NDIA Accountability Project

Potential loss of choice and control over necessary disability supports

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NDIS

NDIS is insurance for everyone, it’s in case we get sick and don’t get better, or if we have an injury and don’t get better, or if we are born with disabilities. It’s a wonderful thing because all of us don’t have to live in fear of disability so much. We can have lives, and our families can have lives too.

Under the proposed NDIS bill we could lose our right to reasonable and necessary support, as currently stated in the NDIS Act. When you have a disability, it can cause you not to have a life, because disabilities cost money. The NDIS is meant to lift you up, so you can have a life. That is where the term ‘reasonable and necessary’ is used. ‘Reasonable’ because bionic legs cost millions and ‘necessary’ because this is what you need to lead a life. Catheters, gloves, wheelchairs, communication devices, hoists, hi-low beds, support workers and so on. Anything you might need because of your disability or disabilities, and this is always different. Like, I need a certain shower head to clean myself. Everyone’s disability is different, and everybody’s life is different, so we need different plans.

‘Necessary’ is a very important word in there, because otherwise, the NDIS can say ‘no’ to all kinds of things that are vital for us, like gloves that don’t hurt me. And we could lose the ability to advocate for ourselves.

Under the proposed NDIS bill we could lose our choice and control over what we can purchase with our NDIS funding.

Under the proposed NDIS bill all support workers will have to be NDIS registered, making it harder for

  • people to become support workers, there for giving us
  • way less choice in who supports us. Support may cost
  • more because of having to go with registered
  • providers, this recommendation may only profit support
  • companies and impact those that the government
  • pretends to want to assist. The companies charge
  • more per hour to cover overheads but pay the workers
  • less, which really isn’t fair as companies don’t pay
  • much and many support workers can’t live off that
  • without working unhealthy amounts of hours. This also
  • increases the risk of harm to us and means that it’s
  • hard to keep good workers because they are more
  • likely to leave this line of work. They’re taking away our
  • right to choose who supports us. And I fail to see how
  • this will make things better. We have the choice
  • between unregistered and registered providers now,
  • how does taking a choice away make any difference,
  • except make it harder. And You can have all the
  • regulations in the world and still have people being
  • abused.

Under the proposed NDIS bill new legislation does not allow for people with disabilities to be involved in determining how processes are designed and put into practice. Our experience and knowledge should shape how we access support and funding.

Under the proposed NDIS bill we could be forced to undergo assessments to prove our needs. We have already had to go through all of this with health professionals, and it is traumatic. Why do we need to go through it all again? We don’t know what these assessments will look like or how they will be used to assess our needs.

Under the proposed NDIS bill, people could be forced

  • off the NDIS before the State and Territory

governments establish ‘foundational supports’; leaving many in our community without support. I can’t see why this isn’t just all under the NDIS.

  • Under the proposed NDIS bill it will be harder to get on the NDIS.

  • Under the proposed NDIS bill people who need 24/7 support could be forced to share support, and be put at greater risk of abuse and neglect. As I wrote in the beginning, I have extensive experience of this, and it was horrible. People think it’s safer in a group home because there are always witnesses, but this isn’t always the case and the abuse I suffered was nearly always witnessed. Bill Shorten said that they are hoping to break the isolation by bringing us together. This is so ridiculous and feels like an old excuse, I felt so lonely and stifled in all crowded living environments. You get us with all our traumas and expect us to get along. Believe me I have tried and we just don’t. We are not all connected by our disabilities because we are all different and we are different people.

  • Under the proposed NDIS bill people with mental disabilities could be treated less fairly. I can see this happening.

  • Under the proposed NDIS bill it could be harder to appeal an inadequately funded NDIS plan. I have been through the appeals process, and I get really scared at the thought of not being able to do it again.

  • Under the proposed NDIS bill NDIA may unfairly ask you to pay back the funds they see as inappropriately spent, but will not prosecute because in a court of law you are innocent until proven guilty. They would be putting us in debt with no hope of paying it back. Of

  • course we want to have any fraud stopped, but
  • penalising us all through these changes is not right.
  • And all of this fraud is because NDIS was asleep at the wheel.
  • As a society, we will all suffer, because NDIS is meant for all of us and we will just suffer because so many of us are suffering.
  • We will all suffer and many more people will die through neglect.

Weee, Sam

Sam Petersen I go by the pronouns you/your. Or just call me Sam when referring to me.

I’m an AAC and a power wheelchair user, a visual artist, writer and performer. https://www.sampetersen.com.au

I am a third generation white settler, of German and British descent. I live and work by the Birrarung, on the stolen lands of the Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung people of the Kulin nation. I pay my respects to Elders both past, present, and to the future. Land that was, and still is being stolen.