Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee
Inquiry into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for
Future Generations) Bill 2026
From: Todd Murfitt
NDIS Participant, former school principal, disability advocate, peer support facilitator
Dear Committee Members,
I write as an NDIS participant, former school principal, educator, parent and person living with complex disability. I also write as somebody who has seen firsthand the difference between a system that enables participation and one that unintentionally creates dependency.
I support the goal of a sustainable NDIS. Australians with disability want sustainability too. The NDIS is too important to fail. However, sustainability must not be pursued through reforms that unintentionally weaken the very foundations that made the Scheme successful: individualisation, evidence-based supports, meaningful review rights, choice and control, and social and economic participation.
My concern is that this Bill risks replacing a person-centred scheme with a centrally rationed one.
- The Bill risks weakening the practical meaning of “reasonable and necessary” The NDIS was designed around an individual question: What supports are reasonable and necessary for this participant to live an ordinary life, function, participate and reduce long term disadvantage?
This Bill appears to shift the practical emphasis toward centrally determined support categories, ministerial determinations, budget frameworks, impairment-linked restrictions, sustainability settings and system-wide funding controls.
The concern is not that the words “reasonable and necessary” disappear from legislation. The concern is that, in practice, a participant may demonstrate through evidence that a support is reasonable, necessary and life-changing, yet still be denied because the support sits outside a revised category, capped budget or ministerial determination.
In effect, reasonable and necessary risks becoming subordinate to centrally determined funding rules. That is a profound philosophical shift.
- Appeals may remain technically available while becoming less meaningful in practice I acknowledge that review rights technically remain. However, there is an important distinction between having a right to appeal and having a meaningful opportunity to succeed.
If supports are reduced through system-level settings rather than participant evidence, tribunals may increasingly be constrained to apply ministerial determinations and legislative funding frameworks rather than weigh lived evidence of need.
A participant may be told: “Your support is no longer funded under the framework” rather than “Your evidence does not establish need.” This creates the risk that decisions become harder to challenge, despite formal appeal pathways continuing to exist. From a participant perspective, this feels like reduced accountability.
- The scale of projected savings raises serious questions Government has announced very large projected savings associated with NDIS reforms. It is reasonable to ask: Where do savings of this magnitude realistically come from?
It is difficult to reconcile large savings targets with assurances that meaningful participant supports will remain untouched. Participants are understandably concerned that reductions will occur not through overt statements such as “we are cutting supports,” but through narrower eligibility, tighter reassessments, capped categories, stricter impairment links, reduced flexibility and framework-driven refusals.
Government should clearly explain what proportion of savings derives from fraud prevention, administrative efficiency, and reduced participant expenditure or access.
- The Bill risks creating a false economy My strongest concern is that these reforms may save money inside the NDIS while increasing costs elsewhere.
Supports do not only assist participants. They often enable whole families to remain economically active. If supports are reduced, carers may reduce hours or leave employment, workforce participation may decline, income tax revenue may decrease, reliance on Centrelink may increase, hospitalisation and crisis service demand may rise, and social isolation and mental distress may worsen.
In this scenario, savings inside the NDIS become cost shifting across government systems. Parliament should ask not simply “How much can be removed from NDIS expenditure?” but “What is the net economic and social effect across the whole of government?”
- Fraud prevention must not come at the expense of trust Fraud should be addressed. Participants overwhelmingly support sensible integrity measures. However, public narratives that over-emphasise fraud risk stigmatising people with disability and creating fear-based administration.
Most participants are not exploiting the system. Most are trying to live ordinary lives with dignity. The quality measure of the NDIS should not simply be reduced expenditure, but whether disabled Australians are participating more, working more, parenting better, more connected, and less hospitalised.
Recommendations
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Maintain genuinely individualised reasonable-and-necessary decision making and limit the ability for ministerial determinations to override participant evidence at scale.
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Preserve meaningful merits review so participants can challenge framework-driven decisions.
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Publish transparent modelling of how savings will be achieved.
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Publish whole-of-government economic modelling including workforce participation, tax impacts, welfare reliance and downstream health costs.
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Ensure fluctuating, psychosocial, neurological, fatigue-based and complex disabilities are not disadvantaged by rigid functional frameworks.
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Re-centre the Scheme on participation, dignity, prevention and independence rather than short-term expenditure reduction.
The NDIS should be sustainable. But sustainability without trust, dignity, participation and individualisation risks creating a cheaper system that ultimately costs Australia more — economically, socially and morally.
Thank you for considering my submission.
Kind regards,