Bathrust RDA excludes some students

The new facilities of the Bathurst Riding for the Disabled Association complex behind Carenne Special School are so inadequate that they exclude some students who used to access the service according to parents and staff. Carenne staff also claim that RDA has lost many valuable volunteers because they are fed up with a committee member and Carenne aide being paid to work there.

One parent told Carenne Gate bloggers -

I have been to the old site and the new site and the new site is completely inadequate. It's just like something Carenne are involved in, looks good but doesn't work. There is no starting platform or anything which means some students who are difficult to get on or off the horses are being left out.

Another parent said -
My child used to always go to RDA and they loved it. They are being told they can't go now because there is no way for them to safely take part. What is the difference between the old site and the new site?

A former RDA volunteer told us -

I'm not working there for nothing anymore, it's so unfair that Melinda Gavin can be on the committee and get paid by Carenne or whoever to work there and then walk around as if she owns the place. They expect more and more from you and for what, to be sneered at by someone who is getting paid to be there, No way! They screwed Mike for his sons getting paid to pull down some stuff there but they pay her week in week out, its just wrong. They treat you like s***. The new facilities are s***, the waiting room is a big problem, there is poor seating and they won't put blinds up so the sun really hurts the kid's eyes. When I approached Michael about getting some he told me there wasn't the money to buy them and if I wanted them to get them myself! How rude is that!

A Carenne employee told bloggers -

RDA is just another example of one of Michael Auld's stuff ups. He lobbied for it to be put behind Carenne and he is the one who has fought for Melinda Gavin to work there. That has really annoyed some of the volunteers who just decided to walk away, especially after Mike Biddle being thrown off the committee for receiving payment for work he did. Melinda is on the committee, why does she get paid to work over there?

"hatho" reports -

RDA has just turned into something else Carenne has tried to take over and made a mess of. It's really just an extension of Carenne now, you can't tell the difference between the two. They received government grants and donations to build that site but they have kept it quiet that they messed it up. Just like the new classrooms Michael Auld pushed for and the bus shed he had designed that the buses can't even get in! When students who used to go can't anymore it shows there is something wrong.

It has been claimed that a Carenne Support therapist is being paid to work at RDA as well as Jasmine Ryan, an aide at Carenne.

With at least part of the funding being given to the organisation coming from government, we must ask just why was this allowed to be so poorly planned. Where has the siphoned part of the $3.7 million trade training centre funding gone?