Repairing disability access in competitive environments: drivers of inclusive service provision for people with intellectual disabilities

In many countries around the world, individualised budgets are replacing ‘block funding’ as the primary way in which disability service provision is funded. These models assume that dynamics of competition improve services for people with disabilities. This article presents the findings of research on the accessibility and inclusiveness of mainstream services for people with intellectual disabilities in four Australian cities in the wake of the rollout of individual support budgets. We use the concept of ‘repair’ and the conceptual framework of ‘landscapes of care and support’ to analyse interviews with mainstream service managers. Our findings reveal that not-for-profit organisations perform crucial tasks in persuading for-profit service providers to collaborate with them to improve their accessibility and inclusion. When these services collaborate to repair service access, not-for-profit organisations often take on associated responsibility, costs and risk to encourage reparative adjustments in for-profit services. Not-for-profit organisations are also more likely to be tasked with the relational and interpersonal work that is crucial for successful service repair. Our findings challenge assumptions that free-market competition is the main driver of more accessible and inclusive service delivery and suggest how policy can support more equitable collaborative repair work.