Submission on the National Disability
Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing
the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
I welcome the opportunity to make a submission on the proposed amendments to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. The NDIS is one of Australia’s most important social reforms. It exists to support people with permanent and significant disability to live with dignity, exercise choice and control, and participate more fully in community life. At its best, the Scheme benefits not only participants, but also families, carers, communities and the broader Australian economy. I am not aCiliated with any advocacy or other related organisation. I am an Australian citizen who supports multiple family members with permanent disabilities and am speaking from lived experience.
I recognise that the NDIS must continue to improve eCiciency, consistency and accountability. Public confidence in the Scheme depends on delivering good outcomes, reducing waste and fraud, and ensuring funding is directed where it is most needed. However, reform must be careful, evidence-based and co-designed with people with disability. ECiciency should never be pursued in a way that weakens the Scheme’s core purpose or leaves participants with less support, less certainty and fewer opportunities to live safely and independently.
This issue is deeply personal for my family. NDIS supports have been critical for our two children, both of whom have complex disabilities. They require ongoing supports for basic needs, dignity and critical safety. These are not optional or peripheral services; they are the supports that make daily life possible, reduce risk, and create the conditions for participation, development and humanity. By reducing risk, they reduce the burden on local hospital, communities and other Medicare funded services.
A major concern is in the bill summary where it says it would “clarify the definition of permanence by introducing the concept of ‘all appropriate treatment’” and “require consideration of a participant’s eligibility for other service systems when determining access to the NDIS.” Each year I spend thousands of dollars and hours getting reports and documentation confirming permanent disability diagnosis and the impact on our lives. Many of these are not read or are disregarded. They also add no value to the lives of the people the are reporting about. In addition, over many years I have worked with the Department of Education, mental health services, allied health providers, private health, and services available through Medicare. Each of these systems is already stretched, over-committed and under pressure to reduce costs. Families are left trying to navigate fragmented systems that often seek to shift responsibility elsewhere rather than provide timely, coordinated support. Navigating and negotiating with these organisations impacts my ability to do my job putting our families financial stability at risk.
Key elements of the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 will worsen these problems. Tightening access settings through new tests around functional capacity and permanence, limit unscheduled plan reassessments, introduce plan end dates and renewal processes, broaden consideration of whether people should rely on other service systems, and give greater power to reduce funding for specified groups of supports. In a service environment where mainstream systems are already overloaded, these changes risk intensifying the current “hunger games” approach, where agencies and services compete to push disabled people into another system to carry the cost. That is costly, ineCicient and deeply unfair to the people these systems are meant to support. [National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026]) proposals and the Government’s [Securing the NDIS for future generations] reform agenda point to significant shifts in access, funding and system responsibility.
My primary concern is that the amendments shift the Scheme away from responsive, person-centred support and towards a more restrictive and administrative model. In my experience, the bureaucratic and combative nature of dealings with the NDIA has already contributed to poor outcomes and significant inbuilt costs. When families must repeatedly gather evidence, justify obvious needs, and fight for continuity of support, the system consumes time, money and emotional energy that should be directed toward helping people live safely and well. I personally have experienced being lied to, disrespected and dismissed by NDIA representatives in conversations. They lack accountability and transparency in the process and decision making. For people with disability, delays, reassessments, uncertainty about eligibility, or reduced access to supports are not abstract policy matters. They aCect whether someone can leave the house, attend school, maintain relationships, avoid hospitalisation, or remain safely housed. The people most aCected are often those who already face the greatest barriers to participation and the least capacity to absorb disruption.
These amendments also risk being detrimental to Australian society more broadly. When disability supports are reduced or made harder to access, costs do not disappear; they are shifted onto hospitals, schools, mental health services, Medicare and other parts of the system. This is one reason public debate can overstate the comparative cost of the NDIS by overlooking the extent to which disability-related costs were previously hidden across multiple service systems. Evidence from the NDIA shows sustained improvements in participant and family outcomes, including increased participation in work and community life, while broader public reporting and government materials point to the Scheme’s social and economic benefits for Australia. [Scheme Actuary Presentation Q4, 2024-25]; [Securing the NDIS for future generations].
More fundamentally, eCective disability support protects health, safety and wellbeing. For many people, timely and adequate support is life-preserving, because it reduces risk, prevents crisis and makes participation in ordinary life possible.
If the Government is committed to securing the future of the NDIS, reform should focus on what genuinely improves outcomes: better planning processes, clearer
communication, timely decisions, stronger safeguards against fraud and exploitation, workforce capability, and meaningful co-design with the disability community. Reform should also reduce unnecessary bureaucracy, end adversarial processes that force families into constant proof and re-proof, wasteful legal fees to avoid NDIA obligations, and address the waste created when systems compete to shift responsibility rather than coordinate support. Any legislative change should preserve participant rights, maintain flexibility to respond to changing needs, and ensure that decisions remain transparent, reviewable and grounded in the lived realities of disability.
My recommendation would be to realign the NDIA with the core commitment and values under the original scheme. Restructure the payments and price guides to be clearer, and ensure alignment of payment to qualification and valued services. Reduced expenditure on legal fees when these have largely not been found in favour of the NDIA. Readjust barriers to entry for smaller providers, since larger providers have been found to be a strong source of the fraud and poor provision of services. Make the decision making within the NDIS transparent, consistent and aligned with the intent of the legislation.
For these reasons, I urge the Committee and the Parliament to reconsider the proposed amendments. The NDIS does need reform, but reform should strengthen the Scheme’s capacity to support people with disability, not narrow it through additional barriers, uncertainty and cost-shifting. For families like mine, the NDIS is not an abstract budget issue; it is the diCerence between isolation and participation, between risk and safety, and between public crisis and private survival. Australia should protect and improve the NDIS so it remains sustainable, humane and eCective for the people it was created to serve, while also recognising that investment in disability support strengthens our communities, supports economic participation, and contributes to a more inclusive nation.