Autism Association Annual Report 2023

Chief Executive Officer’s Report

first step and we look forward to extending this work in the coming year. Demand for diagnostic services also grew this year. Largely, this was the result of families seeking to understand their son’s or daughter’s difficulties, and getting the right support from mainstream and specialist services. We also commenced the iHOAP project this year, funded by the Department of Communities. This is a systemic advocacy project to improve health outcomes for people with Autism and others with complex communication needs. The project will work with individuals, health professionals and family members. The scope of this work will include primary health care, allied health care, oral health care and mental health care. Our overseas work in East Java, as part of the Sister State relationship with Western Australia, reached its11 th anniversary this year. Because we are still in the early stages of the post pandemic environment, with COVID-19 still a disease to take very seriously, our work has mostly been via video conferencing and webinars. We were delighted, however, to have a delegation visit from Singapore to explore Community Living options with a view to their further development in Singapore.

In preparation for continuing service expansion, we continued a significant body of work on digital transformation this year. In addition, we undertook focused work in cyber and information security to protect all data in an increasingly high-risk cyber environment. We also continued our statewide, national and international collaboration, promoting evidence based practice to support people with Autism. To this end, we were very pleased to confirm that we will be hosting the Asia Pacific Autism Conference (APAC 2025) in Perth in November 2025. I would like to thank members of the community, our donors, our colleagues, community-based organisations and public sector organisations with whom we work and who provide us with support. I would also like to acknowledge the dedicated work and support of our Board, led by Dr Rob Storer. In addition, a special thanks must go to our dedicated staff, our families and Autistic individuals. We look forward to the coming year and the opportunities it brings to further our support to people with Autism and their families.

We continued on our path of strategic development this year, despite the many challenges with workforce shortages and the “post pandemic” operating environment. Demand for all of our services remained very high but, unfortunately, we were unable to respond fully in a number of service areas due to workforce shortages. Despite these challenges, we delivered on our strategic objectives, continuing to deliver high-quality services to people with Autism and their families. In addition, we worked with colleagues at a state, national and international level to improve opportunities and support for Autistic people in our community. We commenced our 5-year infrastructure plan in the last 12 months to support service development now and into the future. In addition to a number of important self-funded strategic initiatives, we also collaborated with a group of commercial entities to assist in the furtherance of this work. This year, we also liaised with legal advisors and the Department of Communities to make home ownership more accessible for individuals with higher support needs. This is a very important

Autism Association of Western Australia - Annual Report 2023

Joan McKenna Kerr Chief Executive Officer

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