Submission 3173 — Mr Peter Brady — NDIS Future Generations Bill

SUBMISSION TO THE SENATE COMMUNITY AFFAIRS LEGISLATION

COMMITTEE

Inquiry into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment

(Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026

Health, Safety and Functional Capacity

Submitted by: Peter Brady, NSW

Date: July 2026

This submission is intended to be treated as a public document.

Executive Summary

My son is legally blind, has epilepsy, impaired balance, and requires 24-hour supervision. The NDIA proposed reducing his supports by 66 per cent - over $500,000 annually - on the basis that he can physically perform tasks like walking upstairs and transferring independently.

He can. He cannot do so safely.

That single distinction - between physical ability and safe performance - is the gap this submission addresses. Schedule 1 of the Bill proposes to define “functional capacity” without explicit reference to safety, risk, or the totality of a participant’s circumstances. If enacted without amendment, it will provide a legislative basis for assessments that equate what a person can do with what they can safely do - with foreseeable and preventable consequences.

I support securing the NDIS for future generations. This submission proposes four specific amendments to ensure that the Bill’s functional capacity framework accounts for:

• participant safety, including the cumulative effect of multiple impairments;

• support worker safety and the NDIA’s obligations as an upstream duty holder under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth);

• procedural safeguards before funding reductions, with graduated requirements proportionate to the scale of reduction; and

• a statutory duty of care requiring the NDIA to consider safety, continuity of care, and the practical consequences of its planning decisions.

These are not requests for further study. They are specific, draftable amendments to Schedule 1 that would strengthen the Bill without undermining its sustainability objective.

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As the parent of a participant with highly complex support needs, my experience is that the Bill’s current drafting places considerable weight on whether a participant can physically perform a task, while giving less consideration to whether that task can be performed safely. A reduction of approximately 66 per cent of my son’s supports - representing more than $500,000 per year - was proposed despite continuing evidence of blindness, epilepsy, falls risk, behavioural support needs and the requirement for continuous supervision.

This submission should be read alongside my companion submission on market failure, pricing structures and provider overhead costs. Together, they form a complementary policy package: this submission protects participants from unsafe funding reductions; the companion submission proposes mechanisms to reduce Scheme costs through provider side efficiency rather than participant harm. Both are directed to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee for this inquiry.

1. Introduction I am the parent of a young man with significant and lifelong disability support needs.

The NDIS has been essential to our family. It has enabled my son to participate in community life, maintain important supports and achieve outcomes that would not otherwise have been possible.

I support reforms intended to improve the integrity, effectiveness and long-term sustainability of the Scheme. However, sustainability must be pursued in a manner that remains consistent with participant safety, continuity of care and the realities faced by families supporting people with complex disabilities.

2. My Son’s Circumstances - A Case Study My son is 25 years old and lives at home with our family. He is legally blind and lives with multiple disabilities that significantly affect his ability to function safely in everyday life. He currently receives 2:1 support while awake and 1:1 overnight, including during Short Term Accommodation. He also experiences epilepsy, impaired balance, behavioural support needs and reduced awareness of hazards. Evidence before the NDIA has consistently identified the need for supervision, support and risk management across many activities of daily living.

Recently, a proposed NDIS decision stated that my son is:

“independent with navigating stairs when supported by holding onto railings” and

“independent with mobilising and transfers using no Assistive Technology”. Those observations may be factually accurate in a narrow sense.

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• My son can physically walk upstairs.

• He can physically mobilise.

• He can physically participate in transfers. However, those observations alone do not adequately describe his functional capacity.

• He cannot see stair edges.

• He has impaired balance.

• He has low bone density and is at increased risk of serious injury from falls.

• He experiences epilepsy which requires ongoing monitoring and supervision. The relevant question should not simply be: Can the participant perform the task?

The relevant question should be: Can the participant perform the task safely, consistently, reliably and without unreasonable risk of harm?

This case illustrates a systemic concern. Where assessments focus on isolated observations of physical ability without adequate consideration of interacting impairments, environmental factors and foreseeable risks, they may systematically understate the support needs of participants with complex conditions.

3. Functional Capacity Must Include Safety Many people with disability are capable of performing activities under certain circumstances. That does not mean they possess meaningful functional capacity for the purposes of planning and support decisions.

For example, a participant may:

• walk independently but be at substantial risk of falling;
• transfer independently but require supervision to avoid injury;
• undertake personal care but require assistance to ensure safety; or
• perform a task occasionally but not consistently or reliably. In each case, an activity may be physically possible. However, functional capacity should reflect real-world ability and safety, not theoretical capability.

An activity that cannot be undertaken safely should not be treated as evidence of independence.

4. The Missing Safety Principle - Proposed Amendment to Section 9B The proposed definition of functional capacity should explicitly recognise safety. Without this safeguard, assessments may place undue emphasis on physical performance while underestimating the significance of supervision, risk management and duty of care.

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I recommend that section 9B be amended to include the following provision:

Proposed insertion - section 9B: “For the purposes of this Act, a person’s functional capacity includes their ability to undertake activities safely, consistently, reliably and without unreasonable risk of harm to themselves, their carers or others.” The amendment should further provide that:

(a) an activity that a person can physically perform but cannot perform safely, consistently or without supervision does not, of itself, constitute evidence of functional capacity for the purposes of planning or funding decisions;

(b) functional capacity assessments must have regard to the totality of a person’s circumstances, including the interaction of multiple impairments, environmental factors and foreseeable risks; and

(c) isolated observations of physical ability do not displace clinical evidence, allied health assessments or established support histories regarding a participant’s ongoing support needs.

Comparable Legislative Precedents

This approach is consistent with established principles in comparable Australian legislation:

• Workers’ compensation legislation in Australian jurisdictions routinely distinguishes between capacity to perform work and capacity to perform work safely.

• The Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth) requires that risks be eliminated or minimised so far as is reasonably practicable.

• The Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth) and its successor legislation recognise that care needs must be assessed holistically, including consideration of safety and risk.

The same principle - that capacity must be assessed with reference to safety - should apply to assessments of a participant’s capacity to undertake activities of daily living under the NDIS.

5. Support Worker Safety and Workplace Health and Safety Obligations The Bill’s functional capacity framework has implications not only for participants but for the support workers who deliver their supports. These implications engage existing legal obligations under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth).

The NDIA as an Upstream Duty Holder

Under the WHS Act, a Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking (PCBU) has a primary duty of care to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health and safety of workers

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and others influenced by the conduct of the business. This duty extends to upstream PCBUs whose decisions influence the working conditions of downstream workers.

The NDIA’s planning decisions directly determine the conditions under which support workers operate. A decision to reduce a participant’s support ratio from 2:1 to 1:1 is not merely a funding decision - it is a decision about the physical conditions in which a support worker will perform manual handling, behavioural support, and personal care tasks. A decision to reduce overnight supports is a decision about whether a worker will be alone with a participant who has seizures, falls risk, or behavioural escalation.

The NDIA does not employ support workers directly. But its planning decisions set the parameters within which providers must deliver services and workers must operate. While the application of upstream PCBU duties to a funding body has not been judicially tested in this specific context, the policy rationale is compelling. In Baiada Poultry Pty Ltd v The Queen [2012] HCA 14, the High Court confirmed that upstream entities whose decisions determine the working conditions of downstream workers carry responsibility for foreseeable safety outcomes. The NDIA’s planning decisions carry the same practical consequence - they directly set the parameters within which support workers must operate. The Bill should make this obligation explicit rather than leaving it to be resolved through workplace injury, coronial inquiry, or litigation.

Practical Implications

My son’s support needs include personal care activities that may involve behaviours of concern, reduced awareness of safety, resistance to assistance, hygiene-related risks and circumstances requiring active supervision. In some situations, two support workers are required not because of physical lifting requirements, but because the task cannot be safely performed by a single worker while maintaining appropriate standards of participant care, worker safety and infection control.

When the NDIA reduces a participant’s funding in ways that alter support ratios or supervision arrangements, the following consequences for support workers are foreseeable:

• a worker previously operating in a 2:1 arrangement is now alone with a participant who requires physical intervention, manual handling, or behavioural support;

• a worker is required to provide overnight support without a co-worker, for a participant with seizure activity or falls risk;

• a worker is expected to perform tasks (transfers, community access, transport) that were previously assessed as requiring two workers for safety; and

• a provider, facing reduced funding, is unable to maintain safe staffing levels and the individual worker bears the residual risk.

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These are not hypothetical scenarios. They are the direct and foreseeable consequence of funding reductions for participants with complex support needs.

A reduction in funded supports may create two outcomes. The first is that an existing provider determines the reduced arrangement cannot be delivered safely and declines to provide services. The second is that the participant transitions to a new provider willing to operate with fewer staff. Both outcomes introduce significant risks: changing providers disrupts continuity of care, requires new staff to learn complex support needs, and increases risks for both participant and workers unfamiliar with those needs.

The Gap in the Current Framework

The Bill as drafted does not require the NDIA to consider support worker safety when making planning decisions. There is no requirement to assess whether a proposed reduction would create foreseeable risks to the workers who must deliver the remaining supports under altered conditions.

This gap exposes the NDIA to legal risk under the WHS Act, exposes providers to impossible choices between financial viability and worker safety, and exposes workers to physical harm. The Bill should make the NDIA’s existing obligations explicit rather than leaving them to be tested through workplace injury, coronial inquiry, or litigation.

6. The Royal Commission’s Findings and This Bill

The Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with

Disability spent four years examining the experiences of people with disability and their families. Its Final Report (September 2023) made findings directly relevant to the safety concerns raised in this submission.

Inadequate Supports and the Link to Harm (Vol 3, Ch 5; Finding 10.1) The Royal Commission found - in Volume 3, Chapter 5 and Finding 10.1 - that inadequate or insufficient supports are themselves a form of neglect, and that the withdrawal or reduction of supports without adequate assessment creates foreseeable and predictable risks of harm. The Commission heard extensive evidence that funding decisions made without proper consideration of a participant’s full circumstances - including the interaction of multiple impairments - contributed to preventable injuries, hospitalisations, and deaths.

An assessment methodology that evaluates individual tasks in isolation - without considering the cumulative risk created by multiple impairments - is precisely the approach the Royal Commission identified as contributing to harm.

The Impact on Informal Carers (Vol 4; Recs 4.1 and 4.25) In Volume 4, the Royal Commission documented the devastating impact on families when formal supports are reduced or withdrawn:

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• family members, particularly mothers, were forced to leave the workforce to fill gaps left by inadequate formal supports;

• the physical and mental health of informal carers deteriorated significantly under sustained caring loads;

• family breakdown, including relationship dissolution and sibling impacts, was a recurring consequence of inadequate support; and

• in extreme cases, carer stress and exhaustion contributed to the deaths of both carers and the people they supported.

Recommendation 4.1 called for harmonised national legislation defining neglect to include failure to provide supports necessary for wellbeing. Recommendation 4.25 specifically addressed the need for adequate, timely NDIS funding to prevent neglect through support gaps.

The Commission was explicit: cost-shifting from formal to informal supports does not reduce the cost of disability. It transfers it to families who are least equipped to bear it, with consequences that ultimately return to government through health, mental health, and crisis intervention systems.

Workforce Safety and Staffing Levels (Vol 10, Ch 6; Recs 10.8 and 10.9) Volume 10, Chapter 6 found that inadequate staffing levels and inappropriate support ratios contributed to workplace injuries, high workforce turnover, and workers placed in situations where they could not safely deliver supports alone. Recommendations 10.8 and 10.9 addressed worker registration, minimum qualifications and workforce planning, identifying a systemic vicious cycle: inadequate pricing leads to poor pay, which drives turnover, which creates shortages, which forces workers to support more participants with less assistance, which increases injury risk, which drives further turnover.

Volume 10, Chapter 6 also addressed the NDIA’s pricing decisions as a direct determinant of working conditions - positioning the NDIA as an entity whose funding decisions carry upstream responsibility for downstream worker safety outcomes.

The Consequences of Unsupported Caring

Australia has experienced a number of well-publicised tragedies involving families supporting people with profound and complex disabilities.

While the circumstances of each case were different, subsequent investigations, coronial processes and public discussion frequently identified common themes including prolonged caregiver exhaustion, social isolation, inadequate respite, lack of crisis supports and the cumulative impact of sustained caring responsibilities.

The Royal Commission heard evidence that families can reach crisis point when formal supports become inadequate and the burden of care is transferred to informal carers without appropriate safeguards.

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These cases do not suggest that every reduction in support leads to harm.

They do demonstrate that inadequate supports can have serious consequences and that policymakers should take those consequences seriously when designing legislative frameworks that affect access to support.

The purpose of raising these matters is not to argue against sustainability, but to emphasise the importance of ensuring that funding reductions, planning decisions and functional capacity assessments are accompanied by appropriate safety safeguards and risk assessment processes.

Implication for the Bill The Royal Commission spent four years and heard from thousands of people with disability and their families to establish that inadequate supports cause foreseeable harm. Parliament accepted those findings. This Bill should not create a legislative framework that enables precisely the outcomes the Royal Commission identified and condemned.

The Committee has an opportunity to ensure the lessons of the Royal Commission are embedded in this legislative framework, rather than requiring a future inquiry to identify the same failures under a new statutory regime.

7. Procedural Safeguards for Funding Reductions No reduction in supports should be made without documented consideration of safety. The question is not whether safeguards should apply, but what level of safeguard is proportionate to the scale of reduction. A 5 per cent adjustment warrants documented consideration. A 66 per cent reduction warrants independent assessment.

At every stage, the process must be transparent to the participant and their nominee. The participant must be told, in plain language, not merely that their funding is being reduced by a dollar amount or percentage, but what that reduction means in practice - including any proposed change to:

• support ratios (e.g. 2:1 to 1:1, or 1:1 to 1:2);
• the number of support hours per day or per week;
• Short Term Accommodation nights;
• community access hours;
• the number or type of support workers available; and
• any period during which the participant will be unsupervised or reliant on informal supports.

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A participant told “your plan is reduced by 15 per cent” cannot assess the safety implications. A participant told “your 2:1 support will become 1:1 between 10pm and 6am, and your Short Term Accommodation will reduce from 28 nights to 14 nights per quarter” can.

The Bill should require graduated procedural safeguards proportionate to the scale of proposed funding reductions:

(a) For Any Reduction

The NDIA must:

• document in writing that the safety and welfare implications of the reduction have been considered, including the impact on:

• the participant’s safety, health, and community participation;

• informal carers, including workforce participation and carer wellbeing;

• support workers, including workplace health and safety obligations;

• the participant’s existing service providers, including continuity of care and workforce planning; and

• the participant’s community access and social inclusion;

• provide the participant or their nominee with a clear, plain-language explanation of what the reduction means in practical terms (hours, ratios, nights, supervision gaps); and

• have the decision reviewed and signed off by a second delegate who has not been involved in the original assessment.

(b) For Reductions of 10 Per Cent or More In addition to the requirements at (a):

• the participant or their nominee must be notified in advance with written reasons for the proposed reduction, expressed in both dollar terms and practical impact (hours, ratios, nights);

• a safety assessment must be completed, addressing the cumulative effect of the participant’s impairments and the foreseeability of harm;

• the existing plan must continue during any internal review period;

• the decision record must demonstrate how the reduction is consistent with the participant’s assessed support needs and safety requirements; and

• the decision must be reviewed and approved by a delegate at least one APS level above the original decision-maker.

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(c) For Reductions of 20 Per Cent or More, or $50,000 (Whichever is the Lesser) In addition to the requirements at (a) and (b):

• an independent risk assessment must be completed by a qualified professional who is not employed by or contracted to the NDIA for the purpose of the original decision;

• the decision must be approved by a senior delegate (EL1 or above) who has personally reviewed the participant’s circumstances and the independent risk assessment;

• the existing plan must continue during any appeal to the Administrative Review Tribunal;

• an impact assessment on informal carers must be undertaken, including the effect on their workforce participation, physical health, and mental health;

• where the reduction would require a change in support ratio (e.g. 2:1 to 1:1), the independent risk assessment must specifically address the safety implications of that change, including during overnight, transport, and community access; and

• the participant must be provided with a written comparison showing their current supports and proposed supports side by side, expressed in hours, ratios, nights, and supervision arrangements - not merely dollar values.

Transparency is not a burden. It is the minimum a participant needs to understand what is being proposed, assess whether it is safe, and exercise their right of review. A funding reduction expressed only in dollars is meaningless to a family trying to understand whether their child will be supervised overnight.

The NDIA’s own data indicates that my son’s proposed reduction of 66 per cent would have triggered all three tiers. The question the Committee should consider is: should a reduction of that magnitude be possible without any of these safeguards?

The Administrative Review Tribunal overturns between 65 and 78 per cent of contested NDIA decisions, with an average overturn rate of approximately 73 per cent (ART data, 2024-25). This is not a case for more paperwork - it is evidence that current first-instance decision-making is systematically inadequate. Proportionate procedural safeguards would produce better initial decisions, reducing the volume of appeals and the costs they impose on participants, families and the system. The safeguards proposed here are not a burden on the system. They are the remedy for a burden the system already imposes.

8. Duty of Care The NDIS rightly seeks to balance participant outcomes and financial sustainability. However, decisions that significantly reduce supports have consequences that extend

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beyond budgets and administrative processes. They affect real people, real families and real care arrangements.

There is a strong case for establishing a clearer statutory duty on the NDIA to consider participant safety, foreseeable risks, continuity of care, family wellbeing, and the practical consequences of major support reductions.

The causal chain must be understood: reduced funding leads to provider withdrawal when the arrangement is no longer safely deliverable; provider withdrawal requires a new provider; a new provider means workers unfamiliar with the participant’s complex needs; unfamiliarity increases risk; and risk realised causes harm. A statutory duty of care requires the NDIA to trace that chain before it acts.

9. Practical Consequences for Families In my family’s circumstances, the practical consequences of funding reductions extend beyond the participant themselves.

If my son’s support budget is reduced to the level currently proposed, the support available would leave our family responsible for the majority of his ongoing care and supervision requirements. I am increasingly having to consider whether I can continue participating in the workforce or whether I will need to leave employment entirely in order to provide the care and supervision that would no longer be funded.

In practice, this would not reduce my son’s support needs. Rather, it would transfer those responsibilities from funded supports to unpaid family care.

When participant funding is reduced, it is not always the case that the underlying support need has diminished. In some circumstances, the effect is simply to shift responsibility from the Scheme to families, with significant consequences for carers, family wellbeing and workforce participation.

The Royal Commission was explicit: cost-shifting from formal to informal supports does not reduce the cost of disability. It transfers it to families, with consequences that ultimately return to government through health, mental health, and crisis intervention systems.

10. Recommendations The following table maps each recommendation to the relevant provisions of the Bill:

    Recommendation Description Bill Section(s)

    Rec 1 Amend s.9B: functional capacity ss.9B, 24, 25, 25A

must include safety, cumulative impairments, and foreseeability of harm

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Rec 2 Mandatory consideration of ss.9B, 34, 17B

participant, worker and carer safety in all planning decisions affecting support ratios

Rec 3 Graduated procedural safeguards: ss.34A, 34, 48A any reduction / 10% or more / 20% or $50,000 - with transparency and side-by-side comparison

Rec 4                              Statutory duty of care: participant  ss.34A, 34, 9B

safety, continuity of care, carer wellbeing, practical consequences

Recommendation 1: Amend Section 9B to Explicitly Include Safety Within Functional

Capacity

The Committee should recommend that section 9B of the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 (as proposed to be amended) be amended to include the following provision:

“For the purposes of this Act, a person’s functional capacity includes their ability to undertake activities safely, consistently, reliably and without unreasonable risk of harm to themselves, their carers or others.” The amendment should further provide that:

(d) an activity that a person can physically perform but cannot perform safely, consistently or without supervision does not, of itself, constitute evidence of functional capacity for the purposes of planning or funding decisions;

(e) functional capacity assessments must have regard to the totality of a person’s circumstances, including the interaction of multiple impairments, environmental factors and foreseeable risks; and

(f) isolated observations of physical ability do not displace clinical evidence, allied health assessments or established support histories regarding a participant’s ongoing support needs.

Rationale: The current drafting risks embedding an approach that equates physical ability with functional capacity. A person who can walk upstairs but cannot see stair edges, has impaired balance, experiences epilepsy and has low bone density does not possess meaningful functional capacity for that activity. Without explicit recognition of safety, assessments may systematically understate the support needs of participants with complex, interacting impairments. The Royal Commission (Vol 3, Ch 5; Finding 10.1) found that assessments which evaluate tasks in isolation, without considering cumulative risk, contribute to preventable harm. Workers’ compensation legislation already distinguishes between capacity to work and capacity to work safely. The same principle must apply to NDIS functional capacity assessments.

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Recommendation 2: Mandatory Consideration of Safety - Participants, Carers and

Support Workers

The Committee should recommend that the Bill require all functional capacity assessments and planning decisions to explicitly consider:

(g) participant safety, including foreseeable risks arising from the interaction of multiple impairments;

(h) support worker safety, including workplace health and safety obligations under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Cth) and the NDIA’s obligations as an upstream PCBU whose planning decisions determine downstream working conditions;

(i) informal carer safety and wellbeing, including the physical and psychological risks of transferring care responsibilities to family members; and

(j) behavioural risks, infection control risks and the practical consequences of reducing established support ratios.

Where a reduction in support ratios is proposed, the NDIA should be required to demonstrate that the reduced arrangement can be delivered safely and in accordance with the provider’s obligations as a PCBU under the WHS Act.

Rationale: Support arrangements exist within a system of legal obligations. Providers have duties to their workers. Participants have a right to safe service delivery. Reducing funded support ratios without considering safety obligations may create legal liability for providers, increase risk for participants and workers, and result in providers declining to deliver services - leaving participants without support. The Royal Commission (Vol 10, Ch 6; Recs 10.8 and 10.9) documented the systemic consequences of inadequate staffing levels and inappropriate support ratios on both worker safety and participant outcomes.

Recommendation 3: Graduated Procedural Safeguards for Funding Reductions

The Committee should recommend that the Bill include graduated procedural safeguards proportionate to the scale of proposed funding reductions:

(k) for any reduction - documented consideration of safety and welfare implications across five domains (participant, carers, workers, providers, community access); a plain-language explanation of practical impact in hours, ratios and nights; and sign off by a second delegate not involved in the original assessment;

(l) for reductions of 10 per cent or more - advance notification with written reasons in practical terms; a safety assessment addressing cumulative impairment effects and foreseeability of harm; plan continuation during internal review; and approval by a delegate at least one APS level above the original decision-maker; and

(m) for reductions of 20 per cent or more, or $50,000 (whichever is the lesser) - an independent risk assessment by a professional not employed by or contracted to the NDIA; approval by a senior delegate (EL1 or above); plan continuation during

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appeal to the Administrative Review Tribunal; a carer impact assessment; a specific assessment of the safety implications of any support ratio changes; and a written side-by-side comparison of current and proposed supports expressed in hours, ratios, nights, and supervision arrangements.

Rationale: No reduction should occur without documented consideration of safety. A 66 per cent reduction does not eliminate the underlying care need - it transfers responsibility to unpaid family carers, with significant consequences for workforce participation, family income, carer health and participant safety. The Royal Commission (Vol 4; Recs 4.1 and 4.25) documented the catastrophic consequences that arise when families are left without adequate support. Procedural safeguards proportionate to the magnitude of the decision are essential to prevent foreseeable harm. The Administrative Review Tribunal overturns between 65 and 78 per cent of contested NDIA decisions (average approximately 73 per cent). Better first-instance decisions supported by proportionate safeguards would reduce this burden on participants, families and the system.

Recommendation 4: Statutory Duty of Care

The Committee should recommend that the Bill include an explicit statutory duty on the NDIA, when making or reviewing planning decisions, to have regard to:

(n) participant safety and foreseeable risks of harm, including the cumulative effect of multiple impairments;

(o) continuity of care and the risks of service disruption, including the consequences of provider withdrawal and transition to workers unfamiliar with the participant’s needs;

(p) the wellbeing of informal carers and family members, including workforce participation and physical and psychological health;

(q) the practical consequences of the decision for the participant’s living arrangements and daily life; and

(r) whether the decision, if implemented, would be likely to result in an unacceptable transfer of risk to the participant, their family or the broader community.

This duty should be enforceable through internal review and external merits review processes.

Rationale: The NDIS exercises significant power over the lives of vulnerable people. A statutory duty of care ensures planning decisions are made with explicit regard to safety and consequences - not merely fiscal targets. The Royal Commission established that inadequate supports cause foreseeable harm. Parliament should not accept a framework that permits decisions with potentially irreversible consequences without requiring the NDIA to trace the full chain of harm before it acts.

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This submission does not oppose the Bill’s sustainability objective. It proposes that sustainability be pursued safely.

My son can walk upstairs. That does not mean he can do so safely.

He can participate in transfers. That does not remove the risks arising from blindness, epilepsy, impaired balance and the need for ongoing supervision.

Functional capacity is not simply what a person can do. Functional capacity is what a person can do safely, consistently and without unreasonable risk of harm.

The distinction between “can do” and “can safely do” is not academic. For my son, it is the difference between independence and injury. For support workers, it is the difference between a safe workplace and a foreseeable harm. For families, it is the difference between sustainable caring and crisis.

The Royal Commission spent four years documenting what happens when supports are inadequate. Parliament should not enact a framework that enables precisely those outcomes without the safeguards necessary to prevent them.

The amendments proposed in this submission are specific, draftable, and proportionate. They do not undermine the Bill’s fiscal objectives. They ensure that the pursuit of sustainability does not come at the cost of safety.

12. Availability to Give Evidence I am willing to appear before the Committee to give oral evidence in support of this submission if that would assist the inquiry.

I am also willing to provide supporting documentation, including evidence of the proposed funding reductions referred to in this submission, relevant clinical and allied health evidence regarding my son’s support needs, and other material that may assist the Committee in understanding the practical implications of the issues raised.

13. Related Submission This submission should be read in conjunction with my separate submission addressing market design, pricing structures and long-term sustainability, which addresses complementary concerns arising from the Bill’s objective of securing the NDIS for future generations.

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