Decline/termination decisions: Meaning of discrimination
Summaries of decisions by Disability Discrimination Commissioner or delegate to decline complaints, and of the President of HREOC or delegate reviewing such decisions; or (from 13 April 2000) decisions by the President or delegate to terminate complaints. Last updated: 19 April 2000
Companion dog not assistance animal for DDA purposes
A man complained that he had been discriminated against by a country rail service provider's refusal to permit him to be accompanied in the passenger carriage by his companion animal, a chihuhua dog. The President confirmed the Acting Disability Discrimination Commissioner's decision to decline the complaint. She found that the fact that the man had trained the animal to provide him with companionship was not sufficient to establish that it had been trained to alleviate the effects of his disability (2 December 1998).
Associate of person with a disability remains an associate after person with a disability dies
Reviewing a decision by a delegate of the Disability Discrimination Commissioner, the President decided that an associate of a person with a disability had not ceased to be an associate for the purposes of the DDA when the person with a disability died (31 October 1996).
Imputation of disability is not discrimination in itself
Confirming a decision by a delegate of the Disability Discrimination Commissioner declining a complaint, the President decided that the alleged imputation of a disability could not in itself be considered unlawful discrimination under the DDA. There was no evidence in this case that the imputation of disability, if it had occurred, had led to any less favourable treatment of the complainant compared to someone without the same (imputed) disability in similar circumstances (19 September 1996).
