I’m more than a little angry. I read an online news article (The Feed - SBS))a while ago which talked about the pay disparity between the able-bodied and disabled players at the Australia Open Tennis tournament. Apparently the able-bodied winners of the championship take home A$2.8 million each, the runners-up get A$1.5 million. The disabled champions on the other hand take home a paltry $69,000. Now you may argue that thats a pretty good payday for most people but I would say that its a disgraceful undermining of our disabled athletes. The message that this sends is that disabled players are much, much less valuable than able-bodied players. The most recent winner of the Quad Wheelchair Championship at the Australian Open was Sam Schroder when he defeated Dylan Alcott. As Dylan quite rightly pointed out, they work just as hard, train just as hard, make as many sacrifices as the able-bodied competitors and yet they receive less than half of an able-bodied player who is eliminated in the first round. For those of you that don’t know, Dylan is Australia’s most successful tennis player of all time. He is the only male player to have won a golden slam (all the open tournaments plus Olympic gold). He has retired from professional tennis after years travelling the world competing and winning. He has also just been celebrated as Australian of the Year, works tirelessly as a disability advocate and is an all round good guy. It would seem clear that the disparity in pay for the winners is because they are disabled. Its not that they didn’t bring an audience to an event - they filled centre court and there were more than a million viewers watching the televised event. They showed up for the fans, the sponsors and the tournament. Why wasn’t the Quad Wheelchair winner fairly compensated for his efforts?

The reason this makes my blood boil so much is not just the blatant inequity (though thats disgusting enough) but the wider message that this sends to all disabled people that you are not of the same ‘value’. As someone who identifies as disabled and, who is helping disabled and chronically ill people build businesses, it breaks my heart that these are the messages that are being sent. If you are disabled you are not worth as much. I’m here to say thats bullshit. Disabled people are equal to able-bodied people and surely not treating them as such needs to be called out. I was shocked to learn that it is currently legal in Australia to pay disabled people below minimum wage but illegal if the person is able-bodied. Isn’t that blatant discrimination? It’s time to start the conversations about disparity and calling out organisations that are not giving equitable pay - and that includes sporting organisations.

Okay thats enough sabre rattling from me. I hope you’ve all had a good week and life is being kind to you.

Till next time,

Sarah-Jane

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