Issues to do with the NDIS

We’re taking action to help improve the NDIS.

The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) came from people with disability. It was created to give people choice and control over what supports they needed, who would deliver them, how and when they would be delivered. However, those implementing the NDIS are not handing over choice and control to us, and we have seen a return to the practices it was supposed to solve, such as difficulty accessing the scheme, inadequate funding of supports, deficit based assumptions about people, and huge delays in reviews and access requests.

Some of the issues people are experiencing include:

• The NDIS focuses on diagnostics rather than function, meaning that a person with severe functional impairment who is not in a specific list of disabilities might struggle to get support
• Plans are not adequate to support needs, meaning services withdraw or are not supplied to begin with. This leaves people at risk of harm or even death.
• Appeals regarding both access and funding/ supports go unanswered for long periods of time.

PWDA is campaigning to make sure that people with disability have true choice and control in every step of the process, from access, to planning and using their supports, and that the NDIS is the vital piece of social infrastructure it was always supposed to be.

The government and the NDIA can fix this. They can make planning fair, by listening to people with disability, funding their plans properly, and training their staff. They should also hire more people with disability. A scheme run for people with disability should be a scheme run by people with disability. And the government and NDIA need to listen to us to make the NDIS better.

People with Disability Australia are lobbying state and federal government to make sure the NDIS reflects people’s needs and choices. We are raising the voices of people with disability through public inquiries, media, meeting with the NDIA, government and other politicians, and through our membership of peak representative body Disabled People’s Organisations Australia.

Supporting NDIS community advocacy

We work together with other disability representative organisations to advocate for changes to the NDIS to make it more responsive to the needs of people with disability. Below are some activities we have supported:

Civil Society call for stronger engagement with people with disability on the future of the NDIS

Supported Disability Accommodation – joint statement with the summer Foundation, raising concerns with the NDIS position on housing

Ends | Contact us