L1 Endeavour House 1 Franklin Street Manuka, ACT 2603
+61 6130 0530 16 August 2023 mail@australiainstitute.org.au
To: The Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme
Submission to the NDIS General Issues Inquiry
Dear Committee members
I welcome the opportunity to make this submission to the NDIS General Issues Inquiry on behalf of the Centre for Future Work.
The Centre for Future Work is an independent research centre located at the Australia Institute, an independent research and policy think tank. We conduct and publish research into a range of labour market, employment, and related issues.
This submission concerns the NDIS workforce, current workforce trends and issues, and future directions. We are making this submission to bring to the Committee’s attention the growing problems of poor quality jobs and informalisation of the NDIS support workforce.
We recognise that, at the time of writing this submission, significant policy reform is underway through the National Care and Support Economy Strategy development and the independent NDIS Review processes. Some of the workforce problems we identify are recognised in these policy processes. However, to date, neither the National Care and Support Economy Strategy nor the NDIS Review fully acknowledge or propose to address the problems we identify for workers and the future of workforce of the market arrangements that promote the idea that ‘value’ supports require on- demand support workers to be available at low prices. Nor do they fully acknowledge the problems for workers of individualised employment arrangements and the potential for the large-scale informalisation of support worker employment.
Informalisation of the NDIS support workforce is occurring whereby relatively low-paid, casual and contractor support workers–including young people who are recent labour market entrants and migrants who are on temporary visas–are without organisational support or oversight and are distanced from regulation. Support workers engaged directly by NDIS participants, including workers treated as independent contractors and whose employment may be mediated by digital platforms, are not adequately protected by employment laws, including work health and safety laws, and are disconnected from opportunities for training and progression. These workers can be virtually invisible within the support system, in informal employment and with very little or no access to mechanisms for education, support, dispute resolution, collective representation, or progression to higher paid jobs. Workers may have poor knowledge of, and lack access to information about,
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employment rights, and quality and safety of service provision, beyond that which individual NDIS participants and their families can reasonably be expected to provide.
I attach two reports to this submission letter. Drawing on our own and others’ research, each report provides detail of problems for poor quality jobs in the NDIS and implications for workforce sustainability and growth, support quality and safety, and progress towards women’s economic equality. Each highlights that solutions to these problems lie in large part in NDIS regulation and market arrangements.
- The published report: Unacceptable Risks: The Dangers of Gig Models of Care and Support Work concerns the risks of digital labour platforms in care and support sectors, including the NDIS.
- The forthcoming briefing paper: Going Backwards: How NDIS Workforce Arrangements are Undermining Decent Work and Gender Equality details a broader range of issues for the NDIS support workforce.
We are happy to provide any additional information that might assist the Committee in its work.
Yours faithfully
Dr Fiona Macdonald Policy Director, Industrial and Social Centre for Future Work
Attachments: Unacceptable Risks: The Dangers of Gig Models of Care and Support Work research report; Going Backwards: How NDIS Workforce Arrangements are Undermining Decent Work and Gender Equality briefing paper.
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