Submission 2399
Submission on the NDIS Amendment Bill
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My connection to this issue I am a disabled individual with a family history of disabilities, my one remaining parent, one remaining grandparent, and both of my siblings are all reliant upon the NDIS and would be greatly burdened by this bill’s passing. I have been on disability support programs before the NDIS and was transferred to it on its introduction. I have numerous conditions, not all of which have yet been diagnosed despites years of impairment. All words are entirely my own and unassisted by any means.
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My overall view of this Bill I oppose this bill and suggest it be withdrawn entirely.
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My main concerns
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Mandatory registration of providers. For participants living in Rural and Regional areas any restriction on flexibility of provider choice will severely limit options, likely limiting me and my family to large companies who can not provide guarantees of the same individual worker across shifts and who are much less flexible on short notice changes in requirements as well as requiring far more effort to communicate with. In addition I highly object to the lack of clarity on what “high risk” supports that will require mandatory registration entails, without such information how can the community adequately give input into the effects thereof.
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Civil Penalties and Investigative Powers. Whilst I support greater enforcement of privacy violations and negligence of providers and plan managers the broad scope has signigicant potential to unfairly punish the most vulnerable participants for genuine mistakes or unforseeable events. I have personally been the victim of multiple floods living in Lismore, requirements to keep records for three years (with financial penalties) could ruin lives of those who are already in precarious situations.
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Registration of Plan Management providers. I fear the effect of requiring NDIA approval will limit consumer choice and force more clients upon the approved providers, likely overburdening the ones who are approved and leading to worsening outcomes.
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Automated administrative action. History shows that despite all best efforts automated systems can and will fail to protect the needs of those most vulnerable, and when they do fail (like in the case of Robodebt) recourse
Submission 2399
comes too late if at all.
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Ministerial power to reduce funding for kinds of support and set restrictions upon maximums of support. The lack of oversight, sweeping nature, and impossibility of appeal absolutely will lead to great injustice, felt most by those most vulnerable in this country. I struggle to think of the words to describe the isolation felt without necessary social, civic, and community participation supports, the same supports Minister Butler has said he intends to cut by 50%. This bill in its current incarnation will lead to hugely decreased quality of life and basic dignity as well as leading ultimately to deaths of despair.
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Restrictions on unscheduled plan reassessments. As someone who has undergone reassessment before due to the arcane and opaque nature of the NDIA’s decision making process when it comes to plan allocation and who is still undergoing testing for diagnoses for severely delibitating but hard to pin down disorders I highly object to these restrictions. Additionally restrictions on Plan Managers applying for appeal are highly distressing, again requiring those who lack the capability to easily do so to apply themselves.
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Changes to reasonable and necessary criteria. Firstly disability often affects certain families at disproportionate rates, my own mother is a disabled NDIS participant who is still raising my two disabled siblings, the changes would place great burden on people like her to provide extensive supports that they are not capable of. Secondly the deflection of NDIA responsabilities to informal and community supports creates great burden on relationships, a thing already strained greatly by disabilities in the first place.
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Changing arises to directly arises. As someone with multiple complex, overlapping, and yet undiagnosed conditions this change will inordinately affect me. There are countless daily tasks, which with any single of my disabilities be trivial, that are made difficult to impossible. The impact of this change will be cuts in funding to things as basic as maintaining a safe and habitable environment for myself and support workers.
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Lack of accounting for context in eligibility. The changes to functional capacity assessment, requirements for having undergone “available” treatments, and likely other changes and specifically being changed to ignore real world context. How is a disabled, financially precarious, and geographically isolated individual meant to undergo treatments that require significant travel and personal expense? I personally had to travel interstate, pay out of pocket, and stay overnight for a significant diagnosis. I was fortunate to be able to but what about those left behind? Why should such a burden to be placed upon those who need help?
- What this looks like in real life This will directly cut people off from access to necessary support, create
Submission 2399
bureaucratic hurdle after hurdle for those least able to deal with them, place financial, emotional, and interpersonal burdens upon people for circumstances outside their control, and most importantly immiserate those most vulnerable in our society. I sadly predict significant worsening of quality of life and length of life through neglect, intentional roadblocks, and increased deaths of despair.
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What I want the committee to understand My lived experiences and those of my fellow NDIS participant are being ignored for a quick and easy change, from the perspective of those impacted it can only come across as willful or uncaring cruelty.
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My position on this Bill The purpose of a system is often said to be that which it does, the changes proposed will directly immiserate disabled and vulnerable people with little to no oversight or recourse for those most affected and for this reason I oppose this bill with all my being. I ask the committee to consider the lived experiences of myself and others and to think about those without a voice with which to speak out against this.