National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 567
Attention: Committee Secretary, Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs
Submitted by email: community.affairs.sen@aph.gov.au
Date: 28/05/2026
We 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 an NDIS registered provider delivering support coordination, recovery coaching and specialist support coordination. We are also a collective group of individuals who live with a disability, have family members with a disability and lived experience.
We 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.
With reference to: 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.
Uncertainty around NDIS eligibility and future supports is already placing significant strain on people with disability. Among the individuals and families, we work alongside, we are seeing real and immediate harm. People are questioning whether they will continue to qualify for the NDIS, what supports they will be entitled to, and how their lives may change as a result.
This uncertainty is having a direct and damaging impact on mental health. People who rely on the NDIS — along with their informal support networks — are experiencing heightened anxiety, distress, and fear. Many are exhibiting mental health symptoms that are entirely preventable, triggered solely by the possibility that essential supports they have long been eligible for may be reduced or removed.
It is deeply concerning that such significant changes to eligibility and access could occur without full parliamentary debate or meaningful public scrutiny. Where is the commitment to choice and control that the NDIS was built upon?
The proposal has already increased anxiety and administrative burden. Participants are spending their time navigating bureaucracy, gathering evidence, and trying to “prove” their eligibility out of fear they will be excluded from the system. This is time and energy that should
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 567
be spent on pursuing their goals, maintaining their wellbeing, and living their lives — not fighting to remain supported.
With reference to: 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.
The Bill will make it harder for existing participants to challenge decisions about supports and funding.
As Support Coordinators we are already seeing participants spend a considerable amount of time navigating bureaucracy and gathering evidence. The proposed changes will intensify this burden, particularly for people with cognitive disabilities, psychosocial disabilities or limited informal supports.
By limiting review rights and narrowing the circumstances under which reassessments can be requested, participants lose essential safeguards that ensure plans remain appropriate and responsive to their needs. Automatic plan renewals may appear administratively efficient, but without the right to review these renewals, participants may be locked into inadequate or outdated plans. This is particularly harmful for individuals whose needs change over time or who experience fluctuating conditions.
It is deeply concerning that such significant changes to eligibility and review rights could be implemented without robust parliamentary debate or meaningful public consultation.
With reference to: 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).
We hold great concern for the participants losing the ability to manage their supports. This change penalises participants who manage their budgets efficiently, who experience fluctuating needs, or who intentionally save funds for future, planned supports. Removing carry-over rights undermines flexibility and fails to recognise that disability-related needs are not always predictable or evenly distributed across a plan period. Reducing funding for any
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 567
support or group of supports by a percentage, without consideration for an individuals circumstances will, without a doubt cause irreparable harm to participants, especially those with high and complex support needs. For example, if therapy funding is reduced by 10% for all people receiving therapy, there will be people with critical support needs that are not addressed due to a blanket cut to funding. Participants will high intensity support needs, utilise every dollar of their therapy budget for essential allied health that mitigates risk. For example,
- Participants with Dysphasia will be left without enough funds for an essential swallow assessment and updated mealtime management plan that prevents them from dying via choking,
- Participants with chronic pressure injuries will not have enough funds to have their pressure injuries overseen by a nurse as part of their wound care management and die from preventable infections
- Participants who are PEG fed will not have enough funding for correct oversight by a dietician and speech therapist and risk malnutrition and impaction.
With reference to: A person with disability will need to exhaust treatment options before they can be eligible for the Scheme (Schedule 1 Part 8).
It is unreasonable to introduce a requirement that a person with disability must exhaust all “reasonable and appropriate” treatment options before they can be considered eligible for the NDIS. This creates a significant barrier to access. It assumes that disability-related needs can be resolved through treatment alone and fails to recognise that many disabilities — including psychosocial, neurological, degenerative, congenital, and episodic condition. This may delay access to essential supports; forces individuals into treatment pathways that may be ineffective inappropriate, or harmful; disadvantages people with episodic or fluctuating disability; creates inequity for those with limited access to healthcare, specialists, or diagnostic services
With reference to: 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 proposed use of the Instrument for Classification and Assessment of Support Needs (I-CAN) raises significant concerns because it cannot capture the full diversity and complexity of disability experiences.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 567
The I-CAN tool is not designed to account for episodic disability, fluctuating conditions, or the interaction of multiple impairments. Its structure relies heavily on measuring functioning through a single impairment lens, which fails to reflect the lived reality of many participants whose support needs vary over time or arise from multiple co-occurring conditions.
This limitation mirrors the shortcomings of the I-CAP (Inventory for Client and Agency Planning) assessment previously used in disability services in Queensland. The I-CAP was widely recognised as inadequate because it reduced complex support needs to narrow functional categories, resulting in inaccurate assessments and inappropriate support allocations. The I-CAN risks repeating these failures.
Shifting to a single eligible impairment lens does not capture; the cumulative impact of multiple disabilities; fluctuating nature of psychosocial or episodic conditions; environmental, social, and cognitive factors that shape support needs; real-world challenges participants face in daily living, community participation, and decision-making.
With reference to: 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.
In our experience, reduced funding for Community Access supports have been detrimental to the wellbeing of people with a disability. Community Access is not a luxury. Substantially reducing peoples access to the community will likely have a serious impact how people participate in everyday life, building independence and staying connected to their community. Decades of research demonstrates that the strongest determinant of wellbeing is social connection. The health consequences of social isolation are dire. Multiple peer reviewed studies demonstrate that the mortality risk of social isolation is comparable to smoking and exceeds obesity and physical inactivity.
Reducing these supports risks increasing social isolation, undermining skill development, reducing community participation, and shifting unpaid caring responsibilities back onto families. These changes may leave people less able to achieve their goals and more vulnerable to exclusion.
The broader systemic impacts are also likely to be significant. Reductions in these supports may lead to increased presentations to hospitals, greater demand for health and aged care services, and more people seeking assistance from crisis and social support systems. Where
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 567
participants lose supports that help them maintain daily functioning, community connection and stability, needs are likely to escalate rather than diminish. These risks shifting costs from the NDIS to other systems that are already under considerable strain, particularly the health system, which in many areas is already overstretched and unable to meet existing demand. Rather than reducing overall public expenditure, these measures may simply transfer pressure to systems that are less well equipped to provide appropriate disability-related support.
Reduction to community access also raises serious human rights concerns. The government is undermining the rights of people with disability to inclusion, participation, equality and independence.
The NDIS was designed to provide stability, dignity, and empowerment. Any reforms must uphold these principles, not undermine them.
Naomi Wiley, Nicole Eiszele and Ashleigh Hayes
Adera
28.05.2026