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Submission 2822 — Name Withheld — NDIS Future Generations Bill

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Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee

National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Date: 1 Jun 2026

Introduction

I am 48 years old, a resident of rural NSW near Canberra. I am an NDIS participant. I am also a disability advocate though I have recently had to cease working in that role due to the increasing effects of my disability.

I am deeply concerned about the bill itself, as well as the inadequate time frame for submissions and review, and the lack of consultation with people with disability and disability organisations.

In the past couple of years, I’ve already seen NDIS participants struggling with cuts to funding, the stress of the uncertainty and the burden of advocating for ourselves. I’ve seen people being denied NDIS access who have legitimate, permanent disabilities and far lower functional capacity than myself. This bill threatens to make the situation far worse.

I cannot possibly enumerate all my concerns with the bill with the small amount of energy, time and capacity I have available, so this submission is an overview. I have general concerns about the state of the NDIS and the narrative being used to push this legislation, and specific concerns about the provisions of the bill.

In general

The narrative of a loss of “social licence” and “cost blowouts” is a carefully created strategy to allow cuts to the NDIS to go through. The advice provided to the government by Redbridge Group was to prime the public for NDIS cuts by focusing on fraud. This has very effectively been carried out, with devastating effects for NDIS participants. We were already among the most vulnerable members of society, and now we’re being attacked in the media and in public opinion forums, being blamed for rorting the system, “using NDIS funds to get our nails done” and the like.

National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Submission 2822

It is disingenuous and inaccurate to look at this bill and the state of the NDIS in terms of merely the dollar cost of the scheme, without also considering:

  • The benefit to the economy that each dollar of NDIS spending elicits;
  • The reduction in impact to other areas of government services which results from a functioning NDIS providing participants with all necessary supports;
  • The costs of the scheme outside of participants’ plans: the bureaucracy, the legal costs of fighting applications for funding, the grants and programs, the funds that go to other government departments;
  • The failures within the Scheme as it is, and the feedback of people with disability about the problems and possible solutions;
  • The harm caused to participants and prospective participants by reducing their funding, removing them from the scheme, or preventing them from accessing the scheme;
  • The lack of adequate foundational supports outside the NDIS to take up the burden of supporting those removed from the scheme, and the harm this will cause;
  • The other ways in which cost savings could be achieved, both within the NDIS and elsewhere in the budget;
  • The complicity of the government in destroying the “social licence” of the NDIS.

There has not been enough time or consultation allowed for this bill. Yes, there is waste and fraud in the NDIS system. Yes, more people than anticipated are now participants. In the vast majority of cases these problems are not the fault of NDIS participants, yet the overwhelming focus of the bill is cutting access and funding to those participants.

The bill removes oversight and power from Parliament and gives the Minister sweeping powers to change the NDIS without consultation or due process. This is a grave concern to me and I would think should be of concern to members of parliament.

Specific concerns

Schedule 1—Access and planning measures

  • Part 1: functional capacity.

    • I am concerned by the blanket permission of 9B (3) that may allow for a system of determining functional capacity that is not fully considered, consulted on, or able to consider individual needs

  • Part 2—Limit unscheduled plan reassessments

    • This section allows 90 days for a finding on a reassessment request: I believe this is too long a period

National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Submission 2822

Part 4—Support determinations

  • The potential sweeping percentage reductions that the Minister may impose are an override of the planning decisions that state that funding is reasonable and necessary for the individual. The suggested 50% cut to Social and Community Participation funding is very concerning. This funding isn’t “fun money”… it’s what allows participants to get out into society, to get to medical appointments.

Part 6—Reasonable and necessary supports

  • Changing “reasonable and necessary supports” to “NDIS supports” has the potential to completely undermine the existing mechanisms of the scheme, if “NDIS supports” are later defined very narrowly. Adding “so far as is consistent with the financial sustainability of the scheme” opens up the potential gutting of supports if a much lower level of funding is considered to be “sustainable” in future.

Part 8—Tightening meaning of permanence

  • Centrelink’s Disability Support Pension has different measures of permanence: inability to access a treatment due to financial or travel considerations is not considered a bar to proving permanence. If people can’t afford a treatment, it should be considered unavailable to them.
  • I am concerned that inappropriate treatments will be considered to be “required” – invasive surgery or other treatments with high chances of negative side effects, treatments that have been shown to be harmful but which persist due to long-term entrenchment in the medical system (eg ABA therapy for Autism, graded exercise therapy for ME/CFS)

Part 9—Eligibility based on access to other services

  • 25B (4) allows for the NDIS rules to consider potentially inadequate supports a bar to NDIS participation. Compensation for an impairment may not be adequate to provide all the supports needed as a result of the impairment. The NDIS should still be open to people who have been compensated if there is remaining functional capacity loss.

Schedule 2—Fraud measures

Part 1—Registration of NDIS providers

  • I live in a rural area. Most of my NDIS providers have me as their only NDIS client. I’m concerned about the risk to rural participants that their providers, if required to be registered, will consider the cost and labour not worth the effort to retain a couple of clients.

Part 5—Reducing claim times

  • In theory I support this but I’m very concerned at the risk of a Robodebt scenario where participants are hit with automated demands to justify their claims years down the track and a debt is generated if they are unable to do so. I’m worried about the short claim time only in conjunction with this risk.

National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Submission 2822

Schedule 3: Pricing and Automation

Part 1—Decision-making on pricing

  • Yet another unilateral power granted to the Minister without review or consultation. This is very concerning to me – especially with current cost of living increase, many NDIS prices are already well below what is charged by providers to the public.

Part 2—Automation of administrative action

  • The lack of requirement for accountability, human review, ability to appeal an automated decision, consultation in the development of automation – all are so concerning to me. Again – participants are already among the most vulnerable members of society – and another Robodebt disaster does not seem impossible.

Recommendations

I strongly believe that the Committee should not recommend passage of this Bill until there has been consideration given to and alterations made based on the many grave concerns put forward in submissions and by government ministers and advocacy groups. There should be consultation with advocacy groups and amendments to reduce the sweeping powers this Bill would grant to the Minister.