Steph Hodgins-May (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I remind the chamber that this is not my first speech. I rise to speak about the huge concerns that I hold with the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Getting the NDIS Back on Track No. 1) Bill 2024. But before doing that I want to thank my colleague Senator Steele-John for his extraordinary leadership on this shameful move by the government that will impact so many people and families right across this country. And I'm sorry, Jordan, that you're back here having to fight this, and I'm sorry to the many families that are feeling the pressure and the stress of this bill coming before the parliament today.

As the Greens senator for Victoria I am hearing enormous community backlash to this bill, with organisations and disabled people and their families sharing their despair and detailing the harm it will do to them. The bill puts into action the Labor government's $14.4 billion cuts to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which will result in immeasurable harm to people who rely on the NDIS. Let's be clear: this bill will make disabled people's lives and the lives of their families immediately more difficult. This bill will cost lives and it will set disabled people back decades. The government has failed to engage adequately with these criticisms and has instead undertaken a bad-faith campaign to undermine the scheme by talking about fraud and noncompliance.

In a cost-of-living crisis, the Labor government is choosing to remove $14.4 billion in funding from the NDIS that will lead to disabled people not getting the support they need when they need it. This government has chosen to abandon disabled people. They have abandoned NDIS workers and are passing the buck to the millions of Australians who undertake informal carer roles. Labor has decided that it's more important to fund billions in handouts to weapons manufacturers than it is to support our community and the many disabled people who rely on the NDIS to live happy and healthy lives.

It's clear that there is not an essential service that Labor won't cut to fund nuclear submarines and fossil fuel handouts. This government has betrayed the disability community, and they should be ashamed of themselves for this bill that is being created behind closed doors and rushed through the parliament. Astoundingly, disability organisations were required to sign NDAs in order to be consulted on the bill. What does that say? The government spent $600,000 on a speechwriter for the NDIS minister and $400,000 on RedBridge commissioned focus groups and messaging. Instead of talking about the substance of the bill, the government has been doing what they do best: spinning focus groups to manipulate community sentiment. Despite these claims of fraud being made by the NDIA, they were not able to provide any proof when questioned during Senate estimates.

This bill sets up the framework for pushing people off the NDIS and onto supports that the government reckons will be provided by states and territories. But there is no possible way that the states and territories can provide those supports in time and in a way that is nationally consistent and will guarantee that no disabled person becomes worse off under Labor's NDIS plan—or lack of plan. Removing people from the scheme onto services that don't yet exist is outrageously poor planning, with obviously harmful consequences. This bill will make it easier to prevent people from accessing the NDIS and will make it easier for bureaucrats to remove people from the scheme. This bill is set to prescribe specific supports that you can and can't get from the NDIS. It is a blatant attempt to control the choices that participants make. Choice and control is one of the central pillars of the NDIS, and removing it in this way makes it clear that the government prioritises their bottom line over the wellbeing of the disability community.

This bill will see a restriction of supports available through the scheme. It will limit our ability to have NDIS plans that are based on our individual needs and it will replace 'reasonable and necessary' with a new single definition of 'NDIS supports'. This new NDIS support list will only provide funding for supports that meet a new narrow definition, as defined by politicians holding the NDIS's purse strings.

This bill will allow bureaucrats to demand that NDIS participants undergo mandatory psychiatric or physical examinations within 90 days in order to make a decision about whether their scheme access should be revoked. This will traumatise and retraumatised so many participants and could result in getting them unfairly kicked off the scheme. How is someone supposed to get an appointment with a psychiatrist to undergo an assessment within 90 days when waiting lists are over many years in some areas?

There are so many methods and processes mentioned in the bill that haven't been defined, including the method for turning an assessment of support needs into a budget. These vague references to methods that calculate budgets are a recipe for robodebt 2—make no mistake—and we will not allow that.

This bill will enable the minister to make significant changes to the scheme in the future without community consultation. This is outrageous. To cut out the voices and feedback of affected people is not how good policy should be made, and I thank you, Senator Steele-John, for reminding us of that critical principle: nothing about them without them. Imagine if a minister could snap their fingers and remove a life-saving service from your life.

As the Greens senator for Victoria, I have been inundated with emails and calls from concerned constituents and people working across the sector who are deeply concerned about this bill. One Victorian constituent wrote to me:

I am so concerned about the effect of the NDIS Amendment Bill on my adult daughter with a disability. My daughter is severely physically disabled and blind as the result of a very rare and complex metabolic disorder which is degenerative.

Her speech is hard to understand and she uses a Seeing Eye Dog. She also has complex health issues.

She currently lives independently with 24/7 support in her own house that is owned by her sister. It is not accessible and it is difficult for her and her support staff to manage. We are just about to start building a house for her that will support her high physical support needs so that she can live, work and have a normal life.

If passed in its current form, the NDIS Amendment Bill will have massive impact on her life:

This Victorian has urged their representatives to vote against the bill.

Another constituent shared with me their concerns about the bill on their sister, and I quote them:

The Bill has been pushed through quickly and quietly, with limited consultation and clarity on how it will impact people with disabilities.

What is clear, though, is that the Minister will have huge powers to make rules down the road, without proper scrutiny or protections in place, for life-altering decisions like what needs assessment tools are used, and what funding can be spent on. These rules can be made by the Minister without proper co-design, transparency, or protections in place.

Giving the Minister these unbridled powers mean living with fear that everything can be taken away, a constant pit in your stomach. Having a sister with a disability is not a burden, but living in limbo, waiting for the next rule to be made that upends her life, is.

We must legislate co-design, transparency, and constraints on the Minister's power, which this Bill does not. The Bill cannot be passed.

This Victorian constituent says that to pass the bill is to put into law that people with disabilities are second-class citizens. It is not too late to get the NDIS back on track with what it sets out to do: to provide people with disabilities choice and control over their lives.

Another constituent shared their concerns about the bill for them and their son. They said:

These proposed changes threaten to set the disability rights movement back twenty years, limiting the lives of disability and in many cases presenting serious dangers to lives.

The amendments to the NDIS threaten to narrow the scope of supports, destabilise access and impose undue burdens on participants.

According to this constituent, the proposed definition of 'NDIS supports' risks excluding essential services, undermining the ability of people with disability to live independently. 'By limiting our ability to use supports as we see fit, it limits our ability to live independently and reduce our reliance on support workers,' they told me. This constituent said:

I encourage decision makers to reject this Bill and the premise that the lives of people with disability are narrowed or compromised. I encourage you to prevent its passage through the Senate.

Another constituent said:

I'm writing this email on behalf of two very different friends with very different needs. I have seen up close how difficult their lives are and how every day is a matter of negotiating significant challenges. I have also seen how NDIS has made it possible for them, thanks to their own determination and that of loved ones, to find systems that make life not only bearable, but meaningful.

This constituent told me:

The proposed changes to the NDIS are terrifying for my friends. They are looking at the end of a world where they get to control their own destinies. They are afraid of dramatic cuts to the services that make their ongoing lives possible, particularly where they get to select and train their own support workers. This makes a huge difference to their quality of life. They need support workers who share their values and understand who they are as people.

Talking about their friends, my constituent said,

Support workers who are provided by for-profit companies, who are neither well-trained nor well-paid … Both my friends have horror stories to impart, and both of them live in fear of the day when they will no longer have a say in who gets to have that most crucial and intimate relationship with them. Trust and empowerment are absolutely crucial.

According to this Victorian, funding for basic services for their friends, like being able to swim, to receive psychological services or to take a holiday, are under threat. Small things that able-bodied people take for granted, which require organisation and assistance, make all the difference between wellbeing and a sense of powerlessness and abandonment, depression and physical ill health. This person told me that both their friends need one-to-one support. They won't survive, mentally or physically, if they are put into shared accommodation. They said the NDIS may not be perfect, but it has made lives livable, it has boosted the economy, it is 'reasonable and necessary', and it is for every one of us who needs it. This constituent urged us here in this place to do all that we can to make sure that it stays that way and that 'Shorten's proposed changes do not eviscerate it beyond recognition'.

I reiterate that this bill should absolutely not pass. It should be sent back to inquiry to give the community more time to make their concerns known and to enable further parliamentary scrutiny. Disabled people, those who love them and anyone who cares about the integrity of government social services should make their feelings known about this harmful bill. This bill will cost lives and it will set disabled people back decades. The Greens will not support this bill in its current form in the Senate.