Dear inquiry,
I am writing to ensure people with disability can access the support that we need.
I am really concerned that if the proposed bill goes ahead in its current form:
- We could lose our right to reasonable and necessary support, as it is currently stated in the NDIS Act. This has already been tested and pushed people like myself to the tribunal. Instead of having support I have had to fight the system from the very beginning which has been so not how this was planned to be and put undue stress on myself and my supports.
- We could be forced to undergo assessments to prove our needs. As people with disabilities we are constantly asked to prove that we have a disability and that it is permanent. This is both demeaning and gaslighting behavior to people with disabilities. These assessments will not be done by people who know us and by trauma Informed assesses or specialist assessors in our personal disability and its impacts. It is really quite traumatising to think this could be in place and people will not get the supports they desperately need. We dont know what these assessments will look like, or how they will be used to assess our needs. We were also promised this would not happen by this government and yet they are brining it in!!! We feel betrayed and lied to. This is also a huge waste of money as the reports are in and we should only have submit further evidence if our situation changes not to keep proving our disability.
- We could lose our choice and control over what we can purchase with our NDIS funding. At the moment there is flexilbity but it has also been difficult. Bill Shorten promised we would have more choice and control and yet he is trying to take this away. Choice and Control is about us knowing what is best for our disability and quality of life. This is making decisions for people which takes away their personal power and undermines them. People with disabilities are some of the most careful financial managers because we know the value and cost of things.
There are currently not enough supports for people not on the NDIS and they are going to do what they did when they brought the NDIS in. Before people could even apply and get services, they were withdrawn and there was no assistance to help me and others. It was an awful time. With these changes people could be forced off the NDIS before the State and Territory governments establish foundational supports; leaving many in our community without support.
I have friends with psychosocial disabilities who have had to fight to get on the NDIS and it has been life changing and my friends are now terrified it will be taken away from them, it has absolutely changed their lives. People with psychosocial disability could be treated less fairly, and have been, and find it harder to get support. My friend whose mental health was compromised, who had very little supports, just committed suicide. People who need 24/7 support could be forced to share support, and be put at greater risk of abuse and neglect and this is such a danger. There are so many people who are not the right fit and Narcissists, and so much about this work is the right fit for the right person. We need to weed out the Narcissists and abusers not empower them more. I lived next door to a group Home and the amount of abuse that went on, that I reported was never dealt, and the manager who was abusive was commended. There needs to be psycological assessments and profiling of workers, and keeping choice helps people to
- discern if they feel safe.
People who have experienced abuse are the best judge of characters and do not need to be told who can support them.
From the very beginning I have had to constantly appeal decisions. I even had to appeal getting on the NDIS. They have made mistakes constantly and I have had to fight to get their mistakes and incorrect assessments overturned. Whilst this is arduous and so horrible, at least I could find people to appeal. This is very controlling behaviour to people with disabilities. Making it harder to appeal an inadequately funded NDIS plan is detrimental to the fundamentals for the scheme and people’s well being.
The government has always said it would Codesign but it has not and it will not be required to by the legislation. True codesign is how we get the best systems that are most effective and use the funds/money the best. The best people to understand how to make money stretch as far as it can is people with the disability, the best people to know how to make the scheme better people with disabilities and the best people to know what are the right sorts of supports are people with disabilities!
The current Bill does not consider the whole person or the impact of multiple disabilities when assessing the need for support. No one, very few people ever have one thing that affect their disability, it is usually multiple. They have already made this mistakes so many times. I have had wrong things put down because the NDIA told me to put them down. They do not understand a whole body approach to disability and they do not understand the flow on affect of having things affecting the whole body system. They minimised my disability and rejected me only to find out they were wrong but there was no room for them to fix it, I had to go through appealing and tribunals.
I, my friends, colleagues and health professionals are very concerned about the impacts on myself and also other people with disabilities. The Bill should not pass without further amendments to ensure people with disability do not lose essential support.
I am so incredibly disappointed by this government who promised “nothing about us without us” and promised that this inquiry would not penalise people on the NDIS but the framework put forward does exactly that.
What seriously concerns me is that the NDIS is further entrenching processes that further reflect perpetrator behaviour. You can see from above there is gaslighting, lying to people, taking away their control and personal power, undermining people, telling them what they should or shouldn’t do or have, who can take care of them, financial abuse from trying to control their funding, coercing people into believing they would act for people with disabilities and then taking away the good things, minimising etc etc. We have been asking the NDIS to be trauma Informed and a Trauma safe system but there has been so much resistance to the point we were told that the NDIA does not want to do anything about survivors in the NDIS knowing the rate of abuse is double that of non disabled people.
I am imploring you to ensure these changes don’t go through that there is a bill that is actually put forward with people with disabilities that we can support and get behind. Please ensure that our voices are heard and that nothing is done to make things even harder for us.
The NDIS has absolutely changed my life. I cannot do half of what I do without it. I have even been able to benefit the governments own work because of the NDIS. My quality
- of life has absolutely been transformed. I trusted that when Bill Shorten stood beside us when he was going for government that he really wanted what we wanted, i trusted that Anthony Albanese wants this too, to catch the criminals and strengthen the system, but what we have seen is so discouraging and left us questioning whether it was really t true. Please don’t let this be about getting into parliament but actually changing the lives of people who have been forgotten and not valued for so long. We are wonderful people who transform communities and lives. Please don’t support the bill in its current state, it is not fit for purpose as outlined above. Please address our concerns and in doing so enable us all to put forward a bill that will strengthen and benefit rather than take away from people with Disabilities. In good faith. For too long we have been an aside that other people make decisions for, sure our voices make the NDIS the great plan it could be. Warm regards Talie
Talie Star (she/her) Living and Working on Aboriginal Land
Systems change Advisor/Trauma Informed Trainer/Creative Trauma, Recovery, DFSV, Homelessness & Disability Please contact for consultations/speaking/scoping/creative