3 October 2025
Standing Committee on Health, Aged Care and Disability Department of the House of Representatives PO Box 6021 | Canberra ACT 2600
Dear Sir/Madam
Re: Thriving Kids Inquiry
Disabled Peoples Organisations Victoria is an open and inclusive collective of disability led organisations and groups. It is the representative voice for Victorians with disabilities. DPO Victoria upholds disability justice and embraces the rights-based model of disability.
Disability Advocacy Victoria is the peak body for independent advocacy organisations in Victoria. Members may be disability led organisations, or organisations working for people with disabilities. Disability Advocacy Victoria is committed to operating in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability, including the guiding principle of Leadership by people with disability.
Inquiry process
The Commonwealth has binding obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability (“CRPD”) as Australia has signed the Optional Protocol to the Convention. These include an obligation to ensure that people with disabilities are fully involved in decisions that impact their lives. We refer to General Comment 7 which is an explanatory Comment that sets out clearly how State Parties to the Convention must ensure that people with disabilities participate in the development of programs and policies affecting them.
In view of these obligations, we reiterate here the importance of the Government giving disability representative organisations sufficient time and information to seriously consider and contribute comment on the Thriving Kids proposal, including extending the time for the consultative process.
The brevity of the consultation process is particularly problematic for the autistic community – the community that is particularly impacted by the proposal – given the import, complexity and uncertainty of the proposal’s likely impacts on them.
Meaningful opportunity for that community to engage in consultation is in the interests of improved policy outcomes as well as meeting the Government’s obligations under the CRPD.
Despite the limitations of the consultative process, we are providing here some brief and high level comments on the proposal which in our view exhibits some critical deficiencies.
Categorisation of autism
Despite the language used in the proposal, there is no such thing as ‘mild’ or ‘moderate’ autism. In the DSM-5, levels are assigned according to the range of support the diagnostician believes the person needs at the time they are diagnosed.
- Level 1 = requiring support.
- Level 2 = requiring substantial support.
- Level 3 = requiring very substantial support.
The levels are assigned to two areas:
- Social communication and interaction (must meet all three criteria)
- Restricted and repetitive behaviours (must meet at least two of four criteria)
Autism is a dynamic, permanent neuro-biological condition. This means that the level of support a person needs can fluctuate significantly, according to their environment/treatment. Considerations such as gender, cultural background, and class also vary how autistic individuals respond to the support offered. Additional complexity arises when considering the intersection of childhood autism with development and maturing processes. The timing, design and levels of support can have great implications for individuals into adulthood.
Deterioration in support
While not perfect, the NDIS provides a level of protection for people with disabilities, including regulatory safeguards through the Quality and Safeguards Commission, and legal protections through the NDIA Act.
The NDIS Review showed conclusively that there are currently insufficient supports outside the NDIS to provide supports to people with disabilities (refer NDIS Review).
While ‘Foundational Supports’ were proposed by the Review to address these significant gaps, progress on establishing and funding these supports has stalled.
In that context, attempts to ‘reform’ the NDIS by removing cohorts of people currently accessing it without any other supports in place for them can look like bad faith actions on the part of the Government, seeking to reduce expenditures to the detriment of Australians with disability and their carers.
This means the bar for the ‘Thriving Kids’ proposal is high. It needs to articulate fit for purpose supports and protections with adequate resources and flexible application to meet diverse and complex needs of children with autism and their families. Thriving Kids will also need to match the level of legal and regulatory protection available in the NDIS.
We also note that care duties disproportionately impact women and gender diverse people, with expectations of taking on significant unpaid care duties. In addition, many carers themselves are people with disabilities. This must be considered when resourcing appropriate fit-for-purpose care and support for autistic children and their families. Defining fit-for-purpose requires meaningful codesigned consultation with autistic children and adults.
At this stage, there is too much complexity and uncertainty to have any confidence the proposal will come close to supporting and meeting the needs of children with autism and their families.
Worse, elements of the proposal seem to mean it is being organised on different principles to the NDIS, reducing choice and control and bringing participants back to 20th Century style passive recipients of block funded and unresponsive service providers.
The NDIS has changed the game for disability support systems. While there may be arguments to replace it with different specialist supports for some cohort groups, any replacement system must be able to match NDIS on key principles around choice and control.
Yours sincerely
Ally Scott
On behalf of
Disabled Peoples Organisations Victoria
redacted
Julie Phillips
Chairperson
Disability Advocacy
Victoria
VALID
STAR Victoria
Disability Discrimination Legal Service
NEDA
Deaf Victoria
Blind Citizens Australia
Leadership Plus
Rights Information and Advocacy Centre (RIAC)
Disability Rights and Culture (DRC)
Women with Disabilities Victoria