National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 63
NDIS Senate Committee Submission
Submission to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee
Inquiry into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026
Submitted by: Kieran O’Rourke NDIS Participant and Support Coordinator South Australia
Introduction
I write this submission in strong opposition to the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 (“the Bill”). This submission addresses provisions relating to tightened eligibility requirements, reassessment and removal of participants, changes to reasonable and necessary supports, increased reliance on family supports, standardised assessments, funding restrictions, and the transfer of disability support burdens onto mainstream systems.
Tightened Permanency and Eligibility Requirements
The proposed changes significantly narrow access to the Scheme by increasing evidentiary and treatment requirements for participants. These changes are likely to disproportionately affect people with psychosocial disability, fluctuating conditions, neurological conditions, autism, and chronic illness.
The requirement for participants to demonstrate that all treatment options have been exhausted creates a highly medicalised access framework and risks delaying or denying access to necessary supports.
Removal of Existing Participants and Lack of Grandfathering Protections
The apparent absence of broad grandfathering protections for existing participants is deeply concerning. Participants who lawfully entered the Scheme under one set of rules may now face reassessment under significantly harsher criteria.
Removing supports from existing participants will not remove disability or support needs. Instead, it risks increasing homelessness, hospitalisation, psychiatric presentations, family breakdown, suicide risk, and social isolation.
Impact on Participants, Families and Frontline Workers
Who participants need protecting from is Minister Mark Butler. That man is dangerous. He is more dangerous than providers and people committing fraud against people with disabilities because at least people know what those individuals are doing.
Minister Butler is already ignoring the current legislation and framework. Directives are being handed down internally which are putting participants in danger and putting carers and families through pure hell.
Rules are being changed and interpreted on the run by people who, in the view of many participants and frontline workers, have little understanding of real-world lived experience within the disability sector.
There is also significant concern that many of the “advocates” and “groups” consulted by government only represent a very small portion of the disability community or their own interests within the sector rather than ordinary participants, carers, and frontline workers.
The consequences of these decisions are not theoretical.
National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 Submission 63
Participants are entering crisis. Families are breaking down under pressure. Carers are burning out. Support coordinators and frontline workers are experiencing severe psychological stress. People are being hospitalised due to instability, uncertainty, and loss of support.
Impact on Hospitals, Emergency Departments and Allied Health Systems
The Bill appears to transfer increasing levels of responsibility away from the NDIS and onto healthcare systems, allied health services, states and territories, and families.
Australia’s healthcare system is already under severe strain. Emergency departments are overcrowded, hospital bed shortages remain critical, ambulance ramping continues across multiple states, and mental health services already face extensive waitlists.
These systems do not currently have the capacity to absorb the additional pressure likely to result from tighter eligibility criteria and reduced participant supports.
If participants lose supports or fail to qualify under stricter access requirements, the likely outcomes include increased emergency department presentations, psychiatric admissions, avoidable hospitalisations, delayed hospital discharges, and increased allied health demand.
Recommendations
I urge the Committee to recommend that the Bill not proceed in its current form, or alternatively be substantially amended.
At minimum, the following safeguards should be included:
- Full grandfathering protections for existing participants.
- Independent oversight mechanisms for reassessment and removal decisions.
- Strong procedural fairness protections and limitations on automated decision-making.
- Explicit protections for participants with fluctuating, episodic, psychosocial, and neurological conditions.
- Guaranteed access to appeal and review processes.
- Protections preventing supports from being funded below actual market costs.
- Independent modelling of healthcare-system impacts before implementation.
- Stronger consultation with disability participants, carers, advocates, and frontline workers.
Conclusion
The NDIS requires sustainability and integrity. However, sustainability cannot come at the expense of safety, dignity, fairness, and human rights.
The Bill risks creating a system where vulnerable Australians lose supports, families absorb unsustainable burdens, healthcare systems face increased pressure, and people with disabilities are pushed into crisis.
I urge the Committee to carefully consider the real-world consequences these reforms may have on participants, carers, frontline workers, and Australia’s broader healthcare and community systems.