National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submission 2494
Submission on The National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment
(Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Background
I am a parent of a disabled daughter who has been a NDIS participant for some five years. As such I have observed the NDIS in action and am familiar with the typical problems and benefits encountered by NDIS participants.
My daughter is wheelchair bound, suffers mental fog and is very limited in her physical activity.
I am 78 years old with a 74 year old partner and am ill equipped to be my daughter’s primary support. I need reassurance that the NDIS will continue to provide support to my daughter in the long term.
Functional Capacity
While my daughter’s disability has changed marginally since her initial disablement, her condition has changed little in the past four years. I am concerned that the NDIS may change the criteria defining disability and as a result reduce her support under the NDIS.
My daughter is totally reliant on a network of carers and supports because of her limited functional capacity. Changing the criteria for the assessment of functional capacity may result in a reduction in her supports and make her more reliant on family, or to severely limit her quality of life.
Renewals of NDIS Plans
The proposed automation of the renewal process is a concern. While there are provisions for the existing plan to automatically roll over year on year, what will be the criteria for triggering a review that results in changes to her support?
Leasing versus Purchase
The updated Bill prefers leasing to purchase of facilities to support NDIS participants. Is this based on an assumption that NDIS participants will only be supported for a short period (eg a few years)? In my daughter’s case, she had a leased wheelchairs for several years before the NDIS provided her a purchased wheelchairs. The total lease costs would have bought the manual wheelchair several times over, making leasing a far more expensive option for the NDIS. She also had to wait several years for a purchased power wheelchair.
During this time, she had at least ten evaluations for wheelchair needs by an Occupational Therapist at $3,000 per evaluation, despite her condition not materially changing. This cost would better have been applied to purchasing wheelchairs based on her initial OT evaluation.
Government power to reduce groups of supports
I am concerned that many of the support functions are already being reduced and the bill gives the minister greater powers to reduce existing benefits.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submission 2494
My daughter is totally dependent on supports for shopping, going to medical and dental appointments and other essential travel. There seems to be little provision for support that qualifies as quality of life – eg social outings such as concerts, meals or coffee. My daughter is also on a committee advising the local council on disability matters and this support is limited.
These are already being reduced under the current rules and the changes will potentially give the NDIS greater power to limit supports.
New principles about “scheme sustainability”
While scheme sustainability is clearly necessary, there is potential that current NDIS participants may lose sustainment because of limited budgets and increasing number so NDIS participants. Current participant should have some assurance that there benefits that they currently receive, based on previous assessments, will not be reduced.
Setting Maximum Payments
My observation of the existing allowable charges for NDIS services is that they are already excessive. As a highly-qualified professional who has performed a significant amount of contract work, I am surprised to find that the rates some marginally qualified supports receive are comparable to my professional rates. So some of the rates are excessively generous. The NDIS should review all rates and cut out excessive spend more in line with other comparable support services.
General
In summary, I have concerns that the new bill will excessively cut support to existing NDIS participants and marginalise what quality of life they already have. There is a clear need to limit excessive expenditure on the NDIS but to date there has not been the oversight to cut out excessive claims by some service providers and to limit fraud.