To whom it concerns,

The proposed bill for the NDIS changes are very disheartening in a world where neuro diversity finally seems to becoming accepted.

I am a female who was diagnosed in her 30s for ADHD, something that in hindsight is very obvious when looking back at my childhood and adolescence years. While I have made it fairly successfully in my professional career, it has been an ongoing struggle throughout my life. Even since I’ve been formally diagnosed, the lack of support as a ND person has been limited, and the idea that the small progress where NDSupport is being provided is going to be dropped is wild.

Firstly, the way the bill is written is ridiculously unfriendly for a ND person to try and read, and not in the slightest compensating for the type of brains we have.

The continuous wall of text that just goes on and on and on, is really difficult for a ND person to read and disadvantages the people who are likely to be affected and are already struggling. Often the people who support younger ND individuals are also likely to be ND themselves, whether formally recognised through diagnosis or not. These are the people who are more than likely putting in responses against the bill, because it’s going to impact their lived experience. These people are already struggling with their day to day, with the added difficulty of raising young people and this bill is proposing to reduce the support for these people. The whole situation is entirely insensitive.

While I agree that there are likely providers taking advantage and frauding the system, reducing the support the people rely on because other people are being dishonest is outrageous.

Would you revoke all individual’s driving privileges because car manufacturers create vehicles that can go above the speed limit?

Would you close all libraries because some people are stealing and/or not returning books?

Would you take away medical services because hospitals were charging for items they shouldn’t be?

I would like to think that the people doing the dishonest and illegal things should be the ones being focused on, not the vulnerable people who need the help.

The other problem being highlighted is that these NDIS services costs too much because too many people are accessing the support. Firstly, how great is it that so many people are getting extra support that hasn’t previously been available?!

Secondly, doesn’t that show the government how many people need the services and rely on them? The amount of hoops that families need to jump through to access the support as it exists, surely that demonstrates the need.

While I understand that having higher financial costs upfront by supporting those who need it can be hard now, I believe having this support will create a better society in the years to come.

If there were too many people catching the current available public transport systems, wouldn’t the government invest in putting more services on rather than dismantling the train line or shutting off all the buses and making people drive and fund their own petrol?

I have watched my nephew develop from a non-verbal three year old to a formally diagnosed Level 2 autistic child, who is now a thriving six year old in the space of a couple of short years due to the support he has received from the NDIS system, and the incredible patience and support his mum has given him - who is a late diagnosed ADHD person herself.

I can see the strength it takes his parents every single day to work often minute by minute, task by task, to prepare her son for what the world “expects” of him, in combination with breaking down the stigma from the general public and even direct family of how to make the child “normal” in the eyes of society. This is something that is made achievable with the numerous services accessed via the NDIS system. Without these building blocks for both him and also his mum, he would not be as comfortable in many “regular situations” deemed by society.

I have seen firsthand how the services he has received over such vital developmental years. As an example, recently he came over to visit, and the usual excitement occurred when he came through the door. Very quickly he stopped, looked at me, providing his full attention and asked me “how was your week?” He was able to break himself away from the excitement of being in a new simulating situation, provide me with his full attention, and asked me something about another person, and not just providing information about himself. This might not seem as incredible to a neuro typical person, but this development is not a social “norm” that comes naturally to him, it’s a new skill, something he had been taught in his NDIS provided therapy class that week. I felt so proud to see this occur, especially unprompted.

Additionally, he receives 1:1 in class support, which enables him to focus his energy and attention to learning. Another great example is his reading levels in the past three months have shot up from having a couple of sight words to sounding out words he’s never read before and connecting the familiarisation of the sounds to words he knows. He is now reading at a regular Year 1 classroom level rather than lagging behind and

• feeling ashamed (and thus not wanting even more so to learn) compared to other children.

The classroom setup has allowed him to learn in a way that works for him and his brain. While classroom teachers do incredible jobs, they aren’t able to provide such concentrated and personalised support to ND children in the way their brain needs it, when the majority of the classroom learns in a different way.

I love that in his world, the setup allows him to feel comfortable as a six year old to go outside during class to run off additional energy, a reset that allows him to come back inside reset and can actually be ready to learn. He is also allowed fidgets in the classroom without judgement, which is also funded by his NDIS support.

So much of the support provides an environment that I would have loved to have access to when I was a child. The alternatives I had was scribble in my notebook, rip up bits of paper, click my pen, talk to others, causing general but constant disruption to my classmates and not paying attention. I was usually getting in trouble and thus not learning, not because I wasn’t intelligent, but because the world wasn’t setup for me. I was caught in a spiral circle where I didn’t want to learn because I was in trouble and wanted to rebel, and then got in more trouble.

The safety and extra support my nephew has in his classroom is refreshing. It would be very disappointing to have that removed.

With the proposed bill, my nephew will not be eligible for the support he currently receives. This is not only an impact for his as a young person developing, but also for other young people in his class would be impacted. It also affects the wider family with the reduced support being picked up by us and also needing to provide social, mental, physical and potentially financial support to my sister-in-law’s family.

In summary, ND individuals’ brains are wired differently and do require additional support when comparing to the “general” population. We are already dealing with getting through the day as it is, and removing the little support that is available because there are people conning the system, or because more people genuinely need access to help and that costs more financially, is actually not fair. Target the actual problems not the people that need the help.