Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee

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

31st May 2026

I welcome the opportunity to provide a submission regarding the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026.

I support efforts to ensure the long-term sustainability of the NDIS, reduce fraud, improve consistency, and ensure supports are directed to people with permanent and significant disability. However, I have concerns that several provisions of the Bill may unintentionally reduce access, limit participant rights, and increase uncertainty for people with disability.

My concerns are informed by the experience of our 18-year-old foster daughter with multiple disabilities who recently transitioned from out-of-home care after spending her entire childhood in foster care. My husband and I have cared for her since she was a baby and continue to play an important role in her life as she moves into adulthood. While she is fortunate to have ongoing support from us, many young people leaving out-of-home care do not have that same stability and advocacy.

Our foster daughter is now approaching the end of her schooling and beginning the challenging transition into adulthood, employment, community participation, and greater independence. At this critical stage of life, continuity of support and trusted professional relationships are essential.

It is also important to consider how these proposed changes may affect children who have not yet received a formal diagnosis. When our foster daughter was three years old, many of the challenges she faced were already apparent, but the full picture of her disabilities was not yet understood. Early intervention services and therapeutic supports helped identify her needs, build foundational skills, support her carers, and provide evidence that ultimately informed later diagnoses and support planning. Had access to these supports been delayed until all assessments and diagnoses were completed, she may have missed critical developmental opportunities, placing her at greater risk of poorer educational, social and long-term independence outcomes.

For carers, particularly foster and kinship carers, early access to supports can be the difference between successfully meeting a child’s complex needs and reaching crisis point. Without professional guidance and intervention, carers may struggle to understand challenging behaviours, communication difficulties, sensory needs, or developmental delays. Early supports not only improve outcomes for the child but also strengthen placement stability and reduce the likelihood of more intensive and costly interventions later in life.

Functional Capacity Framework

The Bill proposes a new framework for determining access to the NDIS based on substantially reduced functional capacity.

While consistency in decision-making is important, the legislation leaves many important details to future rules, assessment tools and administrative processes. This creates uncertainty for current and future participants.

Our foster daughter has been supported over the years by therapists who have known her for most of her life. The value of these long-term therapeutic relationships began long before a formal diagnosis was established. When she was a young child, therapists were able to identify emerging concerns, support her development, and help her carers understand her needs. Their observations over time contributed to a more complete understanding of her disabilities than could have been achieved through a single assessment or snapshot of functioning. This highlights the importance of maintaining pathways to support for children whose developmental challenges are evident, but whose diagnoses may still be evolving.

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Over many years they have developed a deep understanding of her disabilities, communication style, behavioural presentation, strengths, challenges and support needs. Their support has adapted as she has progressed through childhood, adolescence and now young adulthood.

The supports that were appropriate in primary school were different from those required during high school. The supports she requires now as she prepares for life after school are different again. As she moves toward employment, independent living and community participation, her support needs continue to evolve. Effective support planning requires flexibility and an understanding of her developmental journey rather than reliance on a single assessment conducted at one point in time. This level of understanding cannot be replicated through a single assessment conducted by someone who has only recently met her.

I am concerned that increased reliance on standardised assessments or rigid functional capacity measures may fail to capture the complexity of participants whose needs evolve over time.

Recommendations:

• Ensure treating practitioner evidence remains central to access decisions.

• Require public consultation before any assessment tools are introduced.

• Include independent review mechanisms for assessment outcomes.

• Ensure functional assessments are used as one source of evidence rather than the sole determinant of eligibility or support needs.

  2. Permanence and Treatment Requirements

The proposed changes to permanence raise concerns about the requirement that impairments may not be considered permanent until appropriate treatment options have been pursued.

Many disabilities are lifelong even when treatment exists. Treatment may improve functional outcomes without eliminating disability.

For our foster daughter, years of therapy have helped her develop skills, confidence and greater independence. However, those therapies have not removed the impact of her disabilities. Rather, they have enabled her to participate more fully in everyday life. Ongoing support remains necessary as she faces the new challenges associated with adulthood.

Participants should not be denied access because treatment options remain available or because they have not pursued every possible intervention.

Recommendations:

• Clarify that the existence of treatment does not automatically mean a condition is not permanent.

• Protect participants from being required to undertake burdensome, risky, expensive or unsuitable treatments to establish eligibility.

  3. Ministerial Powers and Legislative Rules

The Bill provides significant authority for future decisions to be made through legislative instruments and rules.

Many of the most important operational details affecting eligibility, planning and supports are not contained within the primary legislation. This reduces parliamentary scrutiny and creates uncertainty for participants and families attempting to plan for the future.

Recommendations:

• Increase parliamentary oversight of future NDIS rules.
• Require meaningful consultation with disability representative organisations before major rule changes.
• Ensure significant eligibility and support changes require parliamentary approval.

Automated Decision-Making and Transparency

The Bill enables greater use of administrative and automated processes.

While technology can improve efficiency, participants must retain the right to understand how decisions are made and to challenge incorrect outcomes.

Young people with complex disabilities, particularly those transitioning from out-of-home care, often have circumstances that cannot be adequately captured through automated systems or standardised processes. Human judgement, professional expertise and individual consideration must remain central to decision-making, particularly where decisions may have life-changing consequences for vulnerable participants.

Recommendations:

• Require transparency regarding any automated systems used in planning or decision-making.
• Guarantee access to human review of decisions.
• Preserve full merits review rights through existing review processes.

Consultation and Co-Design

The NDIS was built on the principle of participant choice and control. Reforms of this scale should be developed through genuine consultation with people with disability.

Many participants, carers, families and advocacy organisations have expressed concern about the limited timeframe available to analyse and respond to the Bill.

Recommendations:

• Extend consultation on significant future reforms.
• Adopt a co-design process with people with disability and representative organisations.
• Ensure implementation occurs only after adequate testing and public evaluation.

Conclusion

I support the objective of protecting the NDIS for future generations. However, sustainability should not come at the expense of fairness, transparency, participant rights, or access for people with genuine disability-related support needs.

For young people transitioning from out-of-home care into adulthood, flexibility, stability and continuity of support are essential. Long-term therapeutic relationships and evidence from treating professionals should continue to play a central role in determining eligibility and support needs.

I respectfully urge the Committee to recommend amendments that strengthen safeguards, improve transparency, maintain access to independent review, and ensure people with disability remain at the centre of NDIS decision-making. In particular, I ask the Committee to consider the needs of children and young people whose disabilities may not yet be fully understood, and those transitioning from out-of-home care into adulthood, where continuity of support can have a lifelong impact.

Thank you for considering this submission.

Yours sincerely,