Attention: Committee Secretary, Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs
Submitted by email: community.affairs.sen@aph.gov.au
Date: 30/05/2026
We, John and Karina McNulty welcome the opportunity to make a submission to the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs about the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026.
We are parents of two children with Autism/ADHD who currently are fortunate enough to receive NDIS funding to assist with various needs and challenges.
I want to outline the harm this Amendment Bill will cause if it passes Parliament. This Bill is too far-reaching to pass as it stands. We believe the Bill requires further scrutiny and amendment before it proceeds.
Parliamentary Scrutiny and Transparency
The consultation period for the Amendment Bill is two weeks, which is insufficient to allow for appropriate consultation, considering accessibility and communication needs. The Australian Government Guide to Policy Impact Analysis says consultation should occur for a minimum of 30 days where possible.
The short timeline gives far too few in the disabled community enough time to properly prepare evidence to show how these proposed changes may impact them and their families’ lives. The stress and anxiety that this causes on top of the stress that has already been caused by these proposed changes cannot be overstated.
Recommendation:
Amend the consultation period for a best practice minimum of 30 days.
Key decisions left to ministerial instruments, not law
The issue:
The Bill allows Ministers to change who gets NDIS support (Schedule 1 Parts 8 and 9) and how much funding people receive (Schedule 1 Part 4; Schedule 3) by signing an instrument, without going back to Parliament. The rules that will determine critical eligibility thresholds (Schedule 1 Parts 1, 8 and 9) have not yet been written.
How this affects participants:
The decisions that shape the lives of participants, whether they qualify for the NDIS and what supports they can access, could be changed without parliamentary debate or public scrutiny. Participants may not know supports or eligibility rules have changed until their plan is affected.
Our two children have only been members of the scheme for 6 months but the positive change in their lives has been measurable since being able to access the supports that would not have been possible for our family to provide without the help the funding
Existing participants face narrower criteria and fewer rights to challenge decisions
The issue: The Bill changes the rules for existing NDIS participants and makes it harder to challenge some decisions about supports and funding. It also restricts when you can request a reassessment, removes review rights for automatic plan renewals, and makes funding reductions unreviewable (Schedule 1 Parts 1 and 8). Combined with restrictions on reassessment requests (Part 2), automatic plan renewals without review rights (Part 5), and unreviewable funding reductions (Part 4), existing participants face narrower criteria with significantly fewer avenues to challenge decisions about their supports.
How this affects participants: This does not protect participants already on the NDIS, who could be reassessed under stricter rules. If someone’s funding is reduced or their plan renewed automatically, they may have limited or no ability to challenge that decision. This could make it harder for people to get extra support when their circumstances or disability change.
Our children, like all children, change as Our children, like all children, change as they age. Some disabilities are impossible to predict how they will evolve as a child
grows.
There are simply too many variables. As parents, we have worked hard to provide as much stability and consistency as possible for two children who cannot control how their neurodivergent brains affect their daily lives or how their bodies currently function. To add further instability and uncertainty through unpredictable reviews, funding decisions, and appeal processes places an enormous burden not only on us as parents but also on our children.
The reality is that their support needs may increase, decrease, or change in nature over time. If funding is reduced based on assumptions about future needs, only for new challenges to emerge later, the consequences may be significant. Early supports that are removed can be difficult to replace, and opportunities for intervention may be missed. Families cannot simply absorb these additional costs, nor can children pause their development while lengthy reviews or appeals take place. We fear that a system intended to support children to thrive could inadvertently place them at greater risk of poorer outcomes if the flexibility to respond to changing needs is lost.
Recommendation: Require a “no harm” safeguard ensuring no current participant loses access to supports unless equivalent supports are in place, with independent review rights before any exit decision and access to unscheduled reassessments preserved.
Unreviewable ministerial power to cut funding across all support categories
The Minister can reduce funding for any support or group of supports by a specified percentage through an instrument that cannot be challenged (Schedule 1 Part 4). This applies across all budget categories. Unspent funds will no longer carry over at plan renewal (Schedule 1 Part 5).
How this affects participants: A participant’s community participation, capacity building or assistive technology funding could be cut without warning and without any right to appeal. Participants who save unspent funds across plan periods for high-cost items will lose that ability entirely.
The whole idea of releasing funding periodically throughout the year, whilst might be useful for ensuring support coverage across the whole year, does mean that support items that are high in cost, require the participants to “save” their funding across funding periods to afford them. If a participant may lose funding that is not utilised in one funding period this would remove the ability to obtain required supports at all. It is not always possible to foresee if and when a higher cost item may be required.
Recommendation: Require that unspent funds carry over at plan renewal for participants saving for high-cost items and require independent review rights before any funding reduction takes effect.
Requirement to exhaust treatment options before eligibility
The issue:
A person with disability will need to exhaust treatment options before they can be eligible for the Scheme (Schedule 1 Part 8). There will also be a removal of whole-of-person assessment, replaced by single eligible impairment consideration (Schedule 1 Part 3). The note that previously acknowledged environmental factors and other ineligible impairments could affect support needs will be removed (Schedule 1 Part 3).
How this affects participants:
People with disability will need to prove their impairment cannot be treated before they access the NDIS. Once in the scheme, their supports will only be assessed against a single eligible impairment rather than their whole experience. A person’s individual circumstances will not be considered, including ability to pay for treatment, where they live or whether treatment is actually available to them.
Our children rely on supports from allied health professionals. These are highly trained and experienced professionals, who understandably, charge an amount of money we, as a family, would not be able to continue to pay for. These supports are essential for our children to have and develop the physical and mental capacity to be healthy and participate in everyday life. The only other way to access these services is to pay privately, and as already mentioned, we would not be able to provide this without help from funding.
Recommendation:
Do not proceed with a requirement to exhaust “appropriate” treatment options – there are no safeguarding measures around participant harm due to side effects or complications, a participant’s financial ability to pay, or their geographic capacity to access treatments.
Unvalidated functional capacity assessment tool risks misidentifying need
The issue:
The Bill shifts assessment from whole-of-person consideration to a single eligible impairment (Schedule 1 Part 3). Read together with the eligibility thresholds in Parts 8 and 9, the tool used to conduct functional capacity assessments must be capable of sufficiently identifying whether a person meets the threshold for that single impairment.
The named assessment tool is the Instrument for Classification and Assessment of Support Needs (I-CAN). I-CAN requires validation to ensure it will sufficiently identify the needs of all people with disability, including those whose needs may be fluctuating or episodic and may not be captured through a point-in-time assessment, and to ensure it is culturally appropriate for First Peoples with disability.
How this affects participants:
If the assessment tool does not accurately capture the full extent of a person’s disability, including needs that fluctuate or vary over time, a
- participant may be found ineligible or have their supports undercounted, with no guarantee the result reflects their actual experience.
We are deeply concerned that our children’s eligibility for the scheme or they their level of required supports could be determined by a single assessment tool that takes no consideration from people who actually know our children, have worked with them, or understand their fluctuating capacity and challenges day-to-day.
Recommendation: Do not proceed with I-CAN as the functional capacity assessment tool unless it has been demonstrably validated to identify the needs of all people with disability, including those with episodic or fluctuating disability, and demonstrated to be culturally appropriate for First Peoples with disability.
Supports cut before replacement system is ready
The issue: From 1 October 2026, the government has announced funding for social, civic and community participation supports will be cut by 50 per cent and capacity building daily activities by 10 per cent for all participants, reductions that will be implemented through the ministerial instrument power in Schedule 1 Part 4. The Foundational Supports system intended to fill that gap has no confirmed implementation date and is not yet operational.
How this affects participants: Supports that help participants connect with their community, build skills and maintain independence may be cut before anything exists to replace them, leaving carers and families with greater responsibilities and no additional support. These supports are often what help people stay visible, connected and safe.
For our family, reducing Social and Community Participation supports and applying a blanket reduction to Capacity Building funding would have significant consequences. Our children already experience substantial challenges engaging with their community independently and rely on structured support to participate in activities that many families take for granted. These supports do not simply provide recreation; they create opportunities for our children to develop social skills, confidence, independence and a sense of belonging within their community.
Reducing these supports would increase the risk of social isolation and limit opportunities for our children to practise and build the very skills that may reduce their support needs in the future. It would also place considerable additional pressure on us as parents to find alternative ways to meet these needs, despite there being few, if any, accessible alternatives available. Rather than building capacity, such reductions risk undermining the progress our children have already made and shifting greater responsibility onto families who are already doing everything they can to support their children.
- Recommendation: Require that no reductions to community participation or capacity building supports take effect until Foundational Supports are fully operational, adequately funded and demonstrably able to meet the needs of those who will lose NDIS supports.
Thank you for your attention in this matter.