Dear Decision-Makers,

This is my submission in relation to the proposed NDIS Future Generations Bill 2026.

I am writing to you as a 44-year-old person with multiple disabilities, living in rural Queensland with my elderly mother. I am neurodivergent, part of the LGBTQIA+ community, & am socioeconomically disadvantaged. I am currently not an NDIS participant due to the difficulties I have faced with gathering evidence & applying, although I have attempted to apply twice in the past, prior to the pandemic. I intend to apply again in the future, but these proposed changes have left me fearful I may never succeed in receiving support.

My disabilities include Autism, ADHD, Osteoarthritis, & Degenerative Disc Disease, the latter two of which are degenerative conditions which will only see me become more disabled with time. I struggle with chronic pain, sensory sensitivities, intense emotions, & social interaction, & have been unable to work or study for around 10 years. At present, my care falls on my elderly mother, something which is not sustainable for either of us, therefore I will need to access the NDIS in the future. Prior to my mother, my carer was an abusive partner. These proposed changes have me terrified I will be unable to access the Scheme when I try to apply, leaving me isolated & without support. As it is, I barely leave the house, & find it difficult to perform basic tasks such as personal hygiene & cleaning to an acceptable standard. I struggle with making & attending appointments, rely on my mother to do grocery shopping, & I am unable to engage with my community at present. I am constantly teetering on the brink of burnout, if not actively in burnout, & don’t see that changing anytime soon unless I am able to access supports.

One of the reasons I haven’t tried applying to access the Scheme since before the pandemic is due to socioeconomic disadvantage - my only source of income is the Disability Support Pension. My first application was rejected due to a lack of adequate evidence, & my second application, I was told, was denied as I wasn’t ‘physically unable to do things’, something which didn’t make sense to me as I was applying under psychosocial disability, but which I didn’t fight because I was just too overwhelmed & confused to do so. At the time, my diagnoses were Major Depressive Disorder, Generalised Anxiety Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, misdiagnoses which have since been determined to be undiagnosed Autism & ADHD, according to several clinicians I have seen. My financial position, however, has left me unable to afford the necessary Functional Capacity Assessment required to apply for NDIS support, something which I have been trying to save for for several years now, but which is beginning to seem impossible. I may have to ask my mother, an aged pensioner, to loan me the money to allow me to attain this.

My desire to access the Scheme is driven largely by seeing the ways in which the Scheme has benefited friends of mine, & people I follow on social media. I’m also acutely aware of the lack of support in my own life, & the ways in which I could see my life improving if adequate support was accessible to me. I’ve seen friends in similar positions to myself, isolated & unsupported, be able to gain independence, friendships, employment, relationships, & hope. These same people, however, are now terrified these proposed changes will remove the supports that have allowed them to grow & thrive, & have left me afraid I’ll never be allowed to access said supports. Already, I’ve seen horror stories of people having their plans & supports cut, leading to negative outcomes & even death, in

• some isolated cases. This is unacceptable in a rich & developed country like Australia, & cannot be allowed to continue.

A lot of the conversation around these proposed changes have centered on Autistic & psychosocially disabled people, with talks of pushing them off the Scheme onto as-yet non-existent Foundational Supports. As a resident of the state of Queensland, a state which appears to be unwilling to do their part to create said Foundational Supports, where does that leave us? I accessed what little supports existed prior to the creation of the NDIS, which have since been dismantled, & they were barely accessible when I lived in a big city, so I fear there will be nothing available in my small country town when the time comes. I also fear for Autistic young people, & the possibility they will be forced into Applied Behaviour Analysis or ABA-adjacent therapies by way of Thriving Kids, approaches which have been decried by lived experience organisations such as the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network, due to the harm they perpetuate.

I apologise for the stream-of-consciousness nature of this submission - due to the very limited timeframe allowed for submissions, I’m doing my best to convey my thoughts, hhowever this entire process, & the proposed changes, have made me extremely anxious, & I’m very overwhelmed at present.

One of the proposed changes, that all appropriate treatments be tried before permanence is established for future applicants, has me particularly concerned. As I mentioned above, I am socioeconomically disadvantaged, as are many disabled people. Given many treatments aren’t financially accessible, I fear this change will further cement financial disadvantage, leaving the poorest in our society lacking support, something which is already an issue. There is also the question of what constitutes ‘all appropriate treatments’ - what does this even entail? Without having that spelled out, it’s difficult to comprehend what is expected of disabled people prior to being deemed permanently disabled enough to apply.

The move away from individualised plans is also a cause for concern. The whole reason the NDIS was created was to provide individualised support to disabled people, & I strongly object to any changes that would result in the Scheme losing its way in this regard. This is particularly concerning for people with multiple disabilities, myself included. The Scheme needs to be able to provide holistic & wholistic supports to participants, for all their disabilities, not just the one the NDIS deems most impactful.

The proposed cuts to Social & Community Participation worry me, given the isolation many of us face. The NDIS has allowed so many disabled people to participate in their communities, something which is important not only for us, but for our communities. Disabled people are entitled to fulfilling lives, & the Scheme was designed to support just that.

In a similar vein, Choice & Control were written into the Scheme from the very beginning, ththerefore any changes which intend to dilute this core value should not be permitted to happen.

The proposed changes in decision-making & planning, which have been referred to within the community as Roboplanning, are also concerning. As someone who was a victim of

Robodebt, the suggestion that the NDS could follow in Centrelink’s footsteps & rely on algorithms to determine whether vulnerable people are worthy of support terrifies me. Robodebt nearly killed me, yet I was one of the lucky ones - other people died because of it. Did we learn nothing from the Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme? Automated decision-making has no place in Human Services, unless adequate oversight & transparency is mandated to monitor it.

The immense Ministerial powers proposed by these changes are also a point of concern. Labor needs to remain mindful that said Ministerial powers may fall to the opposition following a future election loss, something which could allow them to wreak havoc on the Scheme if they’re so inclined. Decision-making needs to be made with the oversight of experts, & disabled people themselves. Nothing about us without us!

In closing, I refer you to the following Rights frameworks, which are vital to consider prior to making any changes to the Scheme:

• NDIS Act 2013:

  • participation
  • inclusion
  • independence
  • choice & control

• United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, in entirety, but particularly:

  • Article 6
  • Article 16
  • Article 19
  • Article 28

Please do not forge ahead with these proposed changes. This Bill stands to do real & vast harm to disabled people, their families, the community, & the disability sector. Evidence has shown that for every dollar spent on the NDIS, $2.24 is returned to the community, if not more. By all means, crack down on fraud & fund misuse, something which only makes up a small amount of the proposed ‘savings’ this Bill claims to contain, but don’t do so at the cost of disabled people, & the supports upon which they rely. The rhetoric surrounding waste & fraud has already led to widespread public scorn towards disabled people, rather than those who actually perpetrate said fraud, due to the irresponsible narrative surrounding this. Perhaps if less was spent on lawyers at the Administrative Rights Tribunal, fighting unfair plan changes, or on bureaucratic bloat, more could be spent on genuine supports for those of us who need them. Disabled people matter, we vote, & we rely on you to do what’s right - please don’t let us down.

Sincerely,