Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My apologies: the weather is particularly nice down in the main chamber, where I was until a minute ago! I move:

That this House:

(1) welcomes the recent outcomes of the 2019-20 National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) annual price review;

(2) notes the increases in NDIS pricing from 1 July 2019 includes:

(a) significant increases in the base prices for attendant care and community participation;

(b) a new temporary transformation payment for providers of attendant care and community participation supports, which will be 7.5 per cent in 2019-20, and will reduce by 1.5 percentage points each year thereafter;

(c) allowing therapy providers to claim for travel, cancellations and non-face-to-face time for therapy assistant activities;

(d) clarification of charges for cancellations and providers claiming for non-face-to-face direct care-related activities as hours of support against relevant support items;

(e) increasing the amount of time providers claim for travel, for up to 30 minutes between appointments within city areas and up to 60 minutes in regional areas; and

(f) increasing remote and very remote loadings on price limits from 20 per cent to 40 per cent, and from 25 per cent to 50 per cent respectively;

(3) notes that from 1 July 2019, funding in existing participant plans will be adjusted to reflect the price increases; and

(4) welcomes the National Disability Insurance Agency's continued commitment to improvement and transparency in price setting beyond the 2019-20 annual price review.

I congratulate and recognise this very important price review that has transpired giving significant benefits to those who provide services under the NDIS. The history of the NDIS is quite remarkable. We've seen a very rapid development of one of the greatest social reforms in Australia's history. We started with as few as 30,000 participants. That has increased to around 300,000 now. To see that occur has been an incredible challenge for both sides of politics and the Public Service. We have seen an increase in the number of providers—at the moment as many as 20,000—and have projected that this is a remarkable area of skills need for the nation. But it's all about those who are receiving support, many for the first time—around 100,000 of the 277,000 clients we have under the NDIS. Many of those are in electorates of those here today. They are looking at this period of transition, often with delays that have been of great concern, particularly in states where they have staged the rollout.

In the case of Queensland, over that three-year period, some of the largest population areas were switched on only in July last year. That put an enormous burden on those who were ensuring that the NDIS was fit and ready for service. As a result of this transition from state based services, and from block funding, to the NDIS there are in fact fewer than was projected. The expected numbers were to be increased in excess of 300,000. But for many, certainly in South East Queensland, the delays were not insignificant. For the providers there were concerns around price. That brings me to why we are here today. The price review was essential to make sure that those who are providing are able to do so in a range of geographic conditions within Australia. While money has been announced in programs and support, what has been lacking in many cases has been an ability to deliver remote and very remote services—

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They're major systemic problems.

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, I will take that interjection—and to meet the needs of cancelled services. All those things, particularly therapy assistance, were identified as amounts that needed to be assessed. I'm glad that's occurred. The government is committed to continuing to work with NDIA and state and territory governments. A lot of passion brought together this great service. It's been a big shift, as I pointed out. What's more important than anything is the financial stability of this great institution. In many cases, even in my electorate, there are areas where the providers felt they couldn't deliver a service in a viable way without significant changes and restructures.

That is why it is absolutely important that we had a price review. I commend the significant increases in payments as a result of the review, particularly for attendant care and community participation; the new temporary transformation payments to enable those who worked under block funding arrangements to move to the new system, allowing therapy workers to be reimbursed for long journeys between patients and clients and for cancellations; and the increased amount of time that can be charged for in remote and very remote settings, as I pointed out. Finally, I want to commend the Australian people for never having hesitated in making sure that this great service has been made available from one coast to the other and is now finding its feet in every corner of the nation since the final rollouts occurred in the middle of last year.

Trent Zimmerman (North Sydney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

John Alexander (Bennelong, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Emma McBride (Dobell, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Listening to the rhetoric of this government and the substance of this motion one is given a clear demonstration of how out of touch the Liberals are—dismissing criticisms and then trying to give the impression that the NDIS is perfect. The member for Bowman speaks of delays and fewer participants than projected. Member for Bowman, the reality is that the Liberals have ripped $1.6 billion out of the system, leaving people with disability and those who care for them without the proper support they need. The Liberals are deliberately underfunding the NDIS so that they can prop up their budget position, and they are doing it at the expense of Australians with disability and their families and their carers. The effect of this underspend is that NDIS participants are, on average, $20,000 worse off.

Through the Liberals' maladministration and lack of any leadership, people are falling through the cracks as the NDIS is rolled out. This is the consistent feedback of NDIS participants, providers, carers and state and territory governments. The very poor implementation of this scheme is clear from the state of the agency responsible for its implementation—without a CEO and with a mass exodus of its senior leadership in the past months; with a staffing cap that means longer waiting times and less access to services for NDIS participants; and with a substantial lack of proper representation and understanding at the staff and board level of lived experience of disability.

We have seen countless examples across the country of the real world impact that the Liberals' cuts and neglect have had, including families who can only get a response from the NDIA or the Liberal government when they start a community campaign, exposing the neglect—like Angus and his mum in Queensland who relied on a wheelbarrow for transport on the family farm because he couldn't get access to a suitable wheelchair; or Kayla, a university student in Penrith, west of Sydney, who was born with spinal muscular atrophy, who has started a GoFundMe page to get a car so she can travel independently; or Tim, in Tasmania, who lived with severe epilepsy and who died while waiting for the NDIA to deliver vital medical equipment; or a wheelchair-bound man with progressive spastic paraplegia, initially told he 'wasn't disabled enough'; or the countless people with disability who end up in hospital because they don't have suitable NDIS plans; or the inconsistent and inadequate transport arrangements, like the cap on subsidies in Tasmania that will leave people with disabilities isolated. That shows how little regard the Liberal government have for people with disability, their families and their carers.

Unlike the Liberals, the Labor Party will stand up for people with disability and their families and their loved ones. We will make sure the government's neglect is exposed, and we will hold them to account and make sure Australians with disabilities get the care and support they need and deserve. Labor welcomes the increases, which are part of 25 recommendations from a July 2018 independent price review. It is heartening to hear that funding in existing participants' plan will be adjusted to reflect those price increases, but I'm far from confident that those adjustments will be expeditious. One participant who contacted my office on 12 July said that she had said not received that adjustment to her account and she and wasn't optimistic, given that she had waited four months for a call from the NDIA to complete an access request for her three-year-old daughter with a disability.

The past 12 months of the NDIS rollout have been marred by delays and roadblocks for participants and their carers. It is telling that 'participants' were referred to only once by the member for Bowman in his motion and 'carers' did not get a single mention. This government built its surplus from the anguish and despair of those attempting to secure support through the NDIS—support they deserve and urgently need. The government's price increases answer the needs of service providers but they do nothing to resolve the lack of crisis response facilities, long waiting lists and overly complex processes.

The government have many questions to answer. What will they do to address the delays and backlogs? Will they lift the staffing cap? What is their plan to improve employment outcomes for people with disability? What is their plan to ensure there are enough qualified workers in the sector? What is their plan to fix the plagued IT system?

When will they appoint a new CEO? Will it be someone with knowledge or lived experience of disability? The tenure of half of the NDIS board expires in October. What is their plan for having a more representative board? How will this government make it easier for those with intellectual disabilities to access the scheme?

Participant planning and reviewing processes must be improved. This is urgent. Transport arrangements must be improved. Employment supports must be improved. Support for people with complex needs and people living in remote areas must be improved. This government's key objective must be to give all people with disability equal access to the NDIS. To do so, it is time to focus on participation and service delivery, not on providers and prices.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is wonderful to be able to get up and respond to this important motion from the member for Bowman because, like him, I am concerned about those most vulnerable in the community and also concerned about making sure we provide particularly those people with a disability with the care, support and assistance they need. But we also need to be honest about the pathway to do so. We just heard from the previous speaker about how we shouldn't be concerned about things like dollars and cents. I can understand from an opposition that didn't fund the NDIS why they would take so little interest. They judge a policy not by its outcomes, and seemingly not even by whether it is funded, but simply by their good wishes and intent. The tragedy of that is that it might give them good political selling points for their constituents and it might create a narrative or an argument that they can give in their social media videos of speeches they give in the Federation Chamber, but it doesn't reflect the lived reality of many people with a disability in our community who so desperately need not just the rhetoric of support but financial resources for that support.

What stays an eternal shame and a stain on the legacy of the opposition is that when they last left government they made a promise to people with a disability in this country on what they would deliver but never delivered the funding to do so. That is an eternal stain on their legacy and means their commitment to what they want to do rings hollow.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I understand that some members are interjecting because when awful truth is reflected back in a mirror it's a difficult and ugly image to look at, but such is the way of things. Our role as the government is to correct the error of their ways and to find a pathway forward that is sustainable for people with a disability in Australia who so desperately need the assistance and support of the NDIS. Those are the challenges that we have confronted.

Since 30 June 2016, the number of people who have relied on the NDIS has grown from 30,000 to 300,000. It's been the rollout of one of the biggest social welfare reforms in this nation—across a continent. I have to say, sadly, that many of the states have not taken the opportunity to rise to the challenge and show their compassion, empathy and financial support to those people as well. They have seen it as an opportunity for retreat. We have had to fill in every gap but also make sure that we have done so while protecting those most vulnerable and protecting and respecting the contribution of Australian taxpayers—because we have seen a massive growth in the number of service providers, from 3,500 to 20,000, over the same period.

There is nothing Australians want more than to be able to provide support and assistance to people with a disability. That is true. But it will destroy their confidence in and support for such programs if they see service providers profiteer in a malicious way or rip off people with a disability who are vulnerable and can't otherwise support themselves. That's why we have been prudent and responsible in the way we have implemented the NDIS and why there has been so much shame in many of the states that have seen it as an opportunity to cost-cut and retreat as the federal government has entered into the space. It's to make sure that those pricing structures keep meeting the expectations of many of the service providers who are so dependent on the NDIS—that's the point of this motion. We judge a policy not just by its intent but by its outcomes and the government's preparedness to back it up with secure financial resources. I speak often to groups in the Goldstein electorate like Bayley House, under the leadership of Warwick Cavanagh, and Marriott Support Services, under Janine Simpkin. Each one of them works day in and day out to improve the lives of people with a disability so they can live with purpose and dignity. What we in this place owe those people is honesty and the truth, and that is what this government is delivering.

Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To listen to the government speak about the National Disability Insurance Scheme, you'd think the system was perfect and just needed minor tweaks. Well, if that were the case, I wouldn't get emails from mums of kids with autism, or any number of complex disabilities, at the end of their tether, trying to get basic supports. I wouldn't get angry dads who've spent literally days of their lives on the phone trying to finalise a plan. I wouldn't have providers of services grimly tell me about how the plan gaps compromise their cash flow and therefore their viability and take an inordinate amount of unfunded time to resolve. Nor would my office be in the top two of advocates to the NDIA about participant problems.

So let's get clear: we welcome improvements to the system—including some fee increases and recognition of transport costs for regional and rural areas—but, frankly, the Blue Mountains and the Hawkesbury still have too many of our services come from Penrith, and we are considered part of the city, yet it can take an hour and a half to get to a participant. And, for an area like mine, the paltry mobility allowance put into plans—as very few incorporate transport—means that my transport providers are struggling to absorb the vehicle running costs, and participants risk being marooned at home.

The consequence of underspending $1.6 billion is all these problems, plus the fact that early intervention simply hasn't happened for many families. We will not let slide the fact that this government is propping up its budget with money that should have been spent on people with disabilities, with participants on average $20,000 worse off. Why are people's reviewed plans, in their second or third year, much less than the previous year, when nothing else has changed? Why are the delays in reviews so long? Is it deliberate savings from participants, is it a result of inconsistent rules and inconsistently trained staff, or is it just a consequence of the staffing cap?

One person who has spent days of his life trying to finalise plans for his children is Chris from Blaxland. His story is a litany, over the course of three months, of waiting on phone lines, not receiving promised phone calls or emails, more paperwork, poor communication and disappointment. I'm grateful to him for sharing with me the detail and his suggestions on how to improve the system. This government owes him and so many other parents an apology for stuffing them around for months at a time. Parents tell me they'd like to see things like a minimum standard of training for plan managers, who should have at least some experience of working in the disability sector. They want better access to information, including a vetted list of NDIA-approved providers that shows what services are available in specific areas. When you're servicing participants in a 4,000-square-kilometre electorate, a service available in one part of the electorate isn't necessarily going to be there in another. It's clear to me that parents need better support mechanisms to help them negotiate the system.

None of this should be rocket science, but you need a stable agency running it. Without a CEO, and given the mass exodus of senior leadership in recent months, it's hard to see that happening anytime soon. You also need proper representation and understanding, at the staff and board level, of lived experience of disability. It's another big gap.

Service providers are also aware of the problems. New Haven Farm Home, who provide supported living in Freemans Reach and Richmond, have raised with me a number of issues they face as they try to do their best by their participants, and I thank them for allowing me to visit their homes. Members of the Blue Mountains Disability Roundtable, which meets monthly to compare notes and advocate for improvements to the system, point out that, on top of the general problems being faced around the country, the Penrith office, which serves the mountains and Hawkesbury, has issues that are not experienced in other regions, including ongoing plan gaps. They point to significant delays in decision-making and processing information. All of that means that they don't get paid, while still delivering services to the participants. They don't want to see people miss out on vital services. And they wear the cost from their own cash flow, hoping that the delayed plan will make it up eventually. It doesn't always. What's more, the time it takes to resolve the issue is not funded in any way.

The round table—which is made up of a range of organisations, including Blue Mountains Food Services, EMPOWERability, NADO, DARE Disability Support, McCall Gardens and SEE Foundation—said there is no working complaint system. It shows me that this Prime Minister and this government do not understand the magnitude of this issue.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in support of the motion, and I acknowledge the work of the committee chair, who's in the chamber today, and the great work that he has done over the last few parliaments. This is not an easy job. It's not an easy rollout. My friend has gone about his business in a calm, methodical manner. I have absolutely no doubt that the oversight committee will play a very important role in the years to come, and I hope to be a part of that for some time to come.

I've organised four separate NDIS forums in my electorate of Fisher, and I've attended a further 'Make it Work' forum, organised by a local charity, STEPS. I've gathered feedback from hundreds of participants in the NDIS, of which my daughter is one. However, sometimes one individual's story can go a long way to making clear the issues in a huge scheme like the NDIS, and today I want to focus on one of those stories.

At the end of 2018, a Fisher resident and business person, Kylie Martin, visited me to discuss the rollout of the NDIS. Kylie is the founder of Chatter-boxes, a nurturing speech pathology practice in Minyama. She's a dynamic, modest, practical and highly engaged business leader, and I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate her on the fantastic local business that she has created.

Kylie was quietly excited about the rollout of the NDIS on the Sunshine Coast. She described how she is already employing new local therapists to deal with the demand from people who had not previously been able to receive this level of government support. Kylie's story, like that of so many I heard during my time on the NDIS committee, was, indeed, a positive one, of new jobs being created, new services being offered and support being provided to people who might never otherwise have received it.

However, Kylie had some concerns about how the program was to be implemented, and I've been working with her and with the NDIA to explore those. As this motion describes, I'm pleased to say that the government and the NDIA—and, in fact, the oversight committee—have, since our meeting, acted to deal decisively with many of these issues.

Kylie explained to me that, while she would like to be able to have her team travel more to their patients, to deliver therapy in a familiar and comfortable setting, 20 minutes of travel time is not sufficient in a regional area like the Sunshine Coast. I was therefore pleased to see that, in June this year, the government announced increases in provider travel caps from 20 minutes to 30 minutes in metropolitan areas and from 45 minutes to 60 minutes in regional areas. These changes will mean that more providers like those in my electorate will be able to travel to deliver care in the most effective location.

Kylie also explained that, while the NDIS's current pricing structure for therapies was adequate on the Sunshine Coast, without further review and increases over time many providers would soon face tough times. That's why I was pleased to see the government recently announce significant increases in the base prices for attendant care and community participation, as well as increases of up to 4.5 per cent for supports like assistance with daily activities. The Morrison government has also introduced a new tier of higher prices for those individuals with complex needs which will attract up to 10 per cent in additional loading where it's needed.

I was also heartened to see that, following this year's annual review, the NDIA will be improving its processes for future annual price reviews to ensure that it has the full confidence of providers like Kylie and Chatterboxes. Kylie's practice deals with many children, and she expressed concerns to me about the slow pace at which some were gaining access to Early Childhood Early Intervention supports. She explained how these delays not only affect the children concerned but can make efficient forward planning and delivery for providers much more difficult.

With our new six-month plan to resolve delays and backlogs for children, the government took action last month to speed up these processes. This will include standard interim plans, immediate streaming to specialists for participants with complex needs and additional resources where there is most need. The Morrison government is listening to what needs to be done to improve the NDIS, and we will keep doing so.

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is the first time since the election I've spoken in the chamber on a policy issue. I wanted my first contribution to be on the NDIS, so I welcome the member for Bowman's motion. Whilst I commend the member for Bowman for tabling a motion about the NDIS, I find the substance of his motion bizarre, frankly. Basically, it congratulates the agency and the government on some bureaucratic changes in pricing.

Unfortunately, this motion clearly identifies how out of touch the government is with the realities of the scheme and the lived experience of participants. The feedback I get on a regular basis from my constituents is their absolute frustration in their dealings with the scheme and the agency, and I know I'm not alone amongst members receiving this feedback. Despite their frustration, participants and their families always begin their conversations with me by saying how grateful they are for the scheme, so it is disappointing that they have to detail the ongoing problems they have in navigating the system.

The area I represent was a pilot area for the NDIS, so we are now six years into the scheme. One of the major issues constituents are reporting to me is that the funding in their plans is being drastically reduced and they are faced with the ordeal of requesting a review of these reductions or negative changes. The main problem is that there are no legislated time frames for these reviews, and waiting months on end for the review to be finalised is causing people immense anxiety and stress. This needs to be addressed as a matter of priority, as plans are expiring and participants are in limbo while they wait for the outcomes of their reviews.

Another common complaint is a basic one that can be easily addressed. It is the dreadful difficulty participants have in communicating with the agency. I recently met with a mother who told me she had not had a return call from the agency in years. Remember that these are people who have been in the scheme for six years. When she has contact, it is with contractors and not with employees of the agency. She would go up to the NDIA agency in Charlestown every week and stand next to reception for hours on end just to try to talk to a human. This is a major issue related to the Liberal government ripping $1.6 billion out of the scheme. Participants and their families should be able to have direct and informative communication with the agency, and the agency should be proactive in responding when contact is made.

In the time remaining, I want to bring some shocking constituent experiences to the attention of the House. One participant was told by a planner that they wanted to see an improvement in her child's autism by the plan's next review. This is truly shocking. Parents of children with disability should not have to endure this horrific ignorance in their dealings with the agency. Unfortunately, this story is very common for parents with kids with autism. They are being told their plans are being cut because their kids' autism diagnosis is not improving. You don't improve and you don't recover from an autism diagnosis; you learn to live with autism and to manage your life and to live as full a life as you can.

I've also met with allied health professionals who provide music therapy as part of this scheme. They had to seek my assistance to get confirmation from the minister that music therapy could be funded as part of the scheme when it was considered reasonable and necessary, because planners at the agency were telling participants it definitely could not be funded. I had to go to the minister only because my parliamentary liaison at the agency was unable to provide definitive advice on this. There is something wrong with the scheme when you have to go to the minister to get a declaration on whether a service is within the scheme's ambit or not. These are just two examples of what should never ever happen.

I first became aware of problems with the scheme when the emphasis shifted in recent years under this coalition government from participants having choice and control of their lives and their plans to them receiving funding that was deemed reasonable and necessary by the agency. This is a fundamental shift in the philosophy of the scheme and has had a major impact on participants' ability to access the assistance the scheme was designed to provide. This change, combined with a massive underspend by the government to prop up the promised surplus, is having impacts on the most vulnerable people in our society and their families and carers. The government should not be congratulating itself or the agency with motions like this. It should be adequately funding the scheme and immediately addressing, as a matter of urgency, some of the issues I've raised today.

This scheme is one of the great legacies of Labor governments. It stands there with Medicare. I applaud the current government for continuing to support it, but that support should be full throated, it should be meaningful, it should not involve penny pinching and it should improve the lives of every Australian in the scheme. (Time expired)

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too am honoured to rise in this place to speak on this important subject of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and, in particular, the motion that the honourable member has moved in relation to the pricing.

Can I say at the outset that the pricing increases that were announced and came into effect from 1 July this year are significant and are most welcome to both the participants and the providers within the scheme. From 1 July, providers will see increases to remote and very remote plan funding and price limit loadings; changes to billing for travel, cancellations and non-face-to-face services; and a temporary loading for attendant care and community participation supports, including group based supports to assist organisations transitioning to the NDIS. These are important and, as I said, significant price increases in an area which, as many speakers have pointed out during the course of this discussion this morning, is important for the providers of NDIS services.

As the honourable member for Fisher remarked in his comments prior to this, I had the honour of chairing the Joint Standing Committee on the National Disability Insurance Scheme in the last parliament. I wanted to take this opportunity at the beginning of this parliament to pick up on some of those things which the committee examined in the last parliament and I hope will continue to examine in this parliament.

It's important to note from the outset that this committee has been in existence from the beginning of the scheme. It provides an important parliamentary oversight on the NDIS, and it is one which has operated in a very friendly, very non-partisan way for the whole operation of the NDIS. I think that's important. Certainly under my chairmanship of the committee, the only recommendations brought forward were those that had the unanimous support of all the members of the committee regardless of their political partisan backgrounds or hue. It was important, I believe, that we came forward as a parliamentary committee representing all shades of the political spectrum in this place with recommendations in relation to improving the operation of the scheme.

The scheme is one which is still being rolled out. We're currently at approximately half the number of participants which is ultimately envisaged under the scheme. Some 460,000 to 470,000 Australians will be participants in the scheme when it's finally rolled out, and that involves a huge ramping up of the scheme over the next 12 to 18 months. The reality is that, for many of the participants and their families, this is an excellent scheme that works very well for them. But it's also the sad reality that for a minority—one doesn't know how many, but it is a minority—this scheme is not working in the way in which it was intended, and there's a lot of work that needs to be done.

This is an agency which is being built at the very time that the scheme is being rolled out. That in itself spells out some of the enormous challenges that the NDIA—the agency—faces in rolling out the scheme. I think there is goodwill from all parts of the political spectrum. There's certainly goodwill from all parts of the disability sector towards this scheme, but there's also a growing realisation that more needs to be done to overcome some of the basic problems.

In the last parliament, the committee inquired into eight areas and issued eight reports, including on: the provision of disability services for people with psychosocial disabilities relating to a mental health condition; the approach to early childhood intervention; transitional arrangements for the NDIS; the provision of hearing services under the scheme; market readiness for the provision of services under the scheme; the provision of assistive technology under the NDIS; the ICT systems; and general issues around implementation and performance, which was the last report, tabled in the House on 29 March 2019. I won't go through all the various recommendations that have been made in the reports, but I will say a couple of things. One is that I was delighted and I'm sure the committee and, indeed, all colleagues in this place were delighted that the government has picked up many of those recommendations, particularly those around early childhood. However, there are a series of other recommendations that still need to be fulfilled. I hope the committee will continue to look at this and ensure that we have the best possible scheme for disabled people in Australia.

Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the motion by the member for Bowman and to strongly condemn the Liberals and Nationals for their many and continued failures in the NDIS. When the NDIS is working well for people it is changing lives, but for far too many people it is just not working at all. The rhetoric of this government and the substance of this motion demonstrates just how out of touch the Liberals and Nationals really are.

Whilst for many the rollout is meeting their needs and working effectively, there is still substantial work required to urgently address delays and inadequacies in the NDIS operation and rollout. The most common source of complaints to my office is the NDIS. The fact is that many people with disability, their carers and their families are desperate for assistance. The reality is that the Liberal-Nationals government has ripped $1.6 billion out of the NDIS, leaving many people with disability and those who care for them without the support they need. Six years of this government's cuts, chaos and staffing caps has undermined the NDIS, and this has had devastating effects. People are getting poor-quality plans, services are being pushed to the brink and waiting times are completely unacceptable. The deliberate underfunding of the NDIS to prop up the budget bottom line is at the expense of Australians with a disability and their families and carers, and this has real life consequences. The effect of this underspend is that, on average, NDIS participants are now $20,000 worse off, with over 77,000 people missing out on the NDIS this year alone. The government has capped NDIS staff and starved the NDIS of money.

In my electorate of Richmond is the case of 10-year-old Josephine. This is one distressing example of the real-life consequences of a scheme that is not working for the people who need it most. Josephine has a rare condition called giant axonal neuropathy. This neurodegenerative disease progressively causes paralysis, and Josephine needs an electric wheelchair to attend school and participate in other activities. I am advised that Josephine met the NDIS access requirements in 2016 and her plan approved the purchase of an electric wheelchair, a beach wheelchair, a specialised foam bench, an electric bed, a walker, a bilateral supportive lounge chair and other essential therapies, including hydrotherapy. Despite the NDIS approving this vital equipment and prescribed essential therapy by qualified medical professionals over three years ago, Josephine is yet to receive the disability support she desperately needs.

The delay in obtaining equipment through the NDIS has caused devastating long-term consequences for Josephine and considerable stress and anxiety for her family. The flow-on effects have had adverse impacts on all her family members, including on her mother, who has suffered multiple hernias which have been attributed to the physical lifting of Josephine. Without the new NDIS approved electric wheelchair, Josephine is unable to return to school or participate in other activities with her peers. According to her local paediatrician, the deterioration in Josie's condition has accelerated because she has not had access to the equipment she needs. I have made urgent representations to the minister and, again, I call upon him to act on this matter urgently and fix it.

Another local constituent of mine, Tim, who suffers from incomplete quadriplegia and often uses a wheelchair, was told he wasn't disabled enough to access the NDIS. He recounted his NDIS experience as destabilising, disappointing and damaging to his physical and mental health and general wellbeing. How could anyone with a disability have faith or confidence in the NDIS when it requires people to justify their disability and then repeatedly reprove their disability through lengthy and delayed reviews? The fact is the NDIS is in crisis under this government.

Earlier this year I co-hosted an NDIS forum in my electorate with Senator Keneally to hear from local clients and providers about their NDIS experiences. Overwhelmingly, the feedback I received from locals is that the administrative barriers and delays continue to act as some of the greatest hurdles in accessing the benefits and aims of the scheme. Some of that feedback included unacceptable delays to having plans finalised and services delivered, unacceptable delays in plan reviews, with some clients waiting over 12 months for their reviews, and also inconsistencies in assessments from one year to the next.

Unlike the Liberals and Nationals, Labor will always support people with a disability and their families. We designed and built the NDIS, and we understand how important it is that it is actually working properly. So I'm urging the government, on behalf of the people in my electorate and indeed right across Australia, to provide adequate funding and resources for the NDIS. They're desperately needed. The fact is the NDIS must be successful. It must work properly to be able to effectively provide the support, the care and especially the dignity that people in our communities need and deserve.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for the debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.