KEY POINTS
- The NDIS review has been released more than a year after it got underway.
- It calls for better supports for people outside the NDIS to ease pressure on the scheme.
- NDIS Minister Bill Shorten says navigating the scheme can be 'dehumanising'.
After more than a year in the making and thousands of submissions, the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) review is finally public.
, warns a system originally intended to help roughly one in 50 Australians with severe disability is now serving far more, and significant changes are needed to ensure it is sustainable in the long term.
The 329-page document calls for the government to create a and boost supports for Australians with less severe disabilities outside the scheme.
"The scheme was designed to be one part in a much larger ecosystem of supports to make everyday life inclusive and accessible to Australians with disability," it says.
The NDIS review has been released after a year in the making. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas
Speaking to the National Press Club on Thursday, NDIS Minister Bill Shorten warned navigating the scheme had become "bureaucratic, traumatising, even dehumanising".
"People say that dealing with the planning process is like a second full-time job and preparing for a planning meeting sometimes feels like they're going to war," he said.
"People are tired of having to prove every year that they're still blind or in a wheelchair or have … Dealing with the NDIS should be simple and fair.”
The government is expected to release its formal response next year, but national cabinet agreed to capping the scheme's growth at 8 per cent by mid-2026.
Here's what the review suggests.
Impact over diagnosis
Access to the scheme wouldn't be granted purely on the basis of a medical diagnosis.
Recipients would have to prove they had a "significant functional impairment and need", which impacts the person's daily life.
"There is too much focus on diagnosis and not enough on support needs. There is no consistent approach to identifying developmental concerns early, or helping families find evidence-based supports that work for them," it says.
That means the scheme would focus more heavily on the impact a disability has on a person, rather than providing the same funding for everyone diagnosed with the same condition.
That's crucial, because two people diagnosed with the same condition can need very different types of care.
More 'foundational supports', intervention for kids
The review calls for supports outside the NDIS to ease pressure on it.
The report authors suggested a three-layered system, designed to provide care for those most in need while diverting others away from the NDIS.
Many participants would be phased off the scheme and onto what the review dubs "foundational supports".
The reviewers want a "significant expansion" of services which identify children with developmental challenges early in life, it says.
The review calls for more "navigators" to assist participants through the system. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas
"You can't fix the NDIS without fixing everything around it," the review says.
"We want to create a new system of support, including accessible and inclusive mainstream services, a new system of foundational supports as well as the NDIS."
National cabinet agreed on Wednesday to split the cost of the non-NDIS disability services, with the federal government granting the states an extra three years of GST funding in return.
Extra help to get people on the scheme
The NDIS is complex and often confusing for participants engaging with it, the review found.
The review acknowledges that expanding multiple schemes would require more workers employed to help participants.
The review recommends that each family be given access to "navigators", people employed to help them find and coordinate the supports they need across the system.
"Confusion is a fairness issue, not least because the two largest cohorts in the scheme are autistic people and people with intellectual disability," Shorten said.
"The review wants to see the creation of two types of navigators; general navigators would be able to help people with disability connect to mainstream services, while specialist navigators would be available to help participants with more complex needs or circumstances."
That would include "housing navigators" to specifically advise participants on their living options.
Crackdown on dodgy providers
All NDIS service providers would need to be officially registered.
Currently, NDIS recipients who self-manage their plans are usually not required to use registered providers.
The market is saturated with unregistered providers - 154,000 received payments last financial year, compared to just 16,000 registered ones. But there are growing concerns about the quality of care they provide patients.
"The review found that the costs of the NDIS were growing much faster than anticipated, partly because it's being used as a cow by some service providers," Shorten said.
The review also recommends that their staff be required to undergo mandatory screening and training.
"There will be some people who say this affects their business models, that their special double-digit profits they are making may change. I say to them: 'If you are good at your job, there'll be nothing to worry about'," Shorten said.
