Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

The National Disability Insurance Scheme is of the utmost importance to those who depend on it. It enables disabled people to receive the supportive treatment that they need. It's inevitable that any significant changes to the scheme engender significant uncertainty in NDIS recipients. We know that the scheme needs to change and that its cost has blown out to unacceptable levels. The disability community knows that change is inevitable. But the apparent haste with which this legislation has been put together, the lack of detail about the changes anticipated and the extent to which they have been left to the delegated legislation has resulted in insecurity, fear and even trauma to scheme recipients and those who care for them.

The minister has said in the last 24 hours that passage of this legislation will be 'the construction of the scaffolding' that will enable co-design to begin. That means that work will start now on exactly how needs assessments will work and how these foundational services will work. But the disability community remains apprehensive. After all, they are the people whose daily lives will be impacted by this law. The rest of us will move on, but this is their life. They may resent the NDIS. They may rail against it and against people like us who make huge laws with huge impacts on their lives. But they need the NDIS and many, many people say that, for them, it has been transformative.

Many in the community remain really nervous about this legislation and about the changes that have been made even in the last 24 hours—changes which will affect them every day in their daily lives. They say it's imperfect and incomplete, and I agree with them. They say that they are struggling to trust the process and in the government, and I can see why that is. It's not just the lack of detail in this legislation; it's the fact that the government has been so slow to respond to the NDIS review previously and then its recent inadequate response to the recommendations of the disability royal commission.

The co-design process is so important. It should have started months ago. The government should have secured agreements with the states and the territories on the nature of foundational services months ago. This legislation gives the government significantly increased powers over the lives of hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people. In the absence of detail on how those powers will be implemented, of course those people are nervous.

I've really struggled with whether or not to support this bill and these amendments. The opposition is now supporting it, despite having previously criticised it and despite the shadow assistant minister for the NDIS saying, as recently as yesterday, that this bill 'will throw good money after bad'. The Greens are going to vote against it. Let's face it: it's easier to say no than to say yes. It's always easier to tear something down than to build it.

In recent months, I have worked hard with the minister, the department and the agency. I thank them for accepting the amendments moved in this House in my name and in the Senate today. Those amendments go some way, but only a small way, to addressing the concerns of the disability community.

I'm going to support this legislation today because I know that there is an urgent need to improve the NDIS. But I note that this is just the start of that process. The most important pieces of this legislation are not yet written. They'll be in the delegated legislation, and we will see them in tranches over the next few months to years. So I ask the many individuals, the carers, the disability organisations and the health care professionals who care about how that delegated legislation looks and how it will work to help me and my colleagues review that legislation as it comes to hand. Together, we will continue to hold this government to account. Together, we will continue to work with all sides of this parliament to make the NDIS better. I commend this legislation to the House but with reservations and with a commitment to continue to work to improve it as it evolves.

See this speech in context