Submission 1978
NDIS Amendment Bill Submission Templates
Hello, my name is , and I am a disabled person. I have lived twenty-one years of my life thinking something was wrong with me, not knowing I was living in a world not built for me. I also have more than three years working as a support worker for clients that are on the NDIS. I am submitting this as I want my voice heard, as someone with a disability and someone who has seen the cracks in the system first and second hand
My overall position on this bill is that I do not in any way support it. I also have serious concerns about it if it passes in parliament. Firstly, the bill proposes that people on the NDIS may have their support paused, reviewed or affected due to not responding to the NDIA within a specific timeframe. This is unethical. People on the NDIS may be unable to respond for many reasons; they could be in hospital, unable to respond due to their disability, need external support, experiencing an extreme crisis and so many other reasons. Expecting a person with a disability to be able to answer within a timeframe that works for the NDIA isn’t taking into account so many factors for people with a disability. Not everyone is able to drop everything just respond to NDIS in fear of having their support cut.
Next is the plan to cut out 160,000 people from the NDIS in the next four years. This is utterly immoral. There is no plan for who will be cut and what will happen to these people. The NDIS is an extremely vital support and the fact that the plan is to cut people off just because it is “too expensive” is not a good enough reason. This is people’s livelihoods. People don’t choose to be disabled. If there is no plan on what will happen to these people, then they are more than likely going to end up putting more pressure on hospital’s mental health services, taking up more spaces in ambulances and costing the government more in the long run. The NDIS was made to help those most vulnerable, and the fact you are planning on taking that away from 160,000 people and leaving them with nothing is more than immoral. It is extremely unethical and disgusting. These people more than rely on this support, it is their life. If you take it away, there will be an influx of suicide rates, death, and flood the already falling apart mental health system in australia that no one can afford.
The 30% cut to social and community outing. From July 1 they are wanting to return the funding levels to what it was in 2023. The key issue here is people who live with disabilities are already an extremely isolated group of individuals. Cutting funding from the most vulnerable to not have as much social and community access will truly kill people. From my own experience as a support worker so much of building a client’s capacity is going out into the community and socialising. Cutting this will leave people in their homes unable to access basic things like going to the shops for groceries, doctor’s appointments, employment services and so much more. These
Submission 1978
are basic human rights, the right to education, the right to work, the right to healthcare and the fact that you want to take that from people just to save some money is outright appalling behaviour.
Proposed in this bill you have decided to make getting onto the NDIS that much harder, a diagnosis is no longer the way you get onto the NDIS. It is said that it will move from a diagnosis to getting a functional capacity assessment. As someone currently trying to get funding this way, you are making it so much harder for people who truly need the support. It’s making them feel like a show pony to get funding for what they need to survive in a world not built for them. I submitted my NDIS application in December 2025, we are currently half way through the year and I have only just received the funding to get a functional capacity assessment. As a person who struggles heavily with their mental health, it shouldn’t take this long to get onto the scheme supposed to help me. I am left inside, extremely isolated, relying on free programs just to get through some days, because I’m unable to afford these basic things for my own mental health such as a psychologist. If this was me breaking my leg, I’d be seen immediately, so why is it so different for me accessing support for my struggling mental health?
My own lived experience has been put briefly throughout this submission but here is some more of my professional and lived experience. I have lived twenty-one years undiagnosed with Autism and ADHD, this has impacted my life as I struggled throughout school with no support with my disability. I couldn’t concentrate in class with all the noise, I’d become so overwhelmed from being in loud environments like the shops, and everyday was truly a struggle living with something I didn’t truly know I had. It took me till I was twenty-two to get a diagnosis for my Autism and ADHD, and finally it all made sense. Why my life was so hard and not just me struggling for no reason with things people without disability manage so easily. Still I’m waiting. Six months of trying to get all the right documents, having to give my birth certificate to the NDIS over three different times, waiting to be accepted, then finding out I only had funding for an OT to get a functional capacity assessment and now I’ve finally got my assessment done, it’s been over a month and I am still waiting. It shouldn’t take this long to get onto the NDIS.
My professional experience of being a support worker for over three years and the NDIS has so many cracks from the opposite side of the coin. I have seen so many of my clients in crisis over not having the right support in place, having to fight for funding they clearly need like a wheelchair for mobility and having fundings cut because they didn’t use it in time or were just unable to use it cause they didn’t know how to. My clients are having to show everyday that they need these supports, but if any of them were to lose them it would be detrimental.
Nothing about this bill was made with people with disabilities in mind, it was made with the greed of saving money and leaving people with disability with no or significantly less support, just so some extra dollars can be saved. What needs to
Submission 1978
change is that this needs to be redone to actually fix the NDIS/NDIA. It needs to be made clear that these cuts will potentially leave myself and my clients with nothing.
This shouldn’t be about saving money and should be about the 160,000 people you will be leaving without the support that they need. Their human rights are the right to healthcare, food, and shelter. That cutting these people off is taking away rights that should always have been there in the first place.
I ask the committee to consider my lived and professional experience when reviewing this Bill.
Thank you.