SENATOR JORDON STEELE-JOHN
AUSTRALIAN GREENS
SENATOR FOR WESTERN AUSTRALIA
2 October 2025
Submission to the House Standing Committee on Health, Aged Care and Disability
for the Inquiry into the Thriving Kids Initiative.
Dear Committee Secretariat,
Thank you for the opportunity to make a submission. As the Australian Greens spokesperson for Disability, Health, and Mental Health, I have heard from thousands of constituents who will be impacted by the transition from NDIS support to the Thriving Kids Initiative. In this submission, I will share some of their stories and perspectives.
After the announcement of the Thriving Kids Initiative on August 20th earlier this year, I surveyed some of my community members who will be impacted by this change. When asked how they felt about ‘Thriving Kids,’ 66% of respondents identified ‘unhappy’ as their primary feeling towards the initiative. A further 23% of respondents identified ‘confused’ as their primary feeling towards the initiative. 512 people responded to this survey.
In addition to completing the survey, many constituents have written to me to express their concerns directly. I have compiled some of these written experiences and have categorised selected accounts according to the terms of reference of this Inquiry. All of these written accounts have been deidentified, and all have been replicated in the original tone and voice of the constituent who shared them.
A. Examine evidence-based information and resources that could assist parents identify if their child has mild to moderate development delay and support parents to provide support to these children.
This collection of statements express how late or missed diagnosis for adults can lead to excessive masking and misunderstanding of oneself. Through drawing on their lived experience as evidence, this group identifies their own lack of access to support as a key barrier to their ability to recognise autistic traits in their children.
A common thread amongst the experiences these parents share is that access to appropriate support earlier could have prevented compounding disability and disadvantage for themselves and could have put them in a better position to support their children.
“I didn’t find out I was autistic until my 30s. By then, I’d spent decades masking and burning myself out, which made it impossible to see my own traits reflected in my child. I thought they were just ‘quirks’ until a teacher suggested an assessment.”
“As an undiagnosed autistic mum, I couldn’t see that my daughter’s struggles were the same as mine. I’d been told my whole life to toughen up, so I told her the same, and now I feel guilty because I know she needed support earlier.”
“Masking was so ingrained in me that I couldn’t even recognise when my son was doing it. I thought he was coping fine at school until he started melting down at home every day. It wasn’t until my own diagnosis that I understood what was happening for both of us.”
“Late diagnosis meant I misunderstood my whole identity. I didn’t realise my child might also be autistic because I didn’t even know what autism looked like without the stereotypes. Our whole family lost years of support because of that gap.”
“My “mild” autism was a result of the stigma around autism and my ability to be accepted in society. The heavy masking I did was to protect myself, and eventually led to a laundry list of comorbid conditions I never would have had if I had been diagnosed and accepted in society from childhood.
As an adult, my personal struggles come predominantly from a misunderstanding of autism and a lack of accommodation from institutions and individuals I interact with. There are so many children who are just like me who deserve to live a fulfilling life, who are getting slapped in the face by things like this.” [Referring to the transition away from NDIS support].
B. Examine the effectiveness of current (and previous) programs and initiatives that identify children with development delay, autism or both, with mild to moderate support needs and support them and their families.
Many of my constituents have shared with me their concerns that this new initiative could replicate the harm they have experienced in previous treatment programs for this cohort. Concerns that surfaced repeatedly in this category tend to centre around a perception of a lack of a robust research base supporting the initiative and concerns about the new initiative’s potential for prioritising masking over well-being.
“Inklings has 1 study that showed a decrease from 21% to 7% [in meeting diagnostic criteria for ASD].That’s their selling point. Success by their metrics is looking less autistic. There are no measures of masking behaviour or of overall wellbeing in these kids. There are no studies, to my knowledge, that follow up beyond age 3.”1
“When they talk about ‘growing out’ of autism, they mean learning to mask more, which is […] putting extra work on autistics, and typically ultimately leads to higher stress, lower
1 Whitehouse. A. J. (2021). Effect of Preemptive Intervention on Developmental Outcomes Among Infants Showing Early Signs of Autism. JAMA Pediatrics, 175(11).https://doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2021.3298 _______________________________________________________________________________________________________
satisfaction with life, poorer mental health, and eventually burnout (if not suicide). There needs to be a better way.”
“As an autistic woman, I’m honestly really worried [Thriving Kids] will be used to teach autistic kids how to mask and hide themselves instead of giving them the support and accommodations they need. I don’t feel like we have enough detail on what’s involved in this program to be optimistic at this stage.”
“The Inklings and PACT programs raised as alternatives [assume] that autism can be addressed by “correcting” the way that parents (likely autistic themselves) interact with their babies and children. They ask the parent to mask reactions and modelled behaviour, risking […] the disruption of authentic and effective autistic to autistic communication (which has continually been shown to be more effective than autistic to alistic) between parent and child.”
“This is not a reform, this is austerity. These cuts are designed to make autistic kids fit into the world by masking, instead of making the world fit autistic kids. That’s not thriving, that’s suffering.”
C. Identify equity and intersectional issues. Fear surrounding schools being the main site of initiative delivery has been expressed to me repeatedly. These concerns focus on mainstream schools as historically inaccessible or harmful places for many children in this cohort, and extend to the inherent exclusion of homeschooled children from service delivery, and to the potential creation of a ‘postcode lottery.’
“Positioning schools as the primary gateway for autism-related supports ignores the evidence – and risks placing essential services in the very environments many autistic children already find inaccessible.”
“[…] if schools are the main vehicle for Thriving Kids, many ASD kids are homeschooled.”
“It will become a postcode lottery, where if you live in an area with good support in schools, you’ll be more supported than those in less advantaged communities.”
“I am afraid [the Thriving Kids Initiative] will go back to non-affirming practices and ditch the therapies that are making a difference to the kids and their families. They are moving away from the remit of the NDIS and taking our choice and control away. I don’t believe they understand autism and best practice principles. These kiddos aren’t over-serviced, and some are only doing as well as they can because they have the supports in place.”
D. Identify gaps in workforce support and training required to deliver Thriving Kids. The following collection of statements warns that workforce design must consider practitioner needs to avoid service loss. These constituents note problems in the existing system and are concerned that access to support could continue to be compromised if new initiatives don’t actively seek to correct the structural inequities currently at play in the NDIS service provider system.
“If that therapist worked five billable hours per day (which is less than a 40-hour week), the provider then is making $130,000 if not more per therapist. And yet, a therapist is paid $35 to $45 an hour. Fix the structure! Allied health professionals should be paid more, and providers should not be profiting this way.”
“Many allied health professionals do not want to be government employees because they do not want to be employees at all… working from home, an allied health professional still has very high costs such as internet, phones, laptops, printer, paper, ink, insurance, professional development, registrations, licenses, cars, fuel, repairs, etc. These would be expensed back to NDIS under a government contract anyway.”
“Create hubs in towns and cities to support services and tender out to non-profits and charities. The system is full of cowboys.”
Conclusion
In this submission, I’ve shared the voices of parents and autistic adults who emphasise that children need early, evidence-based, and affirming supports. They warn that past programs often led to misdiagnosis, delays, or pushed families into harmful behaviourist models. Gaps in equity, workforce capacity, and system access leave children from marginalised backgrounds most at risk.
To close, I want to share quotes that show the deep emotional and mental health toll that inconsistent support and sudden transitions create for families.
“I’m so exhausted. Fighting for my kids’ basic human rights for years has left me unable to fight for my own needs at this point. Honestly, it just feels like they want the ‘poor’ and the disabled to be ‘gone.’ They are chipping away at all the social support services until we will no longer be able to engage in the community, let alone contribute. Normally, I’m not so negative, but it all feels so grim.”
“I’m so frightened. We were starting to be out, proud, and beginning to unmask. Now it’s difficult to admit to belonging to our wonderful autistic community. We are being used…again. We are not safe…again.”
“It’s triggered a lifetime of trauma from someone from the generation who knows what it’s like when you don’t get the right help early on. I am appalled that the government can’t
seem to learn from its mistakes. Maybe because they won’t listen to those with lived experience and can’t see [the connection between] the mental health issues, suicide, addictions, unemployment, chronic illness, homelessness, victims of abuse & violence, those who are more disabled as adults than they would have been if they’d been supported as kids.”
The emotion and passion apparent within these statements remind us that this is a community who have been historically mistreated, ignored, devalued, and discriminated against within all systems of government and society. Their collective mistrust is deeply rooted in this ongoing systemic discrimination. It will take time, goodwill, genuine consultation, transparency, and positive system transformation to rebuild this trust.
When sharing their perspectives with me, my constituents consistently frame the Thriving Kids initiative as an opportunity to learn from international best practice and avoid past mistakes. If one thing comes through loud and clear, it’s that this community is determined to ensure safety and equitable access to affirming support for their children. I strongly urge you to hear them.
Sincerely,
Senator Jordon Steele-John
Senator for Western Australia