Submission 1698

Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee

Inquiry into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Introduction

This submission is made in a personal capacity by a parent in Australia raising a child with disability and support needs. It is informed by lived experience of seeking early intervention, navigating childcare and school settings, and seeing firsthand how access to timely, practical supports can change a child’s trajectory, family stability, and participation in everyday life.

The submission focuses on the parts of the Bill dealing with eligibility, funded supports, and governance, because these changes are likely to have the greatest direct effect on children and families.

Position

The objective of a sustainable NDIS is supported. The Scheme should be protected for current and future participants, and fraud and waste should be addressed. However, sustainability cannot be achieved by making access less clear, narrowing supports too aggressively, or shifting risk and ambiguity onto disabled children, families, and frontline decision-makers. The strongest version of reform would protect the Scheme’s long-term viability while preserving early support, functional support, and clarity about what participants can rely on.

Key concerns

1. Eligibility and support rules must not make early support harder to access

The Government has stated that the Bill is intended to clarify eligibility and the supports the NDIS funds. In practice, families often experience “clarification” reforms as a higher evidentiary burden, more gatekeeping, or more room for inconsistent interpretation. That risk is especially serious for children, whose developmental trajectories can change significantly when support is available early and in the right settings.

For many children, early intervention is not a luxury or an optional add-on. It is the difference between exclusion and participation at childcare, reduced distress in daily routines, greater communication and regulation, and a more workable transition into school. Reforms should therefore be tested against a

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simple question: will they help children get the right support earlier, or will they delay support until

needs escalate and family functioning deteriorates?

2. Functional supports should not be treated as optional extras

A narrow approach to funded supports can miss the reality of disability in family life. Supports that help

a child regulate, communicate, tolerate clothing, participate in education, or remain in care and school

settings are not peripheral. They are often the reason a family can keep working, a child can keep

attending, and an educator or teacher can keep including that child in ordinary settings.

The Bill should not encourage a false divide between “core” disability supports and the practical

supports that make daily participation possible. If the legislation or subsequent rules become too

restrictive, the likely result is cost-shifting to families, mainstream systems that are not resourced to

absorb the need, and increased crisis presentations later.

3. “Future generations” should include future children, not only future budgets

The framing of securing the NDIS for future generations is understandable, but future generations are

not served by short-term savings that reduce developmental support, participation, or family stability

today. Children with disability become adults with disability. Decisions that reduce early support may

simply move costs forward into school exclusion, poorer mental health, more intensive support needs,

family workforce withdrawal, and greater pressure on health, education, and social systems.

A future-focused NDIS should preserve investment where the long-term return is strongest: early, evidence-informed, function-based support that enables participation in home, care, school, and community settings.

4. Major reform requires more time and clearer consultation

The Bill is substantial and complex, and sector organisations have raised concern about the speed of the inquiry and the limited time available for meaningful community response. That matters because disability legislation works best when it is shaped with disabled people, families, and the organisations that help implement it. Tight timelines increase the risk of unintended consequences, especially where key effects will depend on later rules, operational guidance, and administrative discretion.

If Parliament proceeds with the Bill, it should do so with a stronger commitment to staged implementation, co-design, public guidance in accessible formats, and structured review after commencement.

Submission 1698

Recommendations

• Retain clear, workable eligibility pathways for children and young people. Any legislative changes should explicitly avoid creating higher informal thresholds through narrower language or more onerous evidentiary expectations.

• Protect access to early intervention and functional supports. The legislation and subordinate rules should make clear that supports enabling communication, regulation, participation, transitions, and inclusion remain within scope where linked to permanent and significant disability.

• Require transparency before support restrictions take effect. Draft rules, operational guidance, and examples should be published in accessible form before major changes commence, so participants and families can understand what will change in practice.

• Build in independent review and monitoring. The impact of the reforms on children, rural and regional participants, culturally and linguistically diverse families, and participants with psychosocial disability should be reviewed within 12 months of commencement.

• Do not rely on mainstream systems to fill gaps without proof of capacity. Where the policy intent is that education, health, or other systems should meet a need, implementation should be contingent on those systems being funded and accountable for doing so. Otherwise families are left with a theoretical boundary and a practical void.

• Address fraud and waste in targeted ways that do not increase friction for legitimate participants. Integrity measures should focus on provider misconduct, serious non-compliance, and exploitative billing rather than creating broader administrative barriers for families already under strain.

• Extend consultation and strengthen co-design. Given the scale of the Bill, the Committee should recommend either more time for consultation or a structured post-inquiry process to test the most consequential provisions with disabled people, representative organisations, and families.

Conclusion

The NDIS does need to be sustainable, but sustainability should be measured by whether the Scheme remains reliable, fair, and effective for the people it exists to support. For children and families, timely supports often prevent higher long-term costs in education, health, employment, and family breakdown. Reform that protects the budget while weakening access to practical, participation-

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building supports would not secure the NDIS for future generations; it would simply push costs and

g pressure elsewhere.

The Committee should ensure that any amendments preserve early support, functional support, clarity

of entitlement, and real co-design. That would be a stronger foundation for both sustainability and

justice.