Whole-of-Government V People with Disability

Nadia has been described as one of the world’s most advanced projects in Artificial Intelligence.

But this magnificent creation by people with disability, came up against the grizzly bureaucratic doctrine of whole-of-government standardisation, and the emergence of ungoverned and deadly automated decision making Algorithms.

In this excerpt from the book 'Nadia: Politics | Bigotry | Artificial Intelligence', we see that - notwithstanding this global breakthrough innovation - people with disability would get no seat at the digital transformation table of government.

And still don't.

EXCERPT:  CHAPTER 14: WHOLE-OF-GOVERNMENT V. PEOPLE WITH DISABILITY

I believe in standardizing automobiles, not human beings. Albert Einstein

‘The Nadia technology story is a vortex of twisted threads: of a bureaucracy utterly bereft of skills; the hyper competitive global battle of the cognitive platforms; of fast-moving innovation; the dark shadows of RoboDebt; and the controlling grip of a culture of political and bureaucratic bigotry regarding people with disability.

It’s an important fact that Nadia did not exist as a ‘product’. This endeavour was not limited by what already existed; something to be tweaked; by what technology firms had for sale. Nadia was not even a curiosity paraded by tech companies.

The AI powered digital human concept for service delivery was envisaged by people with disability well before the technology was brought together.

But Nadia came up against the ‘whole-of-government’ doctrine in digital transformation. A superficially alluring mirage that became a battlefield of vested interests and power plays across the bureaucracy. If you have the time and stomach (as an Australian taxpayer) for it, search online for ‘whole of government technology failures Australia’.

In the whole-of-government battle, the specific needs of people with disability became inconsequential collateral damage. Co-design, the process by which people with disability themselves envisage and create different solutions, fundamentally challenged the status quo.

And whilst we created new concepts of how people and systems would interact, there would be no place for people with disability at the digital transformation decision making table of government.

The one-size-fits-all like-for-like whole-of-government fiction translated into the flawed and costly swap-out strategy - the battle of the cognitive platforms – that would see the termination of Nadia.

In this Part IV, we also consider what is actually involved in ‘testing’ a cognitive experiential system co-designed with people with disability. On the basis of trust is an excursion through the related concepts of co-design, testing, and human agency, to consider the many layers of ‘trust’. This is not an exercise of IT control.

And as it happened throughout this period, DHS and other areas of government were rightly excoriated in the media over a growing number of massive IT disasters.

The spectre of the unlawful RoboDebt catastrophe blowing up at the same time within the same government portfolio as Nadia and the NDIS, in combination with the blistering politics engulfing the NDIS, was a poisonous combination.

‘Sexy fingers’ became a reference to everything that is touched is f**ked.

(There’s a whole chapter on ‘sexy fingers’ in the book.)

The Nadia project was at the epicentre of a massive battle on many fronts.’

…

‘I wanted the Digital Transformation Office (DTO) to personally meet with people with disability themselves face-to-face; to understand their unique needs; to listen to their ideas; and to hear first-hand the co-design effort that created Nadia.

Notwithstanding all the coordination efforts over many months, letters of introduction; multiple personal requests, the DTO refused to meet on no less than six occasions.

On each occasion, a different excuse: not available; let’s meet another time; so the story went. On the last occasion, the meeting cancellation came through less than an hour before the meeting was to take place one Monday morning in Canberra. The NDIA team, the Digital Innovation Reference Group (DIRG) and support workers were already on their way.

On this last occasion, I called out the DTO on their disgraceful bigoted behaviour. I asked them if they even cared about the four hours it took for a disabled person to get prepared in the morning to get to a meeting; the physical effort involved requiring support workers and transportation.

A cancellation that literally could not be picked up on a mobile phone enroute to the meeting. The human cost of each cancellation was not even acknowledged. I said there would be no more meetings.

I have long thought that the DTO and subsequently the DTA, was a spectacular failure, an anachronism appealing to vested interests, frightened by the future.

The NDIS was clearly seen as a bit player whose needs in digital transformation would be ‘taken care of ’ in the whole-of-government battle being waged across the DTO, DHS and large service delivery agencies, fuelled by the marketing efforts of the global tech and consulting firms.

In reality, the whole-of-government doctrine would have people with disability join the queue with every other sector, their needs shoe-horned into a templated strategy. The one size fits all philosophy is the antithesis of what the NDIS is all about. In fact, one size fits no one.’

Think this story is just about what happened 7 years ago with Nadia? Think again. It’s happening still. Today.

Watch out for my next article, where I’ll be talking about the political weaponisation of co-design.

Read the full story of how people with disability continue to be denied the agency to shape and lead digital transformation of the very services central to their lives. Denied the benefits of digital transformation, forced to languish in a grotesquely complex wormhole of paper forms, inaccessible unsearchable website, the unlawful despicable rationing of Assistive Technology, and subjected to deadly RoboNDIS cost cutting Algorithms.

‘Nadia: Politics | Bigotry | Artificial Intelligence’ available on Amazon .

#Nadia #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #CoDesign #AugmentedHealth #Innovation #HumanRights #AssistiveTechnology #NDIA #NDIS #RoboNDIS #ClassAction #RoyalCommission #Algorithms #Bias #Bigotry #DigitalHumans #VirtualBeings #ConversationalAI Samantha Connor Sean Fitzgerald Chris H. Mark Toomey Tony Ridley, MSc CSyP FSyI SRMCP Karen Kline Mark Sweeney Nick Avery Tara Hannon Brendon Grail Muriel Cummins Georgia van Toorn Graham Taylor Paul Flintoft Vinod Ralh InnovationAus.com Rick Morton James Riley Guy Huntington Rafael J. Grossmann, MD, MHDS, FACS NextMed Health Singularity University