National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1688
Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee Inquiry into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submitted by: Date: 27 May 2026 This is- …
About•=• is 24 years old and a current NDIS participant who lives with Down Syndrome, a moderate to severe intellectual disability and global developmental delay (among other related impairments, including choking risk). - works 2 days a week in a supported workplace@ 1:2 ratio, with 1 :1 support for 1 hour of work-related training and skill development. This is funded through her current Social and Community Participation funding.
About Me: I am , 65,. ’s mother, Assistant Principal and nominee of- ’s self- managed NDIS plan. I currently support her with all daily life, supervision, transport, safety and social & community participation needs outside the 9-5, Monday to Friday support provided by her current NDIS funding (which covers her support needs while I am at work)
This submission is in my own words, with input and some ‘wording excerpts’ from NDIS advocacy groups including The Growing Space, Down Syndrome NSW and Down Syndrome Australia. It reflects my personal concerns as a mother whose daughter faces the prospect of a 50% reduction in her ability to be gainfully employed and engage with a life outside her own home.
While I support the objective of a sustainable future for the NDIS, I do not support this Bill in its current form. It contains many changes that, in my view, the Committee should recommend be amended before being adopted.
My submission is focused on (s 34A) and the cuts to social & community participation.
-’s social and community participation funding primarily supports her to access meaningful employment. She loves her job as general hand in the restaurant at Summerland House Farm (ARUMA), and the tax paying public love her being there! It also provides active support for her to engage in the world outside her own home, including safely attending appointments and doing her grocery shopping.
Any reduction to her social & community participation funding would not only leave her housebound for an additional 3 days a week, but it would also require a complimentary increase
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 1688
in her core support budget to ensure her support and safety at home, otherwise, it will leave days where no safe support arrangement exists.
Suggestions:
1: Amend s 34A to require that any percentage reduction be preceded by mandatory co-design, or at the very least, consultation with the disability community and a published impact statement, and that a_ected participants retain individual merits-review rights where the reduction produces a harmful change in their plan.
2: Amend s 34A so that any percentage reduction to a support category cannot apply to participants whose plan funding for that category reflects high or complex support needs – including but not limited to participants requiring 24/7 supervision, participants with complex health support needs and participants with 1:1 support requirement for safety. Provide an automatic exemption mechanism so that a uniform percentage reduction cannot produce unsafe gaps in supervision or support.
In Addition: (The following section may be outside the scope of a submission to this Committee, please ignore if it impacts accepting the rest of the submission.)
I also have questions about issues that I have no idea how to approach, specifically, why is there no inquiry into the % of costs a service provider can take from an NDIS plan? My example: a Supported Employment provider charges $300 a day to support each of 2 NDIS participants at a 1:2 ratio – a total of $600 a day for those 2 participants – and then employs a worker at minimum wage to provide that support. Over 50-60% of those NDIS funds are going to that business – surely the oncosts of employing that worker are not 50-60% of the charged fee. (not to mention the NDIS participant is paid a wage of $5 an hour) How are the business models and amount of money providers are profiting from NDIS funding being monitored? Why is this legislation aimed at reducing ’s funding and not the service providers profits and high executive wages? Companies should not be profiting from the NDIS – period – let alone at the expense of its participants. Please consider: Investigating the business -models of service providers and the possibility of a percentage cap on what they can garnish from NDIS pricing arrangements, compared to the % of the wages paid to the actual support worker.
Again, I support the objective of a sustainable future for the NDIS, but I do not support this Bill in its current form.
Yours faithfully,
Mother, Nominee, Taxpayer.