Submission to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the
NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Attention: Committee Secretary, Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs
Submitted by email and upload: community.affairs.sen@aph.gov.au Date 1st June 2026
Please find my submission to the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs about the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securring the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026.
Aam a carer of young adult NDIS participant who has complex interrelated needs. I wish to outline a small snapshot to harm this Amendment Bill will cause if it passes Parliament. It is impossible to do more given the unreasonable time frame and document constraints provided (4 pages). This Bill is unreasonable and discriminatory. I believe the Bill requires proper scrutiny, extra time for those affected to contribute, and to be re-drafted. This tempted rush is a shameful reflection of those responsible. Much of the proposed NDIS Amendment Bill ignores the recommendations made by the Royal Commission and is unreasonable and discriminatory. Concentrate on providing more detail, reducing fraud and mismanagement before passing any NDIS Amendment Bill. This is curently a cost shifting exercise, moving costs to the disabled and their families, the states, health, justice and other systems. This Bill must not become legislation. In the process, the disabled who are reliant on the scheme will fall through the cracks, suffer, become injured or die.
Parliamentary Scrutiny and Transparency
The consultation period for the Amendment Bill was two weeks, which is also shameful and insufficient to allow for apropriate consultation, considering accessibility and communication needs. The Australian Government Guide to Policy Impact Analysis recommends consultation should occur for a minimum of 30 days where possible (for able hodied people).
Recommendation: The government is overtly disinterested in consultation, thus I perceive is disinterested in ununderstanding the challenges of disabled people or providing time for them to participate. This is not transparent or fair, it is opaque, inequitable and impacts all by preventing sufficient time to examine the bill more closely and comment more thoughtfully and thoroughly. It is an unreasonable and disrespectful time-line.
Increase the consultation period, it should make suitable accommodations to enable all people to participate, including those with disabilities, who have enough challenges. More time to allow for disabled people to participate would be reasonable (i.e. 90 days at minimum).
Key decisions left to ministerial instruments, not law
the issue: The Bill allows Ministers to change who gets NDIS support (Schedule 1 Parts 8 and 9) and how much unding people receive (Schedule 1 Part 4; Schedule 3) by signing an instrument, without going back to Parliament. The rules that will determine critical eligibility thresholds (Schedule 1 Parts 1, 8 and 9) have not yet been written.
Submission 2549
The decisions that shape the lives of participants, whether they qualify for the NDIS and what supports they can access, could be changed without parliamentary debate or public scrutiny. Participants may not know supports or eligibility rules have been changed until their plan is affected.
Recommendation: How can we even consider an open cheque book (with rules that have not even been written) be given to the Minister? This is at best a dishonest, dangerous and inequitable attempt to further disenfranchise disabled people. This could turn the NDIS into a ‘slush fund’ which the government could reach into to prop up their pet projects or assist premiers who have mismanaged their state’s finances. For example, to help prop up a profligate state.
All rules should be fair and compliance reviewable; disabled people are entitled to a fair hearing as fair as able bodied people are. The Government has wasted millions of taxpayers’ funds at the Administrative Review Tribunal fighting against disabled people. Seventy-five percent (%) of cases have been ‘won’ by the disabled - this is a poor reflection on the Government – cases should not have reached this stage. Why isn’t the Government working with rather than against disabled people?
This proposition is ill thought out, dangerous and outrageous: yet another discriminatory, unreasonable and disrespectful practice aimed at “second class disabled people.”
Vulnerable disabled people need more, not less oversight as was recommended in the 2023 Royal Commission.
The Bill changes the rules for NDIS participants and makes it harder to challenge some decisions about supports and funding. It also restricts when you can request a reassessment, removes review rights for automatic plan renewals, and makes funding reductions unreviewable (Schedule 1 Parts 1 and 8). Combined with restrictions on reassessments requests (Part 2), automatic plan renewal without review rights (Part 5) and unreviewable funding reduction (part 4); existing participant face narrower criteria with significantly fewer avenues to challenge decision about their support.
How this affects Participants: This does not protect participants already on the NDIS who could be re assessed under stricter rule; if someone’s funding reduced or their plans renewed automatically they may have limited or no ability to challenge that decision which would make difficult get extra support where circumstances change.
lLife is not perfect and disabilities cannot placed into convenient uniform-sized pigeon holes - People with disability also imperfect disabilities which also cannot ‘pigeon holed’. The proposed narrowers criteria & propose few right challenges simply strips disable peoples of human rights ironically In 2023 royal commission made 22 recommendations how improve laws policies structures practices ensure more inclusive just society – Proposed amendment runs counter those recommendation
Recommendation: It unreasonable discriminatory insist disabled people give up reviews rights.
The Minister can reduce funding any supports group supports by specified percentage through an BH-Perth-NDIS-Amendment-Bill June 2026 v01.docx Page 2 of 6
Submission 2549
instrument that cannot be challenged (Schedule 1 Part 4). This applies across all budget categories. Unspent funds will no longer carry over at plan renewal (Schedule 1 Part 5).
How this affects participants: A participant’s community participation, capacity building or assistive technology funding could be cut without warning and without any right to appeal. Participants who save unspent funds across plan periods for high-cost items will lose that ability entirely.
This would pander to the Minister’s desires, s/he could turn funding up and down, on and off like the setting on a television set. This is a dangerous and outlandish proposition. It opens opportunities for corruption, bias, and government to act unjustly and without review. This is an alarming proposition, and should not to be allowed to pceed.
Recommendation: Require that unspent funds carry over at plan renewal for participants saving for high-cost items and do not allow any funding reduction to take effect in the form of an unreviewable Ministerial instrument.
Requirement to exhaust treatment options before eligibility
The issue: A person with disability will need to exhaust treatment options before they can be eligible for the Scheme (Schedule 1 Part 8). There will also be a removal of whole-of-person assessment, replaced by single eligible impairment consideration (Schedule 1 Part 3). The note that previously acknowledged environmental factors and either ineligible impairments could affect support needs will be removed (Schedule 1 Part 3).
How this affects participants: People with disability will need to prove their impairment cannot be treated before they access the NDIS. Once in the scheme, their supports will only be assessed against a single eligible impairment rather than their whole experience. A person’s individual circumstances will not be considered, including ability to pay for treatment, where they live or whether treatment is actually available to them.
This is bizarre, thought out by people who are totally out of touch with the daily necessities of disabled people, and of the unrelenting constraints they deal with. How difficult would it be to ‘prove’ all treatment options have been exhusted. For example, in Western Australia our son had his specialist appointment in a major hospital cancelled by the hospital on several occasions without correspondence and despite our objections. It took him 2.5 years for a simple appointment. The easiest way for him to see a specialist in the public system was to arrive via ambulance after he had a medical episode. This is how he was reviewed, as an inpatient, rather than an outpatient. Being an out-patient would have been cheaper for the health budget. Would this mean his treatment options had been exhausted or not? Would it take us at least 2.5 years to prove this? Would the emergency doctor and specialists have the time and expertise to provide the required document/s for a review?
Recommendation: Do not proceed with a requirement to exhaust “appropriate treatment” options – there is no ameliorating treatment for a permanent disability. Additionally, there are no safeguarding measures around paticipant harm due to side effects or complications, a participant’s financial ability to pay, or their geographic cacity to access treatments.
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Unvalidated functional capacity assessment tool risks misidentifying need
The issue: The Bill shifts assessment from whole-of-person consideration to a single eligible impairment (Schedule 1 Part 3). Read together with the eligibility thresholds in Parts 8 and 9, the tool used to conduct functional capacity assessments must be capable of sufficiently identifying whether a person meets the threshold for that single impairment.
The named assessment tool is the Instrument for Classification and Assessment of Support Needs (I-CAN). I-CAN requires validation to ensure it will sufficiently identify the needs of all people with disability, including those whose needs may be fluctuating or episodic and may not be captured through a point-in-time assessment, and to ensure it is culturally appropriate for First Peoples with disability.
How this affects participants: If the assessment tool does not accurately capture the full extent of a person’s disability, including needs that fluctuate or vary over time, a participant may be found ineligible or have their supports undercounted, with no guarantee the result reflects their actual experience.
Commentary: How will this tool be tested and prototyped to ensure it is a valid and reliable instrument? Or will this be yet another functionary in a backroom in Canberra cobbling together some perceived functional capacity ideas?
Will it cater for variations between ages and different parts of the country? For example, will it cater for people living in the regions? Is it properly and culturally tested for indigenous, culturally diverse and other Australians? Are there enough trained and certified assessors available?
What is the definition of ‘a significant reduction in capacity that affects day-to-day life?’ What is considered “normal” function? Will a “reduction” be from the edge of the normal envelope (once adequately defined), or from the “mean”.
The I-CAN tool is a three-hour verbal assessment unsuitable for many participants for example with autism, an intellectual disability, attention issues, processing problems, pain issues, hearing and speech disorders, psychosocial problems, dementia, to name a few. It has not been normalised against a significant enough test population to allow extrapolation to all disabilities in a national population. Is this a ‘quick and dirty’ or ’one size fits all’ tool designed to override the many specialist reports and other tests a participant has had to endure? A tick and flick modelling tool for the NDIS’ administrative convenience? Australians deserve better.
When my son was assessed, it was not based on ‘having a diagnosis on an approved list’. It was based on his functional capacity, and required much supporting documentation, including many supporting specialist and medical reports. It was a rigorous, time consuming, expensive (thousands of dollars paid by us) and stressful process, entailing independent expert reviews.
Recommendation:
- Defer or reject adoption of I-CAN until it is validated and proven to be a reliable tool for assessing all forms of disability on a national population level. Assure participants that the three-hour verbal I-CAN assessment will be administered in a way that is accessible and does not penalise participants unfairly due to their disabilities.
Submission 2549
- Retain a ‘whole person’ view. Remove the requirement for a participant to be funded for only one disability.
This is outlandish, ignorant and discriminates against many participants, particularly with complex needs and disabilities. Some disabilities occur co-morbidly, to ‘choose’ one disability is dangerous and will cost lives.
The issue: From 1 October 2026, the government has announced funding for social, civic and community participation supports will be cut by 50 per cent and capacity building daily activities by 10 per cent for all participants, reductions that will be implemented through the ministerial instrument power in Schedule 1 Part 4. The Foundational Supports system intended to fill that gap has no confirmed implementation date and is not yet operational.
How this affects participants: My young adult son needs access to peer groups and to perform daily life activities as a normal person in his community setting. Assistance to participate in society after leaving school is an area fraught with danger. The danger is that, if not supported, he will become disengaged, injured, or die. In turn, the consequences of this are impactful and expensive for our son, our family, the health system, and Australian society.
The proposed $200 million ‘Inclusive Communities Program’ (supposedly inclusive) reeks of discrimination & segregation. It would result in corralling disabled people together into groups where they can only mix amongst themselves, fulfilling the Government’s perfect vision of disabled people not being seen or heard.
Placing disabled people together in a so called ‘Inclusive’ Communities Program so the government can gain economies of scale is an idea that could only have been dreamed up by able bodied people totally out of touch with the daily challenges disabled people face. Stop calculating the headline cost of the NDIS without calculating and acknowledging the financial benefits that accrue to communities and the government overall through integration and inclusion.
The Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (the DDA) makes it against the law to treat you unfairly because of your disability. This proposal is ironically unlawful, and shamefully it discriminates against people because of their disability. It treats people with a disability unfairly, and as second class citizens. It seeks to undermine their basic human rights and dignity.
Recommendation: Reductions to community participation or capacity building supports should not be allowed. Additionally, disallow the Minister to make any funding reductions. This is simply a sloppy cost saving measure. The government should make costs savings by reducing fraud and waste, instead of expecting participants to pay for it.
Conclusion Disabled people are not political footballs; they are some of the most vulnerable in our community and rely on a fully functioning and appropriately funded NDIS. Much of the proposed NDIS Amendment Bill ignores the recommendations made by the Royal Commission and is unreasonable and discriminatory. I ask the Senate
Submission 2549
The Committee to concentrate on a more detailed proposal which focuses in the first instance on reducing fraud and mismanagement in any NDIS Bill before entertaining the contentious items detailed in previous sections.
Furthermore, a 1st of July deadline is a rushed deadline and quite simply wrong, as it deliberately excludes input from the people that will be impacted by this poorly thought-out Bill.