National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1149
Submission to the Office of the Minister for Health, Disability and the NDIS The Hon Mark Butler MP
Re: Proposed NDIS Reform Legislation / Securing the NDIS for Future Generations
Dear Minister Butler,
I am writing as the parent of a young adult son with disability.
I understand and respect the need to protect the long-term sustainability of the NDIS. I also understand the need to address fraud, poor-quality services, and supports that do not deliver meaningful outcomes.
However, I am deeply concerned that the proposed reforms, as currently described, may unintentionally harm people with disability who are using the NDIS exactly as it was intended: to build capacity, participate in work, reduce reliance on welfare, develop independence, and live an ordinary life.
My son has disability, including intellectual disability. He has also made substantial progress because of the NDIS.
That progress has not happened by accident. It has happened because he has had the right support, applied consistently, in real-world settings, over time.
He currently receives NDIS-funded support to participate in employment, and capacity building. He has paid support at 1:1 for 24 hours, and 1:2 for 7.5 hours, with part informal support from family, and some time now working on his own, altogether enabling him to work and be paid for 35 hours per week.
NDIS support has been life-changing, and has, and will diminish as he builds more skills. I am confident that he will life interdependently with only informal supports in the future, and will work with much lower support needs over time providing that he still has access to NDIS support. This support also allows me to be in full-time employment. It has not been passive care, recreation, or unnecessary supervision. It has been practical, structured support that has helped him build:
work routines; responsibility; confidence; communication skills; emotional regulation; practical task skills; community participation; self-worth; and a meaningful identity as a worker.
As his parent, I have watched him move closer to the life every parent hopes their child may have: work, purpose, contribution, dignity, and the possibility of greater independence.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1149
My fear is that under the proposed reforms, his progress will be misunderstood.
Please do not mistake supported capacity for independent capacity.
That is the central issue I want to raise.
My son can do more now because support is in place. That does not mean he no longer needs support. It means the support is working.
For people with intellectual disability, autism, developmental disability, psychosocial disability, acquired brain injury, genetic syndromes, and other complex disabilities, capacity is often highly dependent on the right scaffolding. A person may appear capable when routines, prompts, transport, familiar people, structured work tasks, emotional regulation support, and supervision are all in place.
But if those supports are removed, the capacity may not remain.
In my son’s case, if his employment support is reduced by half, or removed altogether, his job is likely to end.
That would be devastating. It would also be a perverse outcome for the NDIS.
The Scheme should not punish progress.
If a participant has used NDIS support effectively to build capacity, maintain work, and move toward greater independence, that should be recognised as a success. It should not automatically trigger the withdrawal of the support that is allowing the person to maintain that success.
I strongly urge the Government to treat employment-related supports with great care.
Supported employment and practical work participation can reduce long-term reliance on Centrelink, improve mental health, build independence, create routine, strengthen community participation, and give people with disability a valued role.
If reforms reduce employment supports too aggressively (Alec is currently using CORE Economic Participation), the result will not be genuine savings. It will be cost-shifting.
People will lose work. Families will carry more. Informal supports will burn out. Mental health may decline. Participants may regress. Some people will move back toward greater reliance on welfare, family care, crisis supports, or day-only services.
In my son’s case, the NDIS support he receives is not an optional extra. It is the reason his job is possible, and frankly, that I can work full-time.
A functional assessment must therefore ask more than “Can this person do the task?”
It must ask:
Can this person do the task independently?
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1149
Can this person do the task only with support? What type of support is required? How often is support required? What happens when the support is removed? What risks emerge without support? Is the person’s current capacity being maintained because support is present? What will be lost if support is reduced?
This distinction is essential.
A person who can work with support should not be treated the same as a person who can work independently.
A person who can travel with planning, prompting, reassurance or backup should not be treated the same as a person who can travel independently.
A person who can complete tasks with supervision, structure and redirection should not be treated as if they have no functional support need.
Please do not mistake supported capacity for independent capacity.
I am also concerned about the proposal to move some participants toward foundational supports or mainstream systems.
In regional communities, these alternative systems are often not strong enough, skilled enough, or available enough to replace NDIS supports. Families are already stretched. Mainstream services are already overloaded. State systems are not currently equipped to absorb people with significant functional support needs.
No participant should lose NDIS support until an appropriate, funded, available and effective alternative is actually in place.
A promise of future support is not the same as support that exists, is accessible, and is capable of meeting the person’s needs.
I support clearer evidence. I support better safeguards. I support assessment that focuses on function rather than diagnosis alone.
But the assessment process must be sophisticated enough to understand that a person’s apparent capacity may be the direct result of sustained support.
My son’s current progress is the outcome of years of support, effort, structure, repetition, and opportunity. It is fragile if the support is removed.
I ask the Government to ensure the proposed reforms include strong protections so that participants are not disadvantaged because they have improved.
In particular, I ask that the reforms:
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1149
- Protect employment supports. Suppo1ts that enable a person with disability to obtain or maintain work should not be reduced unless there is clear evidence the person can sustain that employment safely and reliably without them.
- Recognise supported capacity. Functional assessment must clearly distinguish between independent capacity and capacity that exists only because support is present.
- Do not punish progress. Improvement should be recognised as evidence that suppo1t is effective, not as an automatic reason to remove suppo1t.
- Avoid abrupt reductions. Any reduction in support should be gradual, evidence-based, reviewable, and subject to appeal.
- Protect people with intellectual disability and invisible support needs. These pruticipants may apperu· more capable than they are when support systems ru·e working well.
- Consider long-term cost. Removing suppo1t that enables work and independence may create higher costs later through unemployment, frunily burnout, crisis support, health decline, and loss of capacity.
- Ensure foundational supports exist before NDIS supports are withdrawn. Pruticipru1ts should not be moved out of the NDIS into systems that are not yet capable of meeting their needs.
- Listen directly to families. Fatnilies often understand the difference between what a person can do independently and what they can only do with support.
As a parent, my deepest concern is simple.
My son is working. He is growing. He is contributing. He is moving closer to independence.
The NDIS helped make that possible.
Please do not take away the scaffolding and then call it independence.
Please do not tnistake suppo1ted capacity for independent capacity.
If these refonns are intended to secme the NDIS for future generations, they must protect the ve1y outcomes the Scheme was created to achieve: ordina1y lives, work, pa1ticipation, independence, dignity, and hope.
Yours sincerely,
Pru·ent of an NDIS-