Submission 2324

Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs

Inquiry into the NDIS Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Submitted: May 2026

Submission to the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs NDIS Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Introduction

My name is . I am a 23-year-old Australian living with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), a progressive condition that affects my mobility and my ability to independently carry out everyday tasks, including showering and using the bathroom. I have been a participant in the National Disability Insurance Scheme since 2017.

I am writing this submission because I am deeply concerned that the NDIS Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 would cause serious, lasting harm to people like me — not abstractly, but in the daily reality of how I live, how I am cared for, and whether I get to have any meaningful independence at all.

What NDIS Supports Make Possible

The supports I receive through the NDIS allow me to exercise a level of control and independence over my own life that I simply could not have if I relied solely on my parents or family. This is not a small thing. For someone with DMD, independence is not a given — it has to be built, carefully and deliberately, through the right supports.

My NDIS plan gives me dignity. It lets me be in control of the care I receive, rather than depending entirely on family members who have full lives and responsibilities of their own. It supports my mental health and self-esteem. It makes it possible for me to have a social life — to participate in my community and to engage with the world in a way that would otherwise be out of reach.

These are not luxuries. They are the foundation of a life worth living.

Concerns About Specific Provisions

Section 34(1G)-(1J): The Parental Presumption

This provision deeply worries me. It creates a legal presumption that parents of children and young adults with disability provide “substantial care and support” as a matter of course, and the NDIS can use this to reduce a participant’s funding on the assumption that family is already covering the gap.

The reality of my family’s situation makes this provision particularly cruel. Both of my parents work full time. They also carry additional caring responsibilities for my grandmother. If my NDIS funding were reduced on the presumption that they are

Submission 2324

providing “substantial” support, the burden of my care would fall entirely on their shoulders. In practice, that would mean one of them would have to permanently leave work to meet my needs — a financial blow the family cannot absorb — and it would take a serious toll on their mental health and wellbeing too.

A legal presumption cannot capture the complexity of real family circumstances. My parents love me and support me in every way they can. But love is not a care plan, and goodwill cannot substitute for the professional, structured supports the NDIS provides.

Section 59B(4): Automated Decision-Making This provision authorises automated systems and algorithms to make decisions that involve discretion, evaluative judgement, and forming a “state of mind” — in other words, the kinds of decisions that determine what is in a participant’s plan and what they can access.

I find this genuinely frightening. My condition is complex and progressive. The decisions that shape my NDIS plan require a human being who can understand context, weigh individual circumstances, and recognise that no algorithm can fully capture what my life requires. Automating these decisions introduces a layer of opacity and uncertainty that is incompatible with the kind of individualised, needs- based planning the NDIS was designed to deliver.

If an automated system gets my plan wrong, what recourse do I have? Who do I appeal to? The Bill does not adequately answer these questions, and that silence is troubling.

The Human Cost

If my supports were reduced or removed as a result of this Bill, the consequences would be immediate and severe.

I would become entirely dependent on my family for my care. My parents, who already work full time and care for my grandmother, would face an impossible situation. One of them would likely have to give up paid employment to care for me full time — a financial sacrifice with long-term consequences for the whole family’s security and wellbeing.

Beyond the financial impact, I would lose the independence and dignity that my current supports make possible. My social life would effectively disappear. My mental health would suffer. I would go from being a young person with a degree of agency over my own life to being wholly reliant on others for everything — not because my condition requires it, but because the system chose to withdraw the supports that made something better possible.

That is not a theoretical risk. That is what this Bill makes likely for people like me.

Recommendation to the Committee

Submission 2324

I am asking the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs to reject this Bill in its current form.

The provisions outlined above — the parental presumption in s 34(1G)–(1J) and the authorisation of automated decision-making in s 59B(4) — are not minor technical adjustments. They strike at the heart of what the NDIS is supposed to be: an individualised, needs-based scheme that treats disabled Australians as full human beings with rights, not as a cost to be managed.

The Bill also raises serious concerns about compliance with Australia’s obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, particularly the right to independent living, community inclusion, and individualised support. The NDIS was built on those principles. This Bill undermines them.

If the Committee is not prepared to reject the Bill entirely, I urge it at minimum to recommend the removal or substantial amendment of ss 34(1G)–(1J) and 59B(4), and to require that any transitional protections be written into primary legislation rather than left to ministerial rules that expire within 12 months.

Disabled Australians deserve better than this. We deserve a scheme that supports our independence, respects our dignity, and keeps its promises. I am asking the Senate to stand on the right side of this.