobbing about in their own alternate universe.

Next, I received hard copy correspondence of my NDIS personal Activation Code. (This number will self-destruct in five minutes...) myplace was the quaintly titled and uncapitalised name of all accounts within the NDIA. All I was required to do was follow the instructions on the letter to launch my account. Three...two...one...blastoff!

Except the code didn't work. I tried the Activation Code with and without the Capital Letter at the beginning of the sequence. I added spaces, removed spaces, blew kisses and then swore loudly at the useless piece of information. I was reduced to calling the NDIA for assistance.

So far this week, I have spoken to four different NDIA call centre staff. The first was to a nice woman who tried the original Activation Code I'd been sent. Epic fail. She then issued me with a new Activation Code. Which failed. Then I spoke to a cheerful and efficient lass whom I'll call Agent 99. She tried both the previous Activation Codes to confirm they didn't activate anything. Then we both crossed our fingers whilst she created another Code. Which actually activated my account. Eureka!

Today, I have spoken to the NDIA on two further occasions. The first phonecall was for editing purposes. In the very helpful "personal details" section, I tried to edit my preferences to receive all correspondence by SMS to reduce paper wastage. This morning, I had received three separate letters with three different Activation Codes. Plus, after I had entered to receive notifications by email, a helpful little question mark popped up to inform me that SMS was the NDIA's preferred method and I may not receive all information any other way...Bollocks.

Thus, I tried to edit my details. Repeatedly. myplace blew raspberries and refused to change. Back on the phone. Telstra then tossed me off. Another call. This time, I was connected after a few minutes on hold. This latest operative was enthusiastic, if not entirely helpful. "Sometimes you can't change your personal details on myplace" was her response to my query. So, I apparently couldn't alter my own record. She offered to revise the method of my notifications to SMS. "Be up on your account as soon as I hit the Submit button", she assured me.

Wrong...

After several hours of waiting to view my newly updated contact details, I rang the NDIA again. This time, the polite call centre receiver didn't recognise my personal reference number and had to identify me by Other Means. Once again, I explained the changes I wished to make. She didn't know why I couldn't edit my details either. Five minutes into our conversation, she dropped a pearl of wisdom. "Sometimes, changes can take up to twenty-four hours to take effect". All was finally revealed!

The NDIS website (part of the infamous MyGov package) is not user-friendly. Rather, the website regards users as the enemy. Previously, the gong for the most unhelpful website had been Centrelink's honour. Now the baton has been passed. The NDIS pages are frustrating, contradictory and woeful. The survey that one is invited to complete at the end of each phone conversation does not ask the right questions to give an accurate review of NDIA's service.

I must admit that a slight twinge of sarcasm entered my vocal tone by the end of the fourth conversation. And as I had my phone on speaker mode, Michael, Jan and I broke into peals of giggles the second I hung up.

Either that or I may have had to be restrained in a straitjacket. Pass the vino.

89 Artists...89 Stories...89 Reasons to open the East End Gallery...

Yesterday, I completed the mammoth task (again) of updating the Gallery's catalogue. I like to have a current catalogue always ready to print off to leave for our volunteers to familiarise themselves with our artists and their pieces. Whenever we have an addition or a subtraction or just an alteration within the Gallery, I should bring the catalogue up to date right there and then. The overwhelming reason for avoiding this task is its magnitude. Thus I wait until this mundane job takes on stupendous proportions and then I am forced to tackle the dreaded document. *sigh*

The last rejig was caused by welcoming York artist Jane Gates with her fantastically colourful paintings. And then this morning, Station Arts Artist-in-Residence Lyn Nixon left Beverley after dropping some of her exquisite hand-coloured linocut prints into the Gallery. Eighty-eight suddenly transformed into eighty-nine artists that we promote and support (with much affection).

How on earth has that happened? I am the Front-of-House at a regional art gallery that we started from scratch. After we'd taken a broken-down building and shaken her into renovated beauty. This sequence of events was only made possible by our move to Heavenly Beverley and Michael's incomprehensible and instant love affair with the Forbes Building.

A germ of an idea was for Michael to have his own place to create and display his metal artworks. A crazy friend and mentor in the person of Mister Tim Burns, who along with Mister Murray Cook, galvanised us into collecting a few local artists and then demanded we set a date for opening. So we plucked 19 December 2014 out of the air and announced we would be launching the East End Gallery on that date.

Tim persuaded artists from the Avon Valley, Perth and Fremantle to join us. The power to Michael's workshop had been connected that afternoon and we set up trestle tables and chairs to emulate a Long Lunch. From five o'clock on a stinking hot December evening. We employed the services of a BBQ and a wading pool. Eighteen artists made their way to Heavenly Beverley to christen the East End Gallery. The dream was hatched.

We are fast approaching our fifth birthday, to be held on Saturday 14 December. Since that first momentous night, Michael, with the invaluable services of Executive Officer, Gary and a myriad of other friends and a few tradies finally finished the initial restoration of the Good Ship East End Gallery in March 2016.

I say "initial" as we are well aware that the Forbes Building will continue to carry injuries and need ongoing work. Recently, Michael spent some of most days over several weeks on the roof, fixing holes and cracks, using his standard equipment - tech screws, silica, bitumen paint - to patch and cover and hopefully cut the number of leaks to zero in the Giftshop and minimal in his workshop. This was tedious and tiring work. There is nothing glamorous about being on your knees four metres or so in the air.

Fortunately, like updating the catalogue, running repairs are not a daily occurrence. We have both landed into 'highly unlikely to happen' passionate occupations. Michael, having spent all his working life hoping to be able to pursue his craft in a greater capacity, has been able to do so.

His works "Kangaroo Paw", "Flowers in My Garden" (two pieces), "Starbirth", "The Goldfields in my Garden", "Child's Play", "The Black Dog", "Best Man", "Dory" and dozens of "Magda" (his fridge magnet spiders) have all been produced in the last three or so years. "Mindscape" still holds pride of place in the East End Gallery. "Gears", "Discarded Dreams", "Bicycle Express", "Copper Illusion" and "Sketch in Steel" are proudly displayed at the Freemasons' Tavern. His last remaining nineteen kilogram Magda is patiently waiting for a new home. Having produced a beautiful firescreen for the Gallery, Michael also takes commissions for his firescreens, grates and other decorative metalwork.

At my desk in the main Gallery, I can peruse our amazing space. I welcome guests into the Gallery, I write my blog "Heavenly Beverley", my Facebook pages and the Gallery newsletter. We share decisions about art and artists. We share decisions about the Gallery's appearance. Michael positions the artworks on the walls. And I am Keeper of the Stories.

Knowing all of these stories is such a privilege. Jane created her fantasy birds during her childhood and still paints them. Jenny was put on the Indian Pacific as an eight-year-old with her five-year-old twin sisters and sent to Kalgoorlie. Noela is the mum of our school principal here in town. David would rather tramp around the Cental Wheatbelt taking stunning photographs instead of being a suburban solicitor. Lori's family were soldier settlers in Northcliffe. Ian and Neil love to roam the old Beverley tip in search of objects for their sculptures. Rob is colour blind. Len uses paintbrushes as a last resort. Sharon's organic wilderness guardian inhabits a Tasmanian forest. Paul won the Darlington Art Prize with his metal motorbike "Bat Out Of Hell". Meredith made her beautiful bags, bunting and oven mitts from materials bought from Aboriginal women in the North West. Our other Sharon inherited her artistic talent from her birth mother. Mick has been a politician, a miner and a pastoralist in the Goldfields. Jan and Greg live in a one-hundred-year-old stone house that resembles a labyrinth. Deb grew up in Beverley and has only recently started painting in Busselton.

How lucky are we to have these stories of our artists. In other galleries we have visited, the artists themselves may only be a superfluous addition, their stories invisible. Displaying their photographs and biographies show the varied and fascinating paths our artists have travelled.

We thank each and every one of our eighty-nine artists for believing in us and the East End Gallery.

Giftshop images - October 2019

Gallery images - October 2019