What it's like becoming disabled while living in the bush in Australia
What it's like becoming disabled while living in the bush in Australia
On weekday afternoons, outback dad Scott Richards rolls down the wide streets of Blackall in his motorised wheelchair to pick up his kids from school.
His children, Addison and Parker, wait at the gates with their scooters, ready to race home.
However, school pick-ups haven't always looked like this.
A year ago, Mr Richards was a housepainter and avid footy player, living with his wife Tara and three kids in central west Queensland.
Their world changed when he fell off a ladder while cutting down a tree, plunging headfirst into the ground.
"Someone came knocking at my door and said Scott was hurt and he couldn't feel his arms," Tara Richards said.
He was flown to Brisbane, nearly 1,000 kilometres away, where doctors told the couple the 40-year-old had broken his neck and back — the C4 and T6 vertebrae.
"For quite some time in hospital, I couldn't move nothing but my head," Scott Richards said.
"As the days go on, some things get a bit easier, but I still have a lot of up and down days."
The outback community rallies
Word of the accident travelled fast in the community of 1,300 people.
"I don't think there was one person in the community that hadn't messaged me," Ms Richards said.
She said one of the most meaningful gestures was from a man they had never met before and who lived two hours away.
Longreach resident Jacques Jacobie pushed himself 29 kilometres in a manual wheelchair, raising more than $22,000 for the Richards family.
"When I had my accident, I wouldn't be where I am now without the community's help," Mr Jacobie said.
"If there's more of us that can band together and help each other out, why not?"
Mr Jacobie had a motorbike accident that left him in a wheelchair four years ago.
He now wants to help others in similar situations.
"Being out bush, there's not many people in a wheelchair and not much support out here for people in wheelchairs," Mr Jacobie said.
Mr Richards' rugby league team, the Blackall Magpies, also threw their support behind the family, from fundraising efforts to offering helping hands.
"Every time we see the boys, anything we need they say just to call — muscles, anything," Ms Richards said.
'A lot of things aren't equipped for us'
Mr Richards has had to stay in hospital since returning to Blackall in June because their new house needed significant renovations to become accessible.
"The builder … stopped everything to come and get Scott's job done to get him home which we're very grateful for," Ms Richards said.
She said the $150,000 job, covered by the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), should be finished by the end of the month.
Once complete it will allow the family to be under one roof again for the first time in nearly a year.
However, that's not the only issue Mr Richards has faced since returning to the outback.
"In the cities, we always had disabled toilets and stuff like that everywhere but out here, they're few and far in between," he said.
"There's also quite a few shops that I can't get into."
The Richards said it had also been difficult navigating the NDIS and advocating for care.
"You really have to prove that you need something," Ms Richards said.
Accessibility in the outback
The most recent NDIS figures, from 2021, showed that 6,664 people with a disability lived in remote or very remote locations.
While that showed a 342 per cent increase over three years, according to the NDIS, participants in remote or very remote locations account for just over one per cent of those in the scheme.
Advocacy group Outback Independent Living said people living with a disability in urban areas were often better looked after than those in the country.
"It is quite hard out here," disability support coordinator Louise Gronold said.
"There's an NDIS office in Longreach but they're the only people for hundreds of kilometres in most directions.
"There's just not enough demand for the services out here given our sparsely distributed population."
A spokesperson for the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA), which oversees the NDIS, said: "The Agency understands the challenge of finding disability support services for participants living in rural and remote areas … and is committed to working with communities and stakeholders to address market gaps".
Looking out for each other
Despite the challenges they face living in the bush, Mr Richards and Mr Jacobie said they wouldn't want to live anywhere else.
"I feel like you get more support out of smaller towns than you would in a big city," Mr Jacobie said.
"Everybody knows each other. Everybody helps out."
"We're definitely from the bush, we definitely don't like the city," Mr Richards said.
"It's nice to know you're not alone."
