Assistance animals, including dog guides, are animals specially trained to help you do things you can’t do because of your disability. Like all our funded supports, we only fund assistance animals that meet our funding criteria. We look at whether the assistance animal is a disability-related support that will help you with your disability support needs.
We can only fund an assistance animal if it’s effective and beneficial based on evidence and is value for money. We also need to make sure it meets the definition of an assistance animal and is trained by an accredited provider. It must be able to actively do at least 3 tasks that you can’t do because of your disability. We’ll also check if the assistance animal has passed the public access test. This is so we know it will be able to support you in the community.
Browse the guideline using the links or download a copy: