National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1259
Submission Regarding the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill
My name is and I have been a participant of the NDIS since 2018.
The NDIS has enabled me to live a meaningful and safe life through a combination of funded supports and substantial informal support provided by my family. I live with multiple and complex disabilities including intellectual disability, total legal blindness, and being mute/non-verbal. These disabilities affect every aspect of my daily functioning and create significant vulnerabilities in all settings.
I cannot safely access the community, travel independently, communicate effectively, or participate in everyday activities without one-on-one support. My family already provides extensive daily informal support to ensure my safety, health, wellbeing, and protection from vulnerability and harm. Their support, combined with NDIS supports, has helped me remain healthy, connected, and out of hospital.
Despite my disabilities and additional health complications, I have worked hard to build a life with purpose, belonging, and contribution within my community. This has only been possible because support workers act as my eyes and my voice wherever I go.
I currently volunteer three times per week at two community gardens and at a community radio station. Through these roles I contribute meaningfully to my community and the work I do is valued by others. I have become part of communities that care about me, look out for me, and support my wellbeing. Through this participation I have developed friendships and social networks that are extremely important to my quality of life and mental health.
My community participation also supports my family’s capacity to continue providing informal care. When I am connected, engaged, and emotionally well, my family is better able to sustain the very significant supports they already provide.
The proposed changes under the NDIS Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill place my future participation at serious risk. If social and community participation supports are reduced or excluded, I will effectively lose access to the community because I require one-on-one support in order to participate safely.
For a person like me, social and community participation is not optional or recreational. It is directly connected to:
my safety, my mental health and wellbeing, my ability to contribute, my sense of worth and belonging, and my family’s ability to continue supporting me.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1259
I am also deeply concerned about proposals that focus narrowly on a “primary disability†and fail to properly recognise the cumulative functional impact of multiple disabilities and complex support needs. My intellectual disability, total blindness, inability to use verbal speech, and other health complications cannot be separated and viewed in isolation. Together they create substantial functional limitations across all aspects of my life.
If my disabilities were assessed individually rather than holistically, it would significantly reduce my supports and funding, despite the reality that my daily life is impacted by the combination of all these conditions together.
The current bill does not adequately reflect the realities faced by people with profound and multiple disabilities who rely on support not only for physical access, but for communication, safety, inclusion, wellbeing, and dignity.
I do not support the bill in its current form.
I fear these changes will result in:
reduced community participation, increased isolation, declining mental health and wellbeing, greater strain on my family, loss of purpose and contribution, and a significant reduction in my quality of life.
The NDIS has allowed me to live a life where I am included, valued, and able to contribute to my community despite very significant disabilities. I ask Parliament to ensure that future reforms protect participants like me whose lives depend on ongoing, holistic, and individualised supports.
The NDIS should secure not only financial sustainability, but also the dignity, inclusion, safety, and humanity of the people it was created to support.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1259
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1259