National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1230
Committee Secretary The Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee, Department of the Senate PO Box 6100 Parliament House CANBERRA ACT 2600 AUSTRALIA
Dear Committee Secretary,
RE: National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
I am an Occupational Therapist, but also the mother of a 15-year-old NDIS participant. My feedback on this bill comes from lived experience as a participant’s carer as well as recent work as an OT within the NDIS system.
I would like to make it clear from the outset that: A. We are very grateful for the NDIS support that we have received to date. The difference that it has made to my son has been incredibly significant. B. I agree that the NDIS needs change. As an OT over the past 34 years, I have worked in many health systems, including in significant leadership roles. I recently spent 12 months working in the NDIS system and have stepped back as the NDIS felt so dysfunctional I could not bear to continue.
I believe the areas of change below need reconsideration:
- The proposed 10% reduction to capacity building daily living supports.
3 years ago, my autistic son would not attend school, had no friends and lived almost his entire life in his bedroom. He was fearful of almost everything, had constant meltdowns and was verbally and physically aggressive to his father and I daily. We were at the point of investigating foster care due to the toll it had taken on us and his specialised needs and believed that he would end up in the justice / prison system in the medium to long term.
Over the past 3 years, therapies including OT, Speech Pathology, Psychology and Dietetics have improved his capacity to regulate his emotions, self-care, communicate his needs, make better decisions for his health and navigate the world better, such that although he still has very significant challenges, he is less violent and more engaged, through the skills he has built.
It is not sufficient for people with disabilities to be supported to exist and continue as previous. They need highly skilled assessments, professional judgement and support to leverage even small improvements in capability that make a big difference to everyday life. The NDIS consistently demonstrates a lack of value or understanding of allied health supports that facilitates these things by a) failing to raise pricing so that services are sustainable, b) making these significant cuts to capacity building supports and c) shifting away from high quality professional assessments and judgement to inform decision making. Access to allied health services has already been limited through NDIS, and further reducing access will only serve to undermine the capacity of people with disabilities.
- The proposed 50% reduction to social, civic and community participation supports
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1230
Support Workers have helped my son to broaden out his world, giving him 1:1 support to take part in activities outside our home, helping him develop confidence to try new things in new places and I cannot stress how significant this has been for him.
If I look back 30 years ago when I graduated as an OT, people with disabilities had left institutions, but were largely still living most of their days at home, with limited social or community integration, and certainly no purpose or meaning. Activities that promote social, community and economic integration is what gives life meaning and purpose. What is the point of being able to get yourself washed and dressed when you have nowhere to go or be, and no one to be with? I am fearful that this significant reduction in social, civic and community participation supports will wind back time for people with disabilities so that their life is only lived at home, isolated and separate from mainstream life, community and opportunity.
An area that I believe needs significant attention for reform and funding reduction / reallocation is:
Support Coordinators
Working within the NDIS system I was honestly shocked and horrified that these positions are given an extraordinary amount of decision making, across a large amount of funding, without necessary skills and knowledge. I was part of innumerable meetings and communications where I could not believe the lack of skill or knowledge pertaining to people with disabilities, the lack of care and the poor decisions being made. This directly translates to funds being poorly used, with missed opportunities to more meaningfully improve the lives of the people they are meant to support. Additionally, there is almost no accountability of these positions, of outcomes or how money is allocated.
The significant amount of funding spent on Support Coordinators themselves has an additional knock on in terms of the significant amount of funding that they allocate. It perplexes me why this area of funding is not under intense scrutiny and review, to establish more effective ways of supporting people with disabilities to navigate services, resulting in more effective use of funding and less waste.
I request that:
- Parliament changes the Bill to ensure there are no reductions to participant access to capacity building allied health supports, or community participation supports.
- I also request that funding allocated for Support Coordination be reviewed and consideration be given to alternate ways to assist people with disabilities to navigate services, to achieve less wastage of funds.
I would be happy to discuss any aspect of my feedback or the proposed changes further.