MINISTERIAL BRIEFING — UPDATED
NDIS Funding Inequity in Wentworth
And the Case Against the Securing the NDIS for Future Generations Bill
2026
Prepared: July 2026 | Audience: Federal Minister, NDIS | Includes constituent data, reformconcerns & formal asks
Executive Summary
This briefing is presented to the Federal Minister for the NDIS ahead of the Senate vote on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026. It documents the existing funding inequity experienced by NDIS participants in the Wentworth electorate, provides constituency data on the scale of disability in the electorate, and presents the formal asks of families, advocates and participants regarding the Bill.
The Wentworth electorate has a population of 146,102. Using the national disability prevalence rate of 18%, approximately 26,300 Wentworth residents live with disability. Using the core activity need for assistance rate of 5.8%, approximately 8,470 residents need significant support with daily activities — yet only 9,206 NDIS participants are enrolled across the entire South Eastern Sydney service district, which covers a much larger area. This electorate has significant skin in this game.
Two parallel arguments are made in this briefing. First, participants in Wentworth already receive materially lower NDIS plan funding than equivalent participants elsewhere — a systemic inequity documented in official NDIA data. Second, the proposed Bill would make this situation significantly worse by concentrating unprecedented executive power over funding in the hands of a single Minister, cutting community participation supports by up to 50%, restructuring SIL without housing alternatives, and removing participants from the scheme before agreed state-funded alternatives exist.
The primary ask is to vote to delay the Bill until genuine co-design with people with disability has occurred. If that is not achievable, five specific amendments are sought. Both positions are detailed at Section 4.
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 1- People with Disability in Wentworth — The Constituent
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1.1 Scale of Disability in the Electorate
The 2021 Census recorded a total electorate population of 146,102 for the Commonwealth
Electoral Division of Wentworth. The national Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers
(SDAC) finds approximately 1 in 5 Australians (18%) live with some form of disability. Applying Australian rates to Wentworth’s population produces the following estimates:
~26,300 ~8,470 9,206 ~4,400
People with disability Need core activity NDIS participants (SE Estimated unpaid carers
18% of 146,102 (SDAC assistance Syd district) Census: ~3% of population
national rate) 5.8% — profound/severe Full district, not just provide carelimitation Wentworth
The Census also records that in 2021, approximately 3% of the Wentworth population provided unpaid assistance to a person with disability, health condition, or due to old age — representing approximately 4,400 carers in the electorate whose lives are directly shaped by NDIS adequacy and continuity.
Every vote on the NDIS reform Bill is a vote that directly affects these constituents. Cuts to community participation, changes to SIL eligibility, and removal from the scheme without state funded alternatives will be felt in this electorate — by people who, as this briefing demonstrates, are already funded at below-average levels.
1.2 Wentworth’s NDIS Funding Deficit (Established Data)
The following table summarises the key funding gap data from official NDIA sources, updated to include the December 2025 quarter:
Metric SE Sydney / NSW Average GapWentworth
Avg plan budget (all participants) ⚠ $80,600 $85,200 ⚠ -$4,600 (-5.4%)
Non-SIL avg plan budget ⚠ $58,200 $63,200 ⚠ -$5,000 (-7.9%)
Non-SIL avg payments ⚠ $43,000 $47,500 ⚠ -$4,500 (-9.5%)
Active registered providers ⚠ ~90 ~2,800 (West ⚠ 97% fewerSyd)
Woollahra SEIFA rank ⚠ #1 in Australia National avg = Highest1,000 advantage
SIL avg plan budget $455,500 $461,000 -$5,500 (-1.2%)The inverse relationship — highest socioeconomic advantage in Australia, lowest non-SIL NDIS plan budgets of any major metropolitan NSW district — is a structural outcome of planning assumptions that conflate family wealth with disability need. The NDIS Act is explicitly means-blind. This briefing contends the planning system is not.
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 2- Reform Concerns — The Securing the NDIS Bill 2026
The National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future
Generations) Bill 2026 was introduced to Parliament on 14 May 2026. The following four concerns represent the primary issues raised by families, advocates, participants and clinicians across the Wentworth electorate and the broader disability community. They are presented in order of severity.
Reform Concern 1: Ministerial Power to Cut Funding Components
The Bill proposes to give the Minister for the NDIS the power to make binding pricing determinations — including the power to reduce participant support budgets across entire categories of supports through a ministerial instrument, without requiring a vote of Parliament.
This is a fundamental shift of constitutional power over the rights and entitlements of 760,000 Australians from Parliament to the executive. NDIS participant plans are legal entitlements. The power to reduce them should require Parliamentary scrutiny, not a ministerial stroke of the pen.
Advocacy for Inclusion has noted that the combination of expanded automated decision-making, assessment thresholds set outside Parliament through ministerial instruments, and weakened review mechanisms creates conditions where ‘erroneous or systematically harsh outcomes could affect large numbers of people before problems become visible or correctable. The structural parallels with Robodebt are real.’
The government did accept amendments in June 2026 to limit ministerial power to reduce funding across entire support categories — but advocates maintain these limits are insufficient, as the Minister retains broad discretion to determine pricing and adjust support budgets in ways that bypass Parliamentary oversight. The Greens and crossbenchers have maintained their opposition to these provisions.
Reform Concern 2: Ministerial Pricing Power — The Wrong Governance Model
Under the Bill, the Minister will hold the power to set and alter NDIS price limits through a ministerial pricing determination. Currently, pricing is set through the Annual Price Review process informed by the Independent Pricing Authority and market analysis.
Transferring this power to a single Minister — without a statutory advisory structure — removes the independence and expertise that pricing decisions require. Pricing in disability supports is not a simple economic calculation: it involves clinical complexity, neurodevelopmental research, workforce economics, geographic variation, and lived experience that no single Minister or department can adequately represent alone.
What we are asking for: A Statutory Advisory Panel for Pricing Rather than ministerial pricing determination, we call for a legislatively mandated advisory panel to inform any NDIS pricing decision. This panel should include:
- Disability advocacy organisations and peak bodies NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 3
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Current NDIS participants, including those with complex support needs
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Psychologists and neuropsychologists specialising in neurodevelopmental conditions
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University researchers in social welfare, disability policy, and health economics
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Specialist disability and allied health providers representing the full spectrum of support types
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Specialist treating physicians and diagnosticians covering intellectual disability, psychosocial disability, ABI, ASD, and rare neurological conditions
This model — independent, expert, multi-stakeholder — reflects how other major Commonwealth pricing determinations operate (e.g., the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee). An NDIS Pricing Advisory Panel should be established in legislation, with recommendations required to be published and publicly consulted before any ministerial determination takes effect.
Pricing decisions that are removed from parliamentary accountability and expert review risk being driven by budget targets rather than evidence of support adequacy. A 15% cut to a psychology session rate is not just a cost-saving measure — it is a clinical decision that determines whether a person with schizophrenia has access to the support that keeps them housed and safe.
Reform Concern 3: 50% Cut to Community and Social Participation The Bill proposes, from 1 October 2026, a progressive reduction of participant support budgets for social, civic and community participation supports and capacity building daily activities. Government documents confirm the initial proposed reduction is 50% for social and community participation supports.
Note: In Senate estimates, a departmental official indicated the proposal may be as high as 50% — contradicting earlier public statements suggesting 30%. Regardless of the exact figure, any across-the-board percentage cut to this funding category is both blunt and inequitable.
Community participation is not a discretionary supplement to an NDIS plan. For participants with psychosocial disability — the dominant cohort in the Wentworth electorate — it is the primary mechanism for recovery, social connection, employment pathway support, and mental health stabilisation. For people with autism, it enables engagement with community life that is not otherwise possible without support.
The Grattan Institute’s submission to the Senate committee found:
“The proposed reductions are blunt and inequitable. A flat percentage reduction does not fall evenly. It has the largest dollar impact on people with the largest assessed community participation budgets — budgets which are higher to reflect higher assessed support needs in that area.” — Grattan Institute, Senate submission, June 2026
For Wentworth participants — who already receive below-average plan budgets and access community participation supports in a thin provider market — a 50% cut to this funding line would be devastating. It would:
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 4-
Remove the primary route out of social isolation for psychosocial disability participants
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Eliminate funding for supported employment programs that sit within this category
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Disproportionately harm participants with autism who have assessed high needs in community participation
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Reduce demand in an already thin provider market, accelerating the collapse of community support infrastructure in inner Sydney
The sequencing compounds the harm: participation support budgets are cut from October 2026. The new functional capacity assessment framework that determines future eligibility does not commence until January 2028. Participants face cuts before any alternative support pathway exists.
Reform Concern 4: SIL Changes Before Housing Alternatives Exist
The Bill proposes a commissioned model for Supported Independent Living, moving from an open market to a government-vetted provider panel. Consultation on the design of this model begins in July 2026. Full implementation is expected from 2028. Mandatory SIL provider registration has already been required from 1 July 2026.
The reform rationale is legitimate: SIL quality is variable, some providers are exploitative, and the open market has produced poor outcomes for some of the most vulnerable Australians. However, the sequencing and the absence of alternative housing pathways creates a serious homelessness risk.
The concern is not with the goal of improving SIL quality — it is with the timeline and the gap. Participants who are transitioned off SIL arrangements, or whose providers exit the market due to mandatory registration or panel exclusion, currently have no guaranteed alternative:
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There are no confirmed equivalent state-funded residential supports in NSW that can absorb displaced SIL participants
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Social housing waitlists in NSW exceed 55,000 households — a 10-year wait for many applicants
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Private rental market in the Wentworth catchment is the most expensive in Australia — median weekly rent $650, the highest of any electoral division surveyed in 2021
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SDA supply in South Eastern Sydney is negligible due to land cost, meaning alternative specialist accommodation is simply not available locally
People with intellectual disability, complex mental health needs, or acquired brain injury who are removed from or denied SIL will not simply ‘find another arrangement.’ They will enter hospital emergency departments, crisis accommodation services, or homelessness. The NDIS cannot reform its housing support model without first ensuring that a safe landing exists.
Advocacy for Inclusion’s submission stated directly: ‘Reducing NDIS funding does not reduce disability-related need. It shifts the cost onto individuals, families, carers, and already stretched public systems.’
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 5Removing Participants Before Alternatives Exist
The Bill enables the NDIA to tighten eligibility criteria, with the government’s own modelling projecting that hundreds of thousands of people with disability will be removed from or denied access to the scheme by 2031. The government has also announced a target of 160,000 fewer participants over four years.
The central sequencing problem — identified in virtually every submission to the Senate committee — is that exits from the NDIS are planned before agreed, funded, and evaluated alternative supports are in place at state and territory level.
Advocacy for Inclusion: ‘Our central concern is sequencing. Participation support budgets are cut from October 2026. The functional capacity assessment framework that will determine future eligibility does not commence until January 2028. There is no jurisdiction in Australia where a ready, adequately staffed alternative will exist by the time cuts begin.’
3.1 Children — The Case for a Flat-Rate Early Intervention Package
A significant proportion of participants the government plans to exit are children — particularly those with autism or developmental delay who will be redirected to the Thriving Kids program from 2026. This program is not yet designed, fully funded, or operational.
For children being transitioned off the NDIS, families in the Wentworth electorate — and across Australia — are asking the government to consider reinstating a model similar to the original Helping Kids with Autism package: a flat-rate early intervention funding amount that gives families certainty, is simple to administer, and does not require NDIS eligibility. This approach would:
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Provide immediate certainty for families facing NDIS exits while Thriving Kids is developed
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Reduce the administrative burden on NDIA by removing children from the scheme without creating a support vacuum
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Allow families to purchase evidence-based early intervention supports (speech pathology, OT, behaviour support) directly
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Avoid the harm of a gap between NDIS exit and Thriving Kids availability — which, for children with autism, can mean regression in skills that takes years to recover
The original Helping Kids with Autism package (2008-2013) provided $12,000 over two years for early intervention. A modernised version, indexed to current allied health costs and available to all children with a relevant diagnosis regardless of NDIS eligibility, would be a humane, practical bridge measure.
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 6- The Formal Ask — What We Are Requesting This briefing presents two levels of request, in order of preference. Both are grounded in the evidence presented above and in the lived experience of NDIS participants, families, and clinicians in the Wentworth electorate.
Primary Ask — Delay the Bill for Genuine Co-Design
We ask the Minister to vote to delay the passage of the Securing the NDIS for Future Generations Bill 2026 until genuine, structured co-design with people with disability has been completed. This is not a request for consultation — it is a request for co-design, in which participants and families have meaningful input into the shape of reform, not just an opportunity to comment on decisions already made.
The disability community has spoken with remarkable consistency across more than 4,000 Senate inquiry submissions: the pace of this reform is being driven by budget timelines, not readiness. The human cost of getting this wrong — homelessness, loss of community connection, clinical deterioration — will be borne by people with disability and their families, not by departmental budget lines.
The government’s own June 2026 deal with the Greens acknowledged this concern by extending the inquiry by eight weeks and accepting amendments. That extension should be used to conduct the co-design that has not yet happened.
If a Delay Is Not Achievable — Five Specific Amendments
Should the Minister be unable to support a delay, we ask her to use her position to secure the following five amendments to the Bill before it passes:
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Amendment 1: Remove Extended Ministerial Powers Over Funding Components. The Minister’s power to reduce participant support budgets across entire support categories through ministerial instrument — without Parliamentary vote — must be removed from the Bill. Any reduction to participant entitlements should require primary legislation, with full Parliamentary debate and disallowance rights.
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Amendment 2: Remove the Blanket Proposal to Cut Community Participation by 30- 50%. The across-the-board percentage reduction to social and community participation budgets proposed for 1 October 2026 should be removed entirely. If savings in this area are to be pursued, they should be achieved through individual needs-based reassessment — not a blunt instrument that disproportionately harms participants with the highest assessed community support needs. Any future reduction must be based on an independent clinical and economic review, informed by the multi-stakeholder pricing panel described in Amendment 3.
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Amendment 3: Replace Ministerial Pricing Powers with a Statutory Pricing Advisory Panel.
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 7
The ministerial pricing determination power should be replaced with a Statutory NDIS Pricing Advisory Panel, established in legislation, comprising: disability advocates and peak bodies; current NDIS participants; psychologists and neuropsychologists; university social welfare researchers; health and disability providers; and specialist treating physicians across intellectual disability, psychosocial disability, ASD, ABI, and complex neurological conditions. The panel’s recommendations should be public, consulted, and required to precede any pricing determination.
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Amendment 4: Remove Proposed SIL Changes Until Housing Alternatives Are Confirmed. Provisions enabling commissioned SIL and changes to SIL eligibility and provider access should not take effect until: (a) the National Cabinet has agreed and publicly documented state-by-state alternative housing and support arrangements for displaced SIL participants; (b) those arrangements have been independently reviewed as adequate; and (c) a six-month transition period has been observed following confirmation of readiness. No participant should be at risk of homelessness as a consequence of NDIS reform.
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Amendment 5: Delay Participant Exits Until State Alternatives Are Operational, With a Children’s Flat-Rate Bridge. No participant should be exited from the NDIS until the relevant state or territory government has confirmed, in writing, that a like-for-like funded alternative is available to that participant. For children, the government should reinstate a modernised version of the original Helping Kids with Autism flat-rate early intervention package — available to all children with a relevant neurodevelopmental diagnosis, regardless of NDIS eligibility — as an immediate bridge while Thriving Kids is designed and operational.
Data Sources and References
Source Document Date
ABS 2021 Census QuickStats — Wentworth (CED145): 2022population 146,102, median age 38, median weekly rent $650
ABS SEIFA 2021 — Woollahra ranked #1 most advantaged LGA March 2023in Australia
ABS / AIHW Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers — national disability 2022-2024prevalence ~18%; core activity need for assistance ~5.8%
NDIA NSW Quarterly Performance Dashboard — SE Sydney plan September &budgets, SIL, utilisation December 2025
NDIA Q4 2024-25 Quarterly Report — national scheme June 2025payments, SIL, participant counts
NDIA Q3 2025-26 Quarterly Report — disability cohorts, First March 2026Nations, CALD data
Department of Securing the NDIS for Future Generations — reform May 2026Health timeline and announcement
Grattan Institute Submission to Senate Standing Committee — 50% June 2026community participation cut analysis
Advocacy for Submission to Senate Standing Committee on NDIS June 2026Inclusion Amendment Bill 2026
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 8Source Document Date
ICANReady NDIS Reform Bill Update — June 2026 deal, interim report, June 2026Greens amendments
Kavanagh et al. Social inequalities in eligibility rates and use of the NDIS, February 20252016-22 — Medical Journal of Australia Vol 222 Issue 3
NDIS Commission Mandatory registration for SIL providers — effective 1 July 20262026
Team DSC Minister Butler National Press Club address — pricing, April 2026commissioning, participant numbers
AIHW People with Disability in Australia 2024 — social 2024participation, housing, financial hardship
Prepared July 2026 for presentation to the Federal Minister responsible for the NDIS. All data sourced from official NDIA quarterly publications, ABS Census 2021, and peer-reviewed research. Wentworth constituency disability estimates are derived by applying SDAC national prevalence rates to the 2021 Census electorate population of 146,102. This document is a policy discussion briefing for the purpose of advocacy. It does not represent the official position of any government agency.
NDIS Wentworth Ministerial Briefing | July 2026 | Page 9