Submission 916
Submission 916
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Unrealistic “Exhausted Treatment” Mandates The requirement that participants must exhaust all available medical treatments before accessing NDIS funding is deeply flawed. Many individuals cannot access, afford, or tolerate these treatments. In other cases, further medical intervention will not alter the underlying disability. Withholding essential functional funds while awaiting impossible or ineffective treatments actively worsens a participant’s level of disability.
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Financial Mismanagement Risks due to Lack of Structural
Protections
Without explicit budget breakdowns or ring-fenced funding structures for allied health, there is a high risk that vital therapy budgets will be inadvertently misused or depleted by other services. We regularly see participants struggle to budget effectively, leaving them without the funds required for the essential therapies that maintain their baseline function.
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Rigid Funding Caps and Staffing Ratios for Progressive Conditions The introduction of maximum funding limits and blanket staffing ratios completely ignores the reality of neurodegenerative and rapidly changing conditions. A client with a progressive illness may require only 8 hours of OT early on, but can suddenly decline and require 40 hours urgently. If blanket caps restrict timely intervention, these vulnerable individuals face severe safety risks, hospitalisation, or heightened mortality.
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Destructive Cuts to Social and Community Funding Proposals to slash social and community participation funding by up to 50% target basic survival needs. Participants rely on these supports to fetch groceries, collect vital medications, and attend specialist appointments. If forced to choose which basic necessity to abandon, their health will rapidly deteriorate, forcing them out of the community and into an already overwhelmed hospital system.
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Unsustainable Burden on Families and Caregivers Expecting families to parent far beyond general capacity while managing high-intensity, complex disability needs is a recipe for catastrophic burnout. The therapists who support these families keep them functioning. Without adequate support, we will see an influx of children entering state care or presenting to emergency departments that are entirely unequipped to manage long-term disability needs.
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Dangerous Extensions to Review Timeframes Finally, extending the timeframe to review a decision or a change in circumstances from 3 weeks to 3 months is a risk to human life. For a participant in crisis or experiencing rapid physical decline, there is no viable pathway for urgent reassessment under this
Submission 916
model. In a 3-month gridlock, vulnerable people will end up permanently hospitalized or dead.
The NDIS was built on the core tenets of choice, control, and individualized support. This proposed bill shifts the Scheme toward a cost-cutting exercise that completely silences allied health expertise at the expense of participant safety.
I urge you to advocate for the suspension of these specific amendments and demand a formal review that respects clinical governance and protects our community’s most vulnerable.
Thank you for your time and urgent attention to this matter.
Yours sincerely,