Hollie Hughes (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Hansard source

Two years and four months of inaction—I didn't want to give him the extra two months; I thought that might have been a bit cruel. I like to get my figures correct—something the minister isn't too big on. There has been two years and four months of inaction by the minister who was the shadow minister for the NDIS when the government was in opposition and who was an architect of the scheme. Yet it's taken him two years and four months to bring his first piece of legislation forward. What a joke! It's unbelievable, but here we are.

This should be, you would have thought, a positive day because the NDIS does have bipartisan support. We, in government, acknowledged that there were problems around sustainability and were referred to by the minister as 'pearl-clutching kabuki theatre players', because it was an absolute fallacy that there were ever any sustainability issues in his mind when he was the opposition spokesperson. Now he's the minister and it's: 'Oops, oopsie there are lots of sustainability issues. Now we now need to do something about it.'

We are trying to get to some reform of this incredibly important scheme. We need to make sure that the NDIS is sustainable. Maybe everyone in the disability community and in this place would have had some more confidence if they had actually been given the opportunity to properly scrutinise this bill. In the minister's contribution, we heard him say very proudly that there had been 5½ days of hearings on what is an enormous part of the budget. This is an enormous contributor to the budget in so much as cost, yet we had 5½ days because every government member of the Community Affairs Legislation Committee was way too busy to ever hold a hearing when we wanted to look into this legislation. It's funny, though, that the references committee, which has many of the same members, could find more days and more opportunity to travel for our current menopause inquiry. We have had more days of hearings into menopause, of which there is no legislation around, than we've had on the NDIS, because the government doesn't want scrutiny of its legislation and will do anything it can to block it. We've seen the constant politicking, time and again, trying to block transparency and make sure that no-one really understands what's going on.

In response to Senator Steele-John's questions, they bandy the word 'co-design' around as if it's warm and fuzzy so that people in the disability community feel that we're here with you and we going to co-design. We're probably going to make you sign an NDA, and you going to be invited to the party only if someone on your board or organisation is a former NDIA board member or is someone that those members of the board of the NDIA happen to like. They're the only organisations that are consulted with. They're the only organisations that are spoken to, and then they're made to sign NDAs.

Lots of people in the community were not consulted about this legislation. We hear that it's in response to the NDIS review that the government hasn't even released its response to. It hasn't let anyone know what their response is to the review, but this legislation is somehow based on it. It is an absolute joke. We're here waiting for amendments. Apparently, there are more amendments coming. Hold the phone—apparently there are more amendments, but no-one has seen them yet. We're not quite sure what is happening. No-one knows what's happening with those amendments. This is based on the fact that the states and the territories don't know what is going on. We are told back in December that the financial sustainability was all tickety-boo, that it was all signed off by the premiers and that everyone was happy. We were told that there's a financial sustainability framework attached to the NDIS now to cap future growth at eight per cent. We've been in here asking for the modelling behind that sustainability framework for months. We actually had NDIS Monday this morning, again—six or seven months.

You're right, Senator Reynolds: it's becoming a joke, because they won't provide it. And now they want us to pass legislation that's basically adhering to it, saying that this model is how we're going to cap growth at eight per cent. No-one is saying we don't want growth capped. Everyone wants this scheme to be sustainable. But, when you've got a demand-driven scheme, there are two ways you cap growth—you reduce the number of participants, or you cap the amount on the plans; you reduce the amount on the plans.

I'm the first to say that I think there are too many people on it. The Greens and I are going to disagree when it comes to who's allowed on this scheme. I do think there are too many people on it. I do think we need to define 'reasonable and necessary', and we need to define 'lifelong and permanent'. This is a scheme that was established for people with a lifelong and permanent disability. My heart breaks when I talk to families of people that have severe disabilities that completely impair their ability to live an individual life full of freedoms and choices. It is the NDIS, when done properly, that opens up the opportunities for these participants and their families. But then we see all of this expenditure for people who, quite frankly, shouldn't be on the scheme, who should never have been allowed on the scheme.

I'm going to go out there right now and say that there are a whole lot of autistic adults who get diagnosed in their 40s and 50s or so, and they're university professors. They've got families. They've got a house. They've got a job. Then, all of a sudden, they get a later-in-life diagnosis or a self-diagnosis—that's my favourite type!—and expect NDIS supports. I'm sorry, no. That's not what this is for.

The way that autism is bandied around is absolutely appalling, and I say that as the mother of a classically autistic son, someone who would be defined as having profound autism, who was diagnosed before the level 1, 2 and 3 rubbish came into the DSM-5, someone who was actually given a diagnosis of autism when autism existed outside of PDD-NOS and global developmental delay and even before Asperger's was taken away. These are the kids who need it. These are the kids who have significant cognitive impairment and are never going to be able to live by themselves. They're always going to need supports. Yet it is them at jeopardy because no-one is prepared to actually stand up and say who should and shouldn't be on this scheme. That's the first thing, but this doesn't really address what we're looking at. We're tinkering around the edges here.

Some of these people that shouldn't be on the scheme, in my view—and I say it's my view that they should not be on the scheme. What they are being offered so that the NDIS is not the only lifeboat in the ocean—which it is at the moment because the states and territories vacated the fields. Part of this legislation is proposing that there is an introduction of foundational supports. I don't mind the principle of foundational supports. They used to exist. What they were was community health where there was an OT or a speechie. Kids who had a little bit of a delay or who needed a little bit of a help along, who couldn't say the 'er' sound or something like that, could go and get a little bit of help and then go on with their lives. Now, those community health services don't exist, so families who've got a child with a bit of a developmental delay are all looking to the NDIS because it's the only way they can access some of these now private speech therapists or OTs, as they don't exist in a public system anymore because the state governments removed the funding for those. As soon as Julia Gillard as the Prime Minister, along with the then Minister Shorten and Minister Macklin, introduced the NDIS and said to the states, 'Don't worry, we'll absorb any of the additional cost blowouts,' the states went, 'You beauty; we're off,' and vacated the field. So we're supposed to be bringing in these foundational supports.

To Senator Steele-John's question about what is co-design, what is a foundational support? I know what I think they should be, and we heard, during the 5½ days of inquiries we were so kindly granted by those opposite to look into this bill, from lots of groups in the community and disability workers and representatives and advocates of those people what they think a foundational support should be, but we don't know. There are no guidelines. There is no draft. These are to be developed at a later stage.

Some people might be comfortable with that. They might think: 'There's pretty much general understanding. We want some community health, some access to public speechies and OTs. We need better supports in schools. We need the education departments to step back up. So that's fine—what we kind of think they are.' But is that what the government is talking about?

So, Minister, what is 'a foundational support'? When will a draft of foundational supports be available publicly? And what supports have the states agreed to deliver?