PWDA Template: 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: community.affairs.sen@aph.gov.au
Date: 1/6/2026
I welcome the opportunity to make a submission to the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs about the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securring the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026.
I am an NDIS participant
I want to outline the harm this Amendment Bill will cause if it passes Parliament. This Bill is too far-reaching to pass as it stands. I believe the Bill requires further scrutiny and amendment before it proceeds.
Parliamentary Scrutiny and Transparency
The consultation period for the Amendment Bill is two weeks, which is insufficient to arrow appropriate consultation, considering accessibility and communication eeds. The Australian Government Guide to Policy Impact Analysis says consultation should occur for a minimum of 30 days where possible.
Submission 2816
The short timeline impacts me by preventing a fuller response and more informed understanding of this bill.
Recommendation: Amend the consultation period for a best practice minimum of 30 days.
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 funding 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.
How this affects participants: 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 changed until their plan is affected.
Recommendation: Require that all decisions affecting NDIS eligibility and funding levels be made through primary legislation subject to full parliamentary scrutiny, with mandatory advance notice to affected participants before any changes take effect.
Existing participants face narrower criteria and fewer rights to challenge decisions
The issue: The Bill changes the rules for existing 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 reassessment requests (Part 2), automatic plan renewals without review rights (Part 5), and unreviewable funding reductions (Part
Submission 2816
4), existing participants face narrower criteria with significantly fewer avenues to challenge decisions about their supports.
The How this affects participants: This does not protect participants already on the NDIS, who could be reassessed under stricter rules. If someone’s funding is reduced or their plan renewed automatically, they may have limited or no ability to challenge that decision. This could make it harder for people to get extra support when their circumstances or disability change.
Overall the options to review a plan are already limited, and this bill restricts this further and in some cases decisions are not reviewable eg. Proposed automatic plan renewals. Renewed plans should be reviewable.
Recommendation: Require a “no harm” safeguard ensuring no current participant loses access to supports unless equivalent supports are in place, with independent review rights before any exit decision and access to unscheduled reassessments preserved.
Unreviewable ministerial power to cut funding across all support categories
the Minister can reduce funding for any support or group of supports by a specified percentage through an 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).
The 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.
A NDIS has already been notoriously difficult for disabled people to access among financial concerns of obtaining reports, strict requirements of language used to convey to ndis employees without a disability background why support is needed.
PWDA Template: Submission to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submission 2816
(including reports of people with amputations or paralysis being asked if these conditions will improve.) Cuts will only worsen this situation when money could be found in the budget elsewhere. I know of a deaf NDIS participant unable to get support for speech pathology which is resulting in their inability to work as their speech deteriorates over time, and of cerebral palsy patients whose carers have had to struggle constantly for support despite clear need. Many NDIS patients are taking up more resources through the hospital system and preventing others from getting a bed when needed due to these cuts.
Recommendation: Require that unspent funds carry over at plan renewal for participants saving for high-cost items and require independent review rights before any funding reduction takes effect.
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 other 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.
Requiring a condition to be fully treated before acceptance to the scheme doesn’t allow NDIS participants medical autonomy, or allow for financial circumstances.
PWDA Template: Submission to the National Disability Insurance Scheme
Submission 2816
Recommendation: Do not proceed with a requirement to exhaust “appropriate treatment” options – there are no safeguarding measures around participant harm due to side effects or complications, a participant’s financial ability to pay, or their geographic capacity to access treatments.
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.
P having a standardised assessment for functional capacity will exclude people with lesser understood conditions that require specialist assessment. Multiple Sclerosis was unrecognised for years prior to the invention of the MRI, and similar delays in research has resulted in similar situations among many other predominantly female conditions which have been historically under researched.) Particularly invisible conditions and fluctuating capacity conditions may be affected without appropriately specialised reports.
Recommendation: Do not proceed with I-CAN as the functional capacity assessment tool unless it has been demonstrably validated to identify the needs of
Submission 2816
all people with disability, including those with episodic or fluctuating disability, and demonstrated to be culturally appropriate for First Peoples with disability.
Supports cut before replacement system is ready
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:
- Supports that help participants connect with their community, build skills and maintain independence may be cut before anything exists to replace them, leaving carers and families with greater responsibilities and no additional support.
- These supports are often what help people stay visible, involved and safe.
Deterioration is common while waiting for supports or to be taken seriously. I personally have been rejected for community supports through the council such as cleaning while my condition was mild due to not fitting the typical recipient, and I subsequently deteriorated to the point of being unable to leave the house due to worsening of my condition from lack of support. Since being on NDIS I have been able to have more success stabilising my condition and can now leave the house more regularly and my mental health is much improved, which previously was characterised by suicidal tendencies.
The Recommendation: Require that no reductions to community participation or capacity building supports take effect until Foundational Supports are fully opertional, adequately funded and demonstrably able to meet the needs of those who will lose NDIS supports.
PWDA Template: Submission to the National Disability Insurance Scheme
Submission 2816
Other comments
e5.5 million people in Australia have a disability, so NDIS is not fully utilised despite the need. (https://www.abs.gov.au/media-centre/media-releases/55-million- australians-have-disability) Cutting back on the number of people receiving supportscontravenes human rights obligations, and pushes disabled people further intopoverty and abusive situations.
The NDIA frequently ignores the requested mode of contact. If this bill is passedin its current state, being unable to contact a participant, despite ignoringthe participant’s deafness and contacting them by phone for example, orcontacting them at a time of day where their functioning is reducedand they are unable to engage with the representative/planner and advocatefor their needs will result in people losing theirsupports. This also fails to allow for medical episodes and placesunnecessary strain on already struggling people.
Holding away with ‘reasonable and necessary’ allows arbitrary cuts toplans as an appeal to the need for‘financial sustainability’ can always be made. These arenecessary supports being cut without which deaths will occur. The alternativesystems of support that are referred to as a replacement for ndisare insufficient or do not exist.
Undoing the ‘whole of person approach’ means that overall wellbeingwill be impacted as only the main disability is taken into account,where many have numerous impairments.
e Instead of focusing on cost cutting at the detrimentto disabled people, the focus shouldbe on businesses profiting from the scheme and the costs of essentialitems that disabled people need to live. Financial sustainabilitiy could beadressed in this way as well as focusing on bad actors rorting moneyinstead of those who relyon these supports to survive.
PWDA Template: Submission to the National Disability Insurance SchemeAmendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submission 2816
All of this will result in potentially higher costs to the medical system overall as patients languish in hospitals being unable to function at home, deaths due to lack of specialized care as carers struggle to perform 24-hour care, and deaths due to mental health deterioration from lack of ability to lead a meaningful life. Further stresses will be added to NDIA participants making them afraid to use their supports and therefore deteriorate, particularly the possibility of being ’ audited’.
This all demonstrates a degree of cost cutting that impacts participants to the point of deterioration to their health, and an inability to leave their homes to socialize, or live independently.
The page number is located on bottom left corner - Page 8. The document title reads: PWDA Template: Submission to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securring the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026