Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing and Sovereign Capability) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on a matter that cuts straight to the core of our national conscience, the National Disability Insurance Scheme. A civilised society is judged by how it cares for its most vulnerable citizens, which is why we must get the NDIS right. In the coalition, our foundational wish is for every single Australian to live an absolute best life. It is a human baseline that every person in this chamber would want. To understand the true value of the NDIS, you must look at the immense emotional, physical and financial strain borne daily by individuals and families living with disability just to survive and thrive. For these families, the NDIS is a lifeline. It is the absolute difference between surviving in isolation and thriving in a vibrant community. It is the support worker who provides a parent with a few hours of much-needed respite. It is the home modification that allows a young person to move freely around their own domestic sanctuary. It is the specialised equipment that grants a child the ability to communicate with the world.

Because of the sheer human importance of this scheme, we in the coalition affirm our strong, unshakeable, bipartisan support for the NDIS. We believe in its core mission, and we want it to succeed for generations to come. But, because we want it to succeed, we are deeply concerned that this government's heavy handed cuts are on track to hurt the wrong people. We know that the vast majority of participants are honest, true-blue Australians who simply need a helping hand. They're not rorting the system. They are just trying to survive the challenges of everyday life. Those with real, profound, structural needs should be getting every single bit of help that they require without having to fight their own government for the privilege.

However, we must also confront a cold, hard financial truth that ensuring the long-term sustainability of this scheme is absolutely vital. If we do not secure its foundations, the entire structure will collapse under its own weight, and the people who will suffer the most are the very participants who rely on the NDIS just to live. Let us look plainly at the staggering numbers. The rapid expansion of this scheme has completely outpaced the original forecast. When first established, it was expected to support around 410,000 Australians at a total cost of $13.6 billion. Today, the scheme supports over 760,000 participants, and it continues to expand daily. The cost for this financial year alone is sitting at a massive $50 billion, and on its current trajectory it is projected to blow right out to $70 billion by the end of the decade. This is simply not sustainable. No economy can bankroll a runaway trajectory like that. Something has to give way.

Let us examine the specific mechanisms of this bill, the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026, starting with eligibility and access. This legislation seeks to establish an entirely new legal framework for determining who gets into the NDIS. Until now, eligibility has been based primarily on the person's medical diagnosis. You had a condition, and that condition opened the door to support. This bill shifts the foundational goalposts. Eligibility will now be based on a person's substantially reduced functional capacity—and that is certainly a mouthful—introducing a strict centralised definition. The government tells us this will create a consistent, objective and evidence-based assessment process. But in regional communities like mine it is currently creating fear. Parents are staying up at night, wondering if their autistic child will suddenly be deemed too functional for support. Individuals who have spent years building a life are terrified that their independence is about to be stripped away.

While this bill establishes the legislative mechanism to create the assessments, it provides zero detail on what these new assessments will actually look like. This lack of transparency has caused a massive wave of anxiety throughout the community, where respectful consultation has been completely lacking. From 1 January 2028, all existing NDIS participants will progressively be reassessed over a three-year period, stretching to 31 December 2030. With over 760,000 participants currently on the books, that represents an absolute mountain of bureaucracy, and it begs a massive unanswered question: if these people are forced out, where do they go?

Our state and territory health systems are already bursting at the seams. In regional areas, our emergency departments are overwhelmed and our hospital services are having to turn people away daily. Finding a GP appointment can take weeks, and despite this Prime Minister claiming that all you will need is your Medicare card, everyday Australians are still paying massive out-of-pocket expenses just for the privilege of seeing a doctor. The waiting lists for specialists are months, and sometimes years, long. We are deeply hopeful that people with significant and permanent disabilities are not about to be put through the wringer, forced to provide a multitude of new, highly expensive medical reports just to continuously re-prove a lifelong disability.

This bill also takes direct aim at unscheduled plan reassessments, which currently average 12,000 every single month. Each mid-plan adjustment results in an average funding variation of around 20 per cent, costing taxpayers a projected $6.4 billion over the forward estimates. This mechanism has been aggressively exploited by bad actors, who treat a participant's plan like an unregulated ATM, triggering unnecessary reassessments purely to skim additional funds for services that they've either grossly inflated or never actually provided.

I recently met with a registered NDIS providers group in Townsville, and their frontline audit of this decay is confronting. They've encountered numerous examples of unregistered, completely unaccountable operators actively raiding the piggy banks of vulnerable participants, blowing an entire year's budget in a matter of months. Once the cash is completely drained, honest registered providers are directed to step in and deliver life-saving care for free, because, without them, these people would die. These local businesses are forced to absorb crushing overheads, carrying immense operational risk and fighting a hostile bureaucracy that routinely denies payment for critical care. It is fundamentally unfair, and we're going to lose our very best providers if we do not stop these crooks from stealing from our most vulnerable.

To top off this disgrace, these dedicated teams are trapped in a vicious catch-22: if they attempt to take an unfunded, high-risk patient to the hospital, the agency flags them and penalises them with disgusting accusations of neglect. They are forced to shoulder the entire burden of care for zero funding and are then weaponised against if they seek emergency medical help. No wonder this entire system is completely broken. This failure is supercharged by a system that also grants complex financial control to self-managed participants who, due to profound mental challenges, simply do not have the capacity or the budget. It is a cruel administrative failure that leaves vulnerable people entirely penniless for months on end—a glaring policy blind spot that demands immediate and total reform.

The coalition will always support measures that improve the integrity of the NDIS. We want genuine safeguards in place to protect participants and to stop the rampant fraud and rorting that is currently undermining the scheme. Right now, a staggering 94 per cent of providers are completely unregistered. With $50 billion in taxpayer funds going out the door, our fraud protection mechanisms are simply too weak. The Albanese government has more than 10,000 people working within the NDIS scheme alone, yet they are completely failing to use these massive resources to get on top of the issue and, more importantly, act. To date, neither the government nor the agency have been able to clearly quantify the scale of the theft. The data we have is deeply concerning. The Australian National Audit Office reported that six to 10 per cent of all claims could be noncompliant, fraudulent or simply incorrect.

Let us look at the true cost of this inertia. In the 2025 calendar year, $48.83 billion was spent on paid supports. If 10 per cent of that is leaking out, we're looking at a total loss of up to $4.8 billion a year. On the current trajectory, this leakage could hit a massive $8 billion annually by the end of the decade. This represents a sophisticated wave of organised crime, deliberate overservicing and false invoicing. Law enforcement agencies have warned that criminal groups are directly targeting these weak entry controls. We must remember the human cost of this failure. Every single dollar lost to a fraudster is a dollar directly ripped away from an Australian living with a disability, and they rely on the NDIS for support.

We are constantly receiving deeply concerning reports in our electorate offices across Dawson about participants seeking basic help around the home, like cleaning or gardening. The second they mention they have a NDIS plan, the quote for the exact same service instantly quadruples in price. This is completely unacceptable. These predatory operators are taking cruel advantage of vulnerable participants and treating the Australian taxpayer like an infinite gravy train.

Earlier this week this chamber offered its profound condolences following the passing of an absolute hero, AFL legend and motor neurone disease campaigner Neale Daniher. For 13 years Neale fought a courageous, deeply inspiring battle against the beast that is MND, touching millions of lives and raising over $100 million for vital medical research through FightMND. He showed our entire nation what true selfless determination looks like. Rest in peace, Neale.

A great shame is unfolding right now within our regional communities. In my electorate of Dawson, we're seeing multiple incidents of everyday people diagnosed with similarly degenerative neurological conditions. For these individuals, the path only goes downhill. There is no recovery. Yet, despite being increasingly incapable of looking after themselves and despite rapidly declining, their applications for support have been consistently rejected by the NDIA. If the NDIS is already so broken that people in such genuine, desperate need cannot even gain access to the scheme, then we have a profound moral crisis on our hands.

We absolutely must ensure that these proposed cuts do not place an even higher barrier in front of vulnerable Australians, completely blocking them from receiving the frontline care they require to live their lives with dignity. We need a system that is robust, transparent and completely secure. The message from our communities is clear: stop treating taxpayer funds like an open chequebook, clean out the rorters and protect the vulnerable Australians who rely on this care.

Debate adjourned.

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