Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for COAG) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The cooperative approach that we certainly believe needs to be taken in relation to the National Disability Insurance Scheme is well exemplified by the Prime Minister and the New South Wales Premier Barry O'Farrell showing how effective cooperation can be achieved when they signed an intergovernmental agreement in December for a full state-wide NDIS rollout after the Hunter launch project. I referred earlier in my remarks to the role of the New South Wales minister, Andrew Constance, in that occurring. I would hope that what we see from the government is the Prime Minister applying that very constructive approach to negotiations with the other states and territories.

I also want to refer to those states which are not specifically hosting a launch site but which are nevertheless committed to the NDIS, including both Queensland and Western Australia. The Productivity Commission, in its work, did not envisage that every state would host a launch site but it also did not see the absence of a launch site as a barrier to participation in the national rollout. While the coalition supports the government's $1 billion commitment, we cannot reconcile this figure with the $3.9 billion the Productivity Commission said would be needed over the forward estimates for phase 1 of the NDIS. We are hoping that the government will explain this and make appropriate provisions in the coming May budget.

On the bill itself: it establishes the framework for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the National Disability Insurance Scheme Launch Transition Agency, known as the agency. This will enable the scheme to be launched and the agency to operate the launch in five sites across Australia from July 2013. The first stage of the scheme will benefit more than 20,000 people with a disability, their families and their carers living in South Australia, the ACT, Tasmania, the Hunter in New South Wales and the Barwon area of Victoria.

The scheme will provide funding to individuals or organisations to help those people with disabilities to participate more fully in economic and social life through the provision of an entitlement enabling things such as aids, equipment, supported accommodation or personal attendant care.

The mechanics of the agency will be established by way of legislative instruments called the NDIS rules. These regulations will further detail areas such as eligibility and assessment criteria. The government released a discussion paper on the rules on 1 February this year, but the discussion paper perhaps left a little to be desired in the information it contained. It proposed a series of questions this but it was not really a draft set of rules. This is significant, as the bill itself is essentially a framework; it establishes a transition agency, the board, the CEO and general definition of eligibility. But the nuts and bolts of the scheme will be established by the rules.

A recurrent theme in the evidence presented by witnesses was that it was difficult to offer advice, to pose questions or to plan for the launch sites in the absence of the substantive rules. The government released seven drafts of NDIS rules on the final day of hearings of the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs on Tuesday, 5 March. These included draft rules for becoming a participant; draft rules for children; draft rules for privacy—and my colleague Senator Mason has referred to those at some length in his remarks; draft rules for nominees; draft rules for support; draft rules for registered providers; and draft rules for plan management. They are still the subjects of consultation with the states and territories and disability stakeholders, and the coalition is also studying them carefully.

The government has also indicated that there are potentially dozens of batches of draft rules to be released. I suggest that that is not the way to do this. The rules need to be released quickly, and well before the passage of the bill through the parliament, but given the position in which we find ourselves here in this chamber today that would seem to not be the case. In her second reading speech the Prime Minister indicated the government's intention to bring the final version of the bill to a vote in the budget session. Those remaining rules urgently need to be released to enable proper scrutiny and consultation with stakeholders. The risk with this government, as always, is in its ability to implement it competently. In the absence of these rules it makes it very difficult for stakeholders in particular.

The interaction of three components—the NDIS bill, the NDIS rules and the operating guidelines for the NDIS launch transition agency—will determine how the NDIS operates. Developing a complete picture of how the NDIS will unfold is limited by incomplete and insufficient information. The work of the Senate committee has been critical in this space, and it should have had the benefit of the full rules and the operating guidelines for the agency before it was able to finish its work.

To sum up, it is appropriate to acknowledge the role played by figures on both sides of the chamber in helping to elevate the public policy profile of disability. I particularly acknowledge the coalition's shadow spokesman on this matter, Senator Mitch Fifield, who across my area of Western Sydney—and across the rest of Australia, from reports from my colleagues—has been unstinting in his efforts to make sure that we as a coalition engage with the most important stakeholders in this vital policy area and that we hear directly from them as to their views and their concerns. That is the way that we would formulate policy. That is the approach that we take, and there is no better exemplar than Senator Fifield. But the most credit must go to people with disabilities—to their families, to their carers and to the organisations that support them, including those very important organisations that I mentioned in Western Sydney in particular. They came together and decided that enough was enough. They said, 'There must be a better way to do this, and we won't stop until we find it.'

The coalition wants the NDIS to be a success regardless of who is in government at any time. We want the launch sites to run smoothly. We stand ready to work with the government and with all jurisdictions to make the NDIS a reality.

Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At the outset, I indicate my support for the very worthy concept of this scheme and the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. But it is important that we ensure the implementation of this scheme is effective, efficient and sustainable in the long term. For too long, Australia has been lagging behind the rest of the world when it comes to support and care for people with disabilities. In my view, it is unacceptable that Australians with a disability still find it so difficult to be part of everyday life and to be involved in work and activities that are meaningful and important to them—in short, to live a full and dignified life.

The Productivity Commission inquiry that prompted this scheme was scathing in its assessment of the current support systems. I know these words from the commission's report have been repeated again and again, but they are worth quoting once more:

The current disability support system is underfunded, unfair, fragmented, and inefficient. It gives people with a disability little choice, no certainty of access to appropriate supports and little scope to participate in the community.

The commission, which goes on to describe the current system as a 'system marked by invisible deprivation and lost opportunities', provides an excellent and comprehensive report, including a blueprint for a national disability insurance scheme.

I believe there are few who disagree that we need a major overhaul of the way people with disabilities are supported and cared for. The commission's excellent report delved into the issue of what it means, in everyday terms, when that support is inadequate or poorly delivered. For example, the commission found that there was a strong link between disadvantage and disability, with individuals and their carers more likely to be in financial and social difficulties. These include social isolation, lower levels of education and employment and difficulties with housing. Carers and families were more likely to be under strain and have poorer personal wellbeing. Some particularly heartbreaking findings in the report were about people with profound limitations. It found:

It also found:

…around 18 per cent of carers only had face-to-face social contact either once every three months or less often.

This level of disconnect is both tragic and incredibly concerning. As we know, humans thrive on social interaction and it is vitally important to wellbeing. It is awful to know that this system has failed to this extent.

I believe the NDIS, if implemented correctly, will be life changing for many people with disability and their families. In particular, I note that there are specific provisions in the bill relating to early intervention for conditions such as autism spectrum disorders, where treatment from a young age is vital. I acknowledge the work of the AEIOU centre in Queensland, a not-for-profit organisation that delivers early intervention care for children on the autism spectrum, with remarkable results. Appropriate early intervention can make a huge difference, with long-term impacts that actually reduce a child's level of disability as an adult. A vital part of this service is also the respite hours they provide parents. This organisation is still small, but its services are in huge demand and they are having a massive impact.

A better and more flexible funding structure under the NDIS will give parents the resources they need to get into the AEIOU program and will hopefully give AEIOU the resources it needs to meet demand, because that demand is critical and we cannot delay that. I acknowledge the fact that this legislation is designed to establish a framework, with further detail covered by rules to be made by the minister. I note Senator Payne's quite valid concerns about the framework being somewhat vague at this stage. We need to have those rules so that we can see the details, and that is important.

I have some fundamental concerns relating to individuals who have potential compensation claims seeking support under the NDIS. As someone who has been a compensation lawyer—and I still have my practising certificate and very small law firm—it is something that I am acutely aware of. For example, under the bill as it stands, individuals will lose their right to choose whether or not they want to take legal action in relation to a possible compensation claim. Instead, that person may be compelled to take legal action: if they do not, their support under the NDIS can be suspended. That just seems fundamentally wrong. It is inconsistent with the whole tenor of the scheme.

Basically, this bill uses the right to disability support as a stick behind the carrot, and that is wrong. Further, if an individual wants to appeal the decision forcing them to take legal action, they will need to go through an internal review or take the matter to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. This means the person in question will either have to take on the services of an advocate or a lawyer, or defend themselves. But there is no provision allowing funding for that legal representation under the NDIS, potentially leaving people out of pocket and worse off than they would have been if the scheme had never existed in the first place—and that would be a perverse outcome.

I am very concerned that the NDIS seems overly reliant on payments through compensation claims for its funding. I want to make it absolutely clear that I find this unacceptable, that the responsibility for funding even part of the scheme should rest on the very individuals it is supposed to help. In line with the Senate committee's recommendations, individuals should not be forced to take legal action unless there is some sort of safeguard to protect them from economic loss. There are no such safeguards in this bill. In fact, the government amendments in the House have made these provisions even more onerous on individuals. In fact, where a compensation claim has been taken over or made by the CEO on behalf of an individual, it appears the CEO then has full rights to act on the individual's behalf without that person's consent.

The scheme is supposed to be about giving people with a disability the power to choose and control their own treatment and support, but these provisions blatantly remove any kind of choice from the equation. They operate on the very assumption that a person's only choice in this situation is the one that is right for the NDIS, not the one that is right for the individual themselves. To me, this seems to go against the intent of the bill and treats people with a disability in a patronising and condescending manner. This is particularly clear when you consider similar provisions in other state, territory and Commonwealth legislation which do not have the same element of force and do include safeguards, and that is why I will be moving amendments to that effect and I am looking forward to the support of my colleagues on this side of the chamber and my crossbench colleagues to remedy this absolutely clear anomaly.

Beyond establishing protection for individuals in the case of subrogation—a concept that I will discuss in the committee stage of this bill—these amendments will also ensure that individuals who go through the appeals process will have access to independent advocates. These amendments will also include provisions requiring the CEO to provide reasoning for reviewable decisions and to ensure that individuals are protected from costs if a review goes to the AAT. They also state that the CEO must ensure that the agency institutes a process to ensure that communications to individuals are made in a way that takes their disability into account and allows them to interact with the agency in an effective way. For example, the agency must take into account a person's visual impairment when communicating with them and therefore communicate verbally and provide written documents in an accessible form. This will ensure that individuals dealing with the agency will not be disadvantaged because of their disability. These amendments are in line with the recommendations from the Australian Lawyers Alliance and I thank representatives from that organisation, and in particular the ALA's National President, South Australian lawyer Tony Kerin, for the time they spent with me two days ago discussing these issues.

Ultimately, I support the measures in the bill but we need to make sure that they are open and flexible enough to meet changing demands and that they do not unintentionally perpetuate the exclusion of people with a disability. I will be supporting this bill, but I will be looking forward to discussing it further in the committee stage because there are a number of amendments in order to safeguard the rights of the disabled that must be dealt with. Finally, in the course of the committee stage I do want to raise the spectre of the link between this scheme and a national injury insurance scheme—a no-fault scheme—and the dangers I think that poses, and I will be quoting from the former chief judge of the Employment Court of New Zealand, Chief Judge Tom Goddard, who is scathing about the New Zealand no-fault scheme.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. As the Leader of the Opposition, the Hon. Tony Abbott, said on 13 April 2012, the National Disability Insurance Scheme is 'an idea whose time has come'. The coalition have enthusiastically supported each of the milestones on the road to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. We supported the initial work that was done by the Productivity Commission, we supported the $1 billion in the last budget and we have supported the five launch sites. We support the agreement between the Commonwealth and New South Wales for a full state-wide rollout after the Hunter launch. We support this legislation, the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2013.

Indeed, the coalition called for the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee to be chaired by both sides of politics to oversee the establishment and implementation of the NDIS. What did we get in response to that? The Prime Minister, in her inimitable style, just simply rejected that and said, 'We're getting on with it.' This is a very important issue for thousands of Australians with a disability and their families and carers, and that just goes to show the disdain that the Prime Minister has for something that should have been done on a bipartisan basis. The member for Dawson, George Christensen, has had a motion in the House of Representatives to establish such a bipartisan committee for some time. Regrettably, that motion has not been brought forward for a vote. The shadow minister, my colleague, Senator Fifield, moved a motion to establish the oversight committee. Unfortunately, those opposite and their alliance partners, the Greens, voted this down in the Senate.

The Australian Labor Party always likes to pay lip service to wanting cross-party support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, but when the opportunity was presented they declined to support it. Another example of paying lip service, is the Australian Labor Party's move, hopefully, not to guillotine debate in this matter. It is a very important bill that in this situation needs to be given full airing and full opportunity for all members and all senators to express their views on this important area. It deserves the full scrutiny of the Senate.

In relation to the NDIS, one of the areas that needs to be examined is clause 22, which sets out the age requirements that a person must satisfy in order to become a participant in the NDIS launch. The age requirement is that that person is under the age of 65 on the date the access request is made. This requirement implements part of recommendation 3.6 of the Productivity Commission report and reflects that the NDIS is one part of a broader system of support in Australia, with people over the age of 65 able to access the age care system. Those people who are receiving support under the NDIS and turn 65 can choose either to remain in the NDIS or to move to the aged care system. In other words, the policy intent is that the NDIS and the aged care system remain separate systems that address the different needs of separate cohorts of people; people with a disability and older people with a disability, respectively. Arguably, this assumes that there will be some similarity in the care and support available between the NDIS and the aged care systems. It is concerns like this that need to be worked out, and debate should not be curtailed on these issues.

There is evidence, and certainly there was some evidence provided to the Senate inquiry, that the aged care system may not be an appropriate choice for some people with a disability. We saw in the report, for example, a survey of people with intellectual disabilities living in residential aged care in Victoria raising issues about the appropriateness of such arrangements for this group, including the extent to which such facilities offer sufficient opportunities for participation in community activities and the development of meaningful relationships. Aged care providers themselves also identified a number of difficulties associated with residents with intellectual disabilities fitting into the activities and support provided by that facility. Some providers, however, indicated that these could be overcome by working with specialist disability services. Let us not forget that the NDIS is a person-centred and self-directed funding model. It is aligned to the objectives of empowering the individual and removing the concept of big government from people's lives and, above all, reducing red tape.

I now move to some of the comments made by coalition senators in relation to this bill. We know that the system for Australians with a disability is broken, and it was clear from the submissions of the 1,600 people and organisations that took the time to put in submissions that this very point was made in just about all of those submissions. In the end the evidence that emerged made it very clear that there are people with a disability in Australia who are left without the assistance that they need. As a coalition, we agree that a new system of support based on need, rather than rationing, with the entitlement for support going to the individual, is needed. This represents a shift from the focus of rationing to entitlement, with the person being at the centre of the system and the services that he or she needs being wrapped around them, with support, equipment and service providers of their choice being able to provide those services. This is the vision that the Productivity Commission has in relation to disability. It is also the vision of the Productivity Commission in relation to the aged care system. The basic tenet of the report Caring for older Australians, which was a landmark report that the Productivity Commission did in relation to the aged care system, was a shift from the current ration system in aged care to an entitlement system. The Productivity Commission set out a framework as to how that could happen. Whilst it did not drill down to that detail it is clear that that Productivity Commission report enjoys great support right across the spectrum in the aged care sector, evidenced by the 500 submissions made to Productivity Commission initially, and then by another 500 submissions made after the draft report was released in relation to that legislation.

As far as the leader of the opposition is concerned the issue of disability and Australians with a disability is one he has a very personal commitment to. As part of his 2012 Pollie Pedal charity bike ride $550,000 was raised for Carers Australia. Along that thousand-kilometre route Mr Abbott met with people with disabilities and their carers, and disability organisations to hear directly from them about issues pertaining to disability and to know that the funds from that bike race would go directly to a very important organisation that assists people with disabilities. Indeed, the next two Pollie Pedal rides will also be in partnership with and raise funds for Carers Australia.

Any comments that the coalition offers in this debate are offered in a constructive way, with the intention of making this legislation better. It is something that the coalition wanted to offer bipartisan support for; we wanted to set up a committee where this could be done in a depoliticised manner. The coalition's proposal for aged care reform which we set out at the last official election was a four-year agreement which would not only offer flexibility and certainty in the system but would, above all, provide long-term certainty and a depoliticising of that system.

In the end, it is important to note that every government in Australia and every opposition in Australia supports and wants to see an NDIS. It is a system that will depend on cooperation and on work being done between governments across the political spectrum. This constructive approach has been evidenced when New South Wales Premier O'Farrell and the Prime Minister signed an intergovernmental agreement in December for a full, statewide NDIS rollout after the Hunter launch project. It was disappointing to see that the Prime Minister did not treat all jurisdictions as partners at the COAG meeting in July 2012, and it is to the credit of both the Victorian and New South Wales governments that they continue to negotiate in the face of what has clearly been misrepresentation by the federal government, and that they have reached agreement to host launch sites. It is vitally important that we have a cooperative approach.

I now turn to the aged-care system. This is of particular importance and has been raised with me in various forums that I have attended around Australia as shadow minister for ageing. If people with a disability over the age of 65 are to be looked after in the aged-care system then it is vitally important that the aged-care system is reformed—and reformed in a major way, not just in the way that this government has of paying lip-service. We have seen promises of reform in aged care but, five years on, there is very little evidence of real change on the ground.

I remind the Senate that in 2010 Ms Gillard said that aged-care reform would be a second term priority, and this was at the election when Ms Gillard had to defend herself against the serial leaker who claimed that she had not supported big increases in the age pension because 'old people never vote for us'. But the reality is that we have had a litany of reports and reviews—about 20 of them, including three by the Productivity Commission—which cover ageing and aged-care matters. They have been continually ignored, or responded to with more inquiries without making those vitally important decisions to secure aged care into the future.

Aged-care reform needs to be long term but it also needs to be sustainable. Shortly, we will have the opportunity to debate the package of bills that are a part of the Living Longer. Living Better package. There are five bills which, quite frankly, do not resolve many of the outstanding issues of viability for providers and certainly do not respond to the concerns that have been raised by providers, through the inquiry into the NDIS, because of the added responsibilities that they will have in relation to catering for older Australians with a disability.

We have seen funding cuts of $1.6 billion out of the aged-care funding instrument. Of course, this has put additional pressure on the sector and, most especially, on smaller providers in regional and rural areas. The government has chosen to cherry-pick only a few recommendations from the Productivity Commission's report, Caring for Older Australians. This package of bills will impose even more bureaucracy, even more regulation, on what is already a very, very highly regulated sector.

Most recently we have seen Minister Butler in another spectacular gaffe. First of all, he insulted the people of Western Sydney with his crass remarks about Rooty Hill and then he insulted the people of Western Sydney again when he went out to make his very low-key announcement, downgraded from the Prime Minister to Minister Shorten and Minister Butler, and then just Minister Butler. It was another gaffe in relation to that announcement on the day when he asserted somebody was trying to steal a car—it ended up being the local priest whose car had been blocked in by the minister's car.

Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What!

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, Senator Sinodinos, this is very much a gaffe-prone minister. Today we see him worrying about whether he will or will not support Prime Minister Gillard. Perhaps Minister Butler should be concentrating on—

Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Gutless Butler.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Absolutely. To be or not to be—thank you, Senator Sinodinos—a supporter. Instead of worrying about that, Minister Butler, might I suggest that you worry about the key issues in your portfolio, which are the aged-care system, which needs reform and for which your proposed changes will only make things worse. Aged Care Australia tells us that 60 per cent of aged-care providers are operating in the red. There is a real viability issue for providers, most especially smaller providers in regional and rural areas. So it is little wonder that aged-care providers, who will be dealing with older Australians with a disability, are understandably concerned that they are not going to be able to provide the services that our older Australians with a disability do need.

As I said, this is a sector that does need reform, and I have real concerns that proper reform will not be undertaken in the aged-care sector, which this minister and this government seems loath to do—they are only paying lip-service to it. And what are we seeing? We are seeing that the government is more concerned with rolling out its workforce compact by ripping $1.6 billion out of aged-care funding—to then turn it back and return it supposedly as a $1.2 billion workforce compact as a bid to refinance unions in the aged-care sector. Of course, there is United Voice, as we have seen. Indeed, I have come along this morning with the latest pamphlet from United Voice in which United Voice are urging aged-care workers to join United Voice to 'speak with one voice in negotiations'. That is what it is about. That is what it is really all about, refinancing the unions, the aged-care unions: United Voice, Minister Butler's former union; the HSU, which we know suffered a spectacular fall in membership; and the Nurses Federation.

In the end, I would remind the Senate that under this so-called administrative change, which is really an industrial instrument, aged-care providers of 50 beds or more must enter into an enterprise bargaining agreement; otherwise, they will not be able to access funding. If they are 50 beds or fewer, they do not have to enter into an enterprise bargaining agreement but they must comply with the terms of the compact to be able to access that funding.

What does that mean? That means that, already, that 60 per cent which is operating in the red are going to find it harder and harder to be viable; but most especially here is the government promising pay rises which will never materialise. Why? Because providers are not going to be able to meet those wage increases on the tied money that the government is providing. So another false promise by this minister, who really is demonstrating that he is not up to the job.

Arthur Sinodinos (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a landmark piece of legislation: the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2013, which is supported by both sides of the house. Some people may be surprised at that; they talk about this parliament being fractious and in some ways dysfunctional. Whatever the government's contribution to that, on this occasion we have come together on a matter which we regard as being in some sense above politics. That is a very serious statement to make, to say that something is above politics. I think what we have here is a recognition that we as a parliament have listened to the community and to a section of the community who for too long felt that they were being shunted aside, being ignored, being discriminated against; many families and their carers, disabled people and their families have had to suffer in silence. They could not get access to the range of services they needed on the terms that were appropriate to their particular circumstances.

This legislation, this scheme, seeks to remedy many of those considerations. That is why I certainly support it and that is why my side of politics supports it. It is gratifying that all sides of politics seem to be keen to move on this matter now. In saying that, I am conscious that we are embarking on a very ambitious enterprise as a nation. This is a very complex, long-term, significant set of reforms. In some ways, it provides a precedent in other areas of social support, but it also provides some warning bells about how these sorts of schemes should be considered and implemented.

We face an extra bill when the scheme is fully matured of around $6 billion to $8 billion and possibly more per annum extra, on top of what we now spend. That is a significant expending of public resources, and it is premised on not only compassion and social desiderata—if I can put it like that—but also an economic component in the sense that there is a view that going down this road with the National Disability Insurance Scheme will yield more benefits than costs over the longer term.

There will of course be the social benefits for those who are directly affected, but what we are saying is that there will ultimately also be national benefits, public benefits, over and above those private benefits and that some of those benefits will be economic benefits, because people who are being helped will be in a better position, potentially, in a number of cases, to participate more fully in the economic and social life of our country. That is very important. Tony Blair once made the point that fairness in the workplace begins with the prospect of a job. So anything we can do to help disabled people to realise their full potential, so that they become full and participating members of our economy and society, is very important—not only for their self-esteem and meaning in their lives but also for the contribution they make to the country and how that ultimately enriches all of us socially and economically. So there are some very important issues at stake in this bill and in this legislation that we are debating today.

We are not, as I said before, debating this in a rancorous, partisan way; there is agreement. But, in making comments on the legislation, I do want to raise a couple of points on the way through. These are not points that are necessarily the most significant and some may say, 'Well, you are raising points which are more economic or financial, or sort of bean-counter points,' but I raise them anyway in the spirit of saying: let's make sure that, in adding to the pool of funds available in this area, we are getting the best value for money out of what we are already spending in this space, not in order to cut what we are already spending in this space—that is not what we are intending to do—but, like all these things, let us make sure that the spending we are putting into the system is going on top of a level of spending that is itself the most efficient and effective way to deploy existing resources to help disabled people.

In negotiating with the states, this government or a future government must make sure that there is genuine additionality in the resources that those states are providing to the table. I commend the New South Wales and federal governments for coming to an agreement recently and, like my colleague, Marise Payne, yesterday, I commend the New South Wales Minister for Ageing and Minister for Disability Services, Andrew Constance, who is a very smart, pragmatic and committed minister in this space. He has done a great job on behalf of the people of New South Wales in this space, and I commend him, Premier Barry O'Farrell and their federal counterparts for coming to an agreement. But my point is: let's make sure that the funding going into this space from the states is additional funding, so that we get the best possible deal for the Commonwealth from the states and we are maximising the resources available for disabled people.

In that context, I refer back to the Productivity Commission, which handed down a landmark report on this space. In part, the report went to this issue of funding and the profile for funding. The point made there was that something like $3.9 billion was needed over the next four years, or this current four years, in order to begin to realise the vision of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. To date, the government has provided $1 billion over the forward estimates, and in this budget we wait to see what the longer term funding plan will be.

There had been speculation in the press that the government might well publish forward estimates that go some way beyond the traditional three or four years—perhaps out to 2020—to indicate how it was funding significant additional responsibilities, such as the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the Gonski education reforms. I welcome a commitment by the government to provide a longer term set of forward estimates which explain clearly how we build up the funding to the National Disability Insurance Scheme over time so reach the peak funding—which I think at this stage is expected to be in 2018.

We have to be careful that this does not become one of those cheese-paring exercises, a bit like what we do in the foreign aid area. There we make laudable commitments in the context of the Millennium Development Goals and then say, a bit like St Augustine, 'Make me pure but not just yet,' and we keep putting off the day when we lift the ratio of our foreign aid to our GDP. Over the last couple of years there has been a tendency to do that. I hope for the National Disability Insurance Scheme we do not fall into the same trap simply because over time we find our budgetary situation is deteriorating and we are unable to meet this full commitment.

That may not be an issue for this government. One of the reasons I raise this now is that it could be an issue for a future coalition government. This is a dilemma that we all face, but the point that we have made and the point that the government has made is that schemes like this would be accommodated by reducing spending elsewhere. It is important that we note that it is better to go down the route of reducing spending in other areas rather than seeking to raise taxes further, given that most of those taxes will fall on middle-income earners. From an economic perspective that is the more appropriate way to pay for a national disability insurance scheme.

As I said before, this has bipartisan support. I commend people on both sides of politics who have supported the scheme from its inception, or conception. On my side of politics, I commend our leader, Tony Abbott, who through early support for the scheme and through his work with the Pollie Pedal has been a visible and genuine, committed supporter of doing more in this space. I commend our shadow spokesman in the area, Mitch Fifield. He is a flint-hard economic rationalist who on this occasion has seen the light and decided we must do more. He has handled a difficult area in dealing with stakeholders and the government on the matter with great deftness, skill and authority. I commend him for the work he has done within the party room in bringing us all along on this journey. I also commend Senator Sue Boyce, who has been quite a vocal supporter of the scheme, based in part on personal experiences.

I will not mention others, but my point is simply to say this: the field evidence is very strong that people from both sides of politics have been very strongly supportive. On the other side of politics, outside this chamber, I commend John Della Bosca, a very skilful New South Wales ex-Labor minister and operative. He is an organisation man who has done an excellent job in helping to mobilise public opinion on and support for the scheme. It would be remiss not to say something about some of the people involved in the conception of the scheme: John Walsh, a partner at PwC, who conceived it. It was progressed by Bruce Bonyhady, the president of Philanthropy Australia. I knew Bruce Bonyhady 20 or 30 years ago in the Treasury. I think he was in the forecasting or modelling space. He is a rigorous thinker and he brought that rigour as well as his commitment to helping people with disability to the table. He has done a great job in further fleshing out the concept and helping to sell it.

I note in passing that this matter was first canvassed at the 2020 Summit in 2008. That summit was notable for three things: first of all, Kevin Rudd telling us who the best and brightest in Australia were; some of us were very disappointed in the outcomes of that exercise. Secondly, it did not necessarily yield that many things. I think the bionic eye came out of that process and something is being done on that. Thirdly, there was tax reform, which came on the table when Kevin Rudd had to go on the 7:30 Report and describe the outcomes of the summit. He then decided, 'Let's have a tax review,' and that was the Henry review, which in turn led to other things. But this item, the National Disability Insurance Scheme, is one of the better outcomes of something that was first canvassed at the 2020 Summit.

One of the features of the scheme that I am particularly attracted to is the fact that it is a person-centred and self-directed funding model. It is aligned to the objectives of empowering the individual, removing government from people's lives and reducing red tape. To be honest, we will wait and see how far it goes in reducing red tape and removing government from people's lives. I am a bit sceptical about the extent to which the government gets out of people's lives and reduces red tape, but empowering the individual, setting up a model which is person-centred and which that person drives through their command over funding and resources, drives the package of measures necessary to help them, so it is a customised package. I think that is what this NDIS is trying to get at. It is also trying to provide greater certainty to people about what is available to them so that they do not have to wait in queues and all the rest of it. One downside of all of this that we have to make sure we address is that people who are providing services to the NDIS do not ratchet up their prices because they think that demand is going up as everybody wants everything immediately. We have to guard against people exploiting the situation. That is a footnote.

I support the person-centred and self-directed funding model. I think we showed more of this across government activity, more of a—for want of a better expression—life-cycle model of how government interacts with individuals. I think that is very important, particularly because in an area like this there is some focus on early intervention to 'mitigate, alleviate or prevent the deterioration of' a person's functional capacity. Early intervention to minimise later problems means that there is greater capacity for people to potentially be more self-reliant and better able to do things for themselves. Getting people, to the extent possible, to be mobile and to be able to hold down a part-time or full-time job is important for their self-esteem and the contribution they can make to our nation.

So I support the person-centred and self-directed funding model. It would be interesting to apply this more across government activity. I suspect it would be expensive to do that, so perhaps it is not as appropriate in other areas because of cost; but, certainly, in this area, it is a new model and it will be interesting to see how it goes. I support that element of the model. As the notes say:

The individual needs to be at the centre and in charge, able to pick the supports, the aids, the equipment and the service providers of their choice. This is the vision of the Productivity Commission's landmark report …

I make the point that for some time now, as a reflection of that bipartisanship that I mentioned earlier, the coalition has called for the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee to be chaired by both sides of politics to oversee the establishment and implementation of the NDIS. This is not only a good idea on policy grounds but also a good idea on political grounds for the government to lock the opposition into ongoing support for the NDIS. I do not understand why the government seems to want to shut the opposition out when embracing the opposition and locking them in is the best guarantee that the NDIS will have not only safe delivery but also a reasonably robust childhood growing to maturity with the right sort of support from all sides of the parliament. A parliamentary oversight committee would lock in all parties and provide a non-partisan environment where issues of design and eligibility could be worked through cooperatively. In other words, the parliamentary committee would seek to take out some of the political pointscoring and debate around what I said before was a matter above politics.

In bringing this vision to fruition I think people on the Labor side should avoid the temptation to claim this reform as some reflection of quintessential Labor values. There are very big Australian values around fairness and looking after people who cannot look after themselves, and they are shared by all sides of politics. We sometimes differ about the means to achieving that fairness, and that is a legitimate discussion. Our side of politics—the right-of-centre parties—always put more focus on how we can equip people to better look after themselves, to exercise personal choice and responsibility. That is where sometimes there is quite a marked philosophical difference and therefore a practical policy difference between the two sides of politics. But this is not about something which is quintessentially a Labor value; this is quintessentially a pragmatic Australian response to an important social issue. I am disappointed that on occasion Labor have sought to exploit this for partisan purposes. I say that gently and in passing to underline the point that this is all about bipartisanship.

As Tony Abbott reiterated at the Press Club recently:

The Coalition is so committed to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, for instance, that we’ve offered to co-chair a bi-partisan parliamentary committee so that support for it doesn’t flag across the three terms of parliament and among the nine different governments needed to make it work.

I commend Tony Abbott for that. I do not commend the Prime Minister for attacking some of her state colleagues in the lead-up to the Council of Australian Government meeting and seeking to portray them as somehow being against the scheme. State governments have legitimate responsibilities to argue about how their funding and their services link into this broader national scheme. In the spirit of cooperation, these are issues that are best hammered out behind closed doors and are not the subject of public rancour, pointscoring and mud-slinging. That will not achieve anything.

This is also reflected in the fact that we do not have to have launch sites in every state. The fact that we have launch sites in a number of states is a good thing, but the Productivity Commission never envisaged every state hosting a launch site and never saw the absence of a launch site as a bar to taking part in a full national rollout. The Premier of Queensland, Campbell Newman, has written to the Prime Minister with a proposal to be part of a full national rollout, and Premier Colin Barnett of Western Australia has written to the Prime Minister proposing a joint WA-Commonwealth national disability insurance scheme. The coalition will continue to place this issue above politics and is prepared to work with state and Commonwealth governments towards a better deal for people with a disability.

In the time remaining, I make the point that the bill before the chamber is essentially a framework establishing the transition agency, the board, the CEO and a general definition of eligibility. The mechanics of the scheme will be established by the rules. A discussion paper on the rules was released on 1 February but it was essentially a series of questions. It is not a draft set of rules. The government released seven sets of draft rules on the final day of hearings of the Senate Standing Committee on Community Affairs on 5 March: draft rules for becoming a participant, draft rules for children, draft rules for privacy, draft rules for nominees, draft rules for support, draft rules for registered providers and draft rules for plan management. These draft rules are still the subjects of consultation with state and territories and with stakeholders in the disability sector. We will study them carefully. The government has also indicated that there are potentially dozens of batches of draft rules still to be released which need to be released quickly and well before the passage of the bill through parliament. We need as much information as possible to understand the implications of where we are going in this very important space.

Finally, I commend the legislation and the scheme to the chamber. I think it can make an important difference to the lives of disabled Australians. I have heard too many stories of parents who despair about what will happen to their disabled children after they pass on. It is very important that we assure them that the Australian people are there to take on that responsibility and that task.

Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This National Disability Insurance Scheme is an idea whose time has come. It is an historic day that this scheme is being debated in the Senate and is a real step forward. It is very much an expression of the reality of the federal parliament supporting the concept of the Aussie fair go to ensure that disabled people do have a fair go and are given an opportunity to realise their potential. There are many people in Australia with disabilities whose lives will be improved with the advent of this scheme. Sometimes the perception that someone is disabled is taken to mean that they cannot or are not able to participate in community activities or to do many things which other people might do. This is a recognition more than anything else that disabled people do have abilities, dreams and ambitions and should be assisted to achieve those dreams and ambitions and live meaningful and dignified lives in our community. The fact that disabled people are being given support by the community, and recognition that they are entitled to respect as fellow Australians, is very important. I congratulate those responsible for the development of this legislation.

The coalition has supported each milestone on the road to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. We supported very strongly the initial work done by the Productivity Commission on planning for this NDIS. The coalition supported the billion dollars allocated to the NDIS in the last budget, we supported the concept of the five launch sites and we supported the agreement between the Commonwealth and New South Wales for a full state-wide rollout after the Hunter launch. We do support this legislation very strongly, because, as I have said, it means that disabled people in this country will be given recognition and the opportunity to live lives that are dignified, and be able to achieve their dreams and aspirations.

When Labor members and senators say that the NDIS represents quintessentially Labor values I have to say that I do not think they are particularly Labor values that it represents, but they are the Aussie values of a fair go and giving people a chance to realise their potential. The National Disability Insurance Scheme is a person-centred, self-directing funding model. It is aligned to the objectives of empowering the individual and removing government from people's lives and reducing red tape, which are all values which the coalition strongly supports. The coalition believes that the full implementation of the NDIS will be nothing short of a new deal for people with disabilities and their carers, and we believe that we have to make sure that the details of this scheme are got right and that they do really mean that the scheme works for the benefit of disabled people.

The NDIS is a once-in-a-generation reform which is going to unfold over the life of several parliaments, and it will develop and progress over that time. It should, we believe, be the property of the parliament as a whole, on behalf of the Australian people, rather than of any one political party, and I think that is the spirit in which this whole piece of legislation is being debated here today. The coalition has called for the establishment of a joint parliamentary committee to be chaired by both sides of politics to oversee the establishment and implementation of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Tony Abbott, the leader of the Liberal Party, reiterated this offer in his recent Press Club address, when he said:

The Coalition is so committed to the National Disability Insurance Scheme, for instance, that we’ve offered to co-chair a bi-partisan parliamentary committee so that support for it doesn’t flag across the three terms of parliament and among the nine different governments needed to make it work.

The government, we believe, should accept the coalition's offer of a parliamentary oversight committee. The coalition intends to give the government, the Greens and the Independents an opportunity to accept our hand of cooperation by moving an amendment to this bill to establish such a nonpartisan oversight committee. I do hope, quite simply, that that offer is seen as not being partisan political, and that it is accepted in the spirit in which it is offered so that an oversight committee can be set up to ensure that this scheme works effectively for the people who it is designed to support.

It is important to note that every government and every opposition in Australia want to see an NDIS established in this country. That is why at the COAG before last it was disappointing that the Prime Minister could not rise above her partisan instincts on this issue, and it is to the credit of the Victorian and New South Wales governments that they continued to negotiate in the face of public attack and misrepresentation by the federal government and reached agreement to host launch sites. It is a bit sad that politics has entered into this debate at any level. I hope that the politics will be forgotten in further meetings at COAG and that there will be a spirit of cooperation to ensure that this very worthy legislation is put into practice to benefit the disabled people in our community.

There cannot be a meaningful NDIS without an intergovernmental agreement with each state and territory, and that is something that is yet to be negotiated. Given that, I would like to say a few words in defence of the states who have perhaps been misrepresented as not hosting a launch site. I do not think that means they do not support the NDIS but that they have some concerns about details. It has to be said that the Productivity Commission never envisaged every state hosting a launch site and never saw the absence of a launch site as a bar to taking a full part in the national rollout.

In particular, as a Western Australian I have supported the decision of Premier Barnett who has written to the Prime Minister proposing a joint WA-Commonwealth NDIS be set up. Western Australia has its own problems in terms of distance and the vast size of the state and there are some special local factors which have to be taken into consideration.

We on the coalition side emphatically supported the government's commitment of $1 billion to the NDIS in the last federal budget. I must say we had some difficulty that the sum was only $1 billion when, in fact, the Productivity Commission's recommendation was that at least $3.9 billion would be necessary over the forward estimates for the first phase of the NDIS. We can only hope that more money will be forthcoming in the budget in May and, of course, only time will tell how much money is needed to really make this scheme effective. I hope, in the spirit of the nobleness of the endeavour to ensure that disabled people in this country are able to realise their potential and live in dignity, that there will not be arguments about penny pinching and that the money will be available for this scheme.

The scheme will provide funding to individuals or organisations to help people with disability to participate more fully in economic and social life through the provision of entitlements enabling such things as aids, equipment, supported accommodation and personal attendant care.

The history of this National Disability Insurance Scheme is that the idea has been around for a long time, but people only began giving serious consideration to a national disability insurance scheme over the last five years. It is appropriate to acknowledge the role played by figures on both sides of the chamber in helping to elevate the public policy profile of disability. But the lion's share of the credit must go to those people who have disabilities, their families, their carers and the organisations who support them. These people came together because they decided that in modern, prosperous, wealthy Australia enough was enough and something had to be done to support the disabled people in our community. This is a long overdue measure. In particular, I acknowledge that in Western Australia, our Premier, Colin Barnett, has supported this concept and I know the differences are not, as I have said, ones of principle but merely of detail. There are some particular West Australian factors to be built in to an NDIS in Western Australia.

In conclusion, this is a historic step forward for the Australian community, and the NDIS is very much in the spirit of giving everybody a fair go, a quintessential Aussie value.

Helen Kroger (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to make some brief observations on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2013. I note that in the second reading speech of the shadow minister, Mitch Fifield, he outlined in essence the two principal purposes of this bill. I will not speak to the construct of the bill, but I would like to take the opportunity to recognise and acknowledge the significance of the difference that the implementation of this legislation will make to the lives of so many people. The bill has bipartisan support in this chamber. I am delighted to see that because of the huge impact it will ultimately have on families who deal with disabilities and individuals who deal with disabilities. It will provide them with opportunities and choices. In that way it will in effect change individuals' lives.

When you look at the facts, it is quite compelling to see that some 400,000 people in Australia live with disabilities. That is a number that unfortunately, for whatever reason, is on the rise. Some 400,000 individuals suffer from disabilities—that is, in essence more than 400,000 families that have to deal with the impact of disabilities and provide for the impact of disabilities. It is regrettable that it has taken this time for us to come up with a framework for a national disability insurance scheme, a framework that we all support. The Productivity Commission looked into the scheme in around 2009. It is on the advice of the Productivity Commission that an enormous amount of work has gone into the determination of its structure, framework, and planning as to how this should apply. There has also been a good and effective consultative process to come to where we are today.

The reason it is so heartening is that there is no quick fix for this issue. It is not a situation where one model will fit all. The model must be able to be tailored to the needs of the individual and ultimately will, I hope, not only support the physical challenges faced by those with disabilities but also provide critical psychological and emotional support for families and friends in the lifelong challenge they face and live with. Most of us know someone with a disability or we know families or friends dealing with people with disabilities, so we know first-hand what is required for those families to cope through a lifetime.

In the Senate over the last 12 months we seem to have had a huge population growth, with senators having the joy of a baby entering their lives, either as parents or grandparents. We know, particularly in the last 12 months on the coalition side, that there is one heartfelt wish of those parents or grandparents—that is, the newborns have 10 fingers and 10 toes and they are healthy. That is their one wish: that those children are healthy. As we know, that is not always the case. It is a real issue for those who have to deal with beautiful children who are born with disabilities, or may develop them later on in life.

Since I was elected as a senator, one of the things that has presented to me as an opportunity, which I do not know that I would have had if I had not been elected to the Senate, is to actually visit a number of places that are either early intervention centres, employment workplaces for those with disabilities or other workplaces that provide varying ranges of support services for families. The one thing that strikes you when you attend all of these facilities is the extraordinary love, honesty and goodwill that those with disabilities automatically share and present to all whom they meet. They just have such a wonderful temperament—so many of them. Sometimes, I think that we perhaps could take a leaf out of their books in the way in which we deal with each other in this place, because the degree of goodwill that is shared when you visit so many of these places is so apparent. One thing that strikes me as much as anything is this wonderful sense of humour so many have, and they are very quick to take the mickey out of you. As a politician, I think it is a very good thing to rock up somewhere and have a young child or even an adult take the mickey out of you as you are visiting a particular place. In the main, they just have such wonderful senses of humour, and it is something that I do not know whether I would have had the opportunity to meet so many and attend so many places as I have as a senator. In my patron seats there is a large number of support services and a couple of those that I want to mention in making my short observations.

I firstly acknowledge the families. I know a number of families whose lives changed for their lifetime and for their children's lifetime when they had children with disabilities. They have become full-time carers for individuals from the moment those children were born through the life of the parents, and it depends on the degree of disability as to the extent to which that 24/7 care has been necessary. I am reminded of someone very close to me who has a daughter who has dramatic challenges and needs 24/7 care. She made observations to me not so long ago when her daughter turned 18 about the level of services that they could no longer access and how their economic capacity to raise income in that household was dramatically reduced by the amount of care that they had to provide. It was a bit of a vicious cycle. Their No. 1 overarching concern was what was going to happen to their daughter once they could no longer provide the care that they had, whether because they physically could not or because they financially could not. We have see many instances where ageing parents have expressed their concern about what was going to happen and they have had to put their adult children into aged care facilities because there were no services or residential care available for them to put their disabled adult daughter or son into an appropriate residential facility. You have circumstances where a young 20-year-old has had to be put into an aged-care facility, which is a great tragedy.

I would like to come to a couple of places that I have visited that do a tremendous job. I know that this bill will reinforce the support that the families are able to provide for their children. The first is a specialist early childhood centre in Bayswater in the electorate of Deakin in Victoria. It is an early childhood intervention service called Irabina. I had the great fortune of going there a few months ago because an extraordinarily generous Victorian, Chris Malcolm, the managing director of Clark Rubber, an incredibly philanthropic and generous individual, made a donation, with the Liberal Party, to Irabina to support some services that they are providing. They provided thousands of dollars worth of goods that would assist with early intervention for those children.

Irabina has programs that are family centred for preschool age children. It is a program targeted at early intervention for children diagnosed with or suspected to have autism spectrum disorder. I did not jump into the pool but I joined in with activities they had in the swimming pool. I saw firsthand how early intervention for children that are diagnosed early in their lifetime with autism spectrum disorder can actually break the cycle and assist them in developing the skills and developing learning capacities so that they can then enter a mainstream school and, in many cases, go on to be able to reach their personal and true potential. In many cases for these families this early intervention is a life-changing opportunity.

One of the mothers I spoke to was saying that with this particular scheme there is support provided, but it does not cover the intensive therapies required. This legislation, because it is tailored towards individuals, which is one of the elements I strongly applaud, will provide individual financial support as is needed.

Another facility I visited with the coalition leader, Tony Abbott, and shadow minister, Senator Mitch Fifield, was in Nunawading. Nadrasca in Nunawading is a great place, and Senator Fifield has been there on a number of occasions. Nadrasca was established in 1967. Its purpose when established was to develop a range of services for people with a disability. The organisation has developed and evolved over time. It currently provides a range of services and employment for over 350 people with a disability. It employs approximately 150 permanent, part-time and casual staff across all their services to assist their clients.

The services that they support and provide include—and this is not a comprehensive account—a disability-supported employment service; a service that provides daily programs and activities for persons with significant disabilities; and accommodation services which include 24-hour care and independent living as well as recreational and holiday programs, all of which are tailored to the needs of individual families. Nadrasca Industry is a critical and essential part of the organisational structure of support for disability services because it provides employment and vocational training opportunities for people with a disability and generates revenue in addition to government funding. It generates revenue which is put back into the system to provide greater support.

Recollecting our most recent visit there, it was a great example of how they support people with disabilities and also the diversity of those who might be intellectually or physically disabled. It really does ground you. It was very hard, and it was great to see the leader of the coalition, Tony Abbott, put in a headlock by those working on the factory floor because they did not want him to leave. I do not think I got the same response—I do not know about you, Senator Fifield—but they had the leader in a headlock at one stage! Our program of visits which were scheduled while we were there for an hour or so was rolled out to probably double that—I do not know quite how long we were there in the end—because they did not want us to leave. They loved the engagement; they loved the opportunity to be able to offer and be involved in meaningful activities. This is what is so critical.

I acknowledge the importance of early intervention and therapy, because one-on-one sessions can identify learning issues. I am sure we all know of a lot of examples where diagnosis and early intervention have enabled individuals to go on into—for want of a better word—mainstream activities, mainstream schools and mainstream workplaces. It has to be our No. 1 goal to support people to do that. Early intervention does that through improving fiscal competency and may even slow or minimise the progression of a particular disability.

In essence, this legislation ultimately provides a greater choice for families. What it does is give a greater raft of opportunities for families, and various courses that they can take, so that they can provide greater support and so that we can provide greater support for them. The No. 1, fundamental thing is to appreciate and recognise those with disabilities and to give them the opportunity to be involved. I do not mean to say this in a patronising way, but they may be able to make an active contribution to society. They do now, and this provides a great opportunity for them to do that even more. I strongly support this and I would like, in closing, to recognise and acknowledge all those unsung Australian heroes who basically have held the disability sector together and who have supported what is an enormous, important area and task. I would like to pay my deepest respect to them.

Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2013, and do so to support the bill.

I am sure that everybody who has stood in this place so far to speak on this particular bill would have risen and said that as parents—and most of us probably are parents—the one thing that you consider yourself very lucky for is when you have your children and your children come out 'with 10 toes and 10 fingers', as the senator said before. But there are many people who do not have that luxury. I think we do need to acknowledge that most of us in this place are extremely lucky because we have the luxury of not having to deal with the issue of disability on a firsthand basis.

There is certainly no doubt that everybody is touched by disability, or knows somebody who has the big task of looking after somebody with a disability, whether that be a mental, physical, emotional or challenging social disability. We all need to realise that in the blink of an eye that can change. I am sure many of us here know that as a result of accident, misfortune, illness or disease that in one minute what is otherwise a household of perfectly healthy people who get up every morning and get on with their lives can change 'just like that'.

In speaking to this bill I would like to make three points. Firstly, I believe an issue such as disability, and particularly how we as a society deal with disability, needs to be above partisan politics. This is not something that we can score points on, and nor should we even try to score points on it. What we should be doing is working together, all parties, whether we be the Liberal Party, the National Party, the Labor Party, the Greens or our Independent colleagues who sit here. We all need to be working towards a solution that is going to make the lives of people who are disabled in this country and of the people who have to care for them day in, day out and night in, night out easier. I think we do need to make a very clear distinction that any political game that is played with this particular piece of legislation is an absolute disgrace, and anybody who does that should be entirely ashamed of themselves.

I think everybody acknowledges that the current model of disability is broken. You only have to look around Australia to realise that if you live in one state or another state you will have matters in relation to disability treated differently. It depends on how your disability occurred; whether you are born with a disability. If you are going to have a disability you are probably better off to have one as a result of an accident, where you can sue someone. It does seem quite extraordinary that where you live and the nature of how your disability occurred can have such an extraordinary impact on the resources and support that you get for that particular disability.

A classic example of just how intense this can become is that in South Australia at the last state election a party was set up called Dignity for the Disabled, and that single-issue party actually managed to achieve a spot in the Legislative Council in South Australia. A young lady by the name of Kelly Vincent, who is disabled herself—wheelchair bound—was elected to the Legislative Council in South Australia. That was a complete and utter direct response to the fact that the South Australian disability system had completely let down people with a disability in South Australia. So we now have Kelly advocating from within the House of Parliament in Adelaide in relation to disability issues. I think that is an absolute reflection of the community's support for assistance and for some sensible measures to be taken in relation to how we deal with disability; the fact that we have a member of parliament who has gone into parliament simply because of the issue of how disabilities were being handled in the state of South Australia.

The second point I would like to make actually relates to productivity. I do not imagine that many people think of disability and productivity in the same breath, but there are a lot of people out there who have disabilities who have the capacity to add productively to the community, the environment and the economy in which they live and operate. I think we certainly need to be looking at ways in which we can give the responsibility, the onus and the ability back to people with disabilities to try to make as much of a productive contribution to their society as they possibly can.

There are a couple of programs that I would not mind bringing to the attention of the chamber. The first one is a program called the 'circles' program. It assists a person, particularly with a mental disability, to create a circle of friends—hence the reason it is called the 'circle' program. It encourages them to get out and create a new circle of friends outside of the traditional family and institutionalised care that they often get. They actually go out into the community and are encouraged to get a group of friends. Firstly, it relieves the family of the 24/7 burden of having to deal with the issues for that particular person. But it also gives them a wider network of opportunity to be able to find out what things are available for them out there.

It might be dealing with an issue of housing, it might be dealing with an issue of just going shopping. There are myriad things that people like us take for granted because we have such a wide circle of friends and contacts whom we actually draw on for all of the things—the experiences and activities—that we have in our lives. People with mental disabilities, particularly, often get shut down and they live within a very restricted cocooned environment. This circles program seeks to try and break out of that enclosed environment and allow people with disabilities the opportunity to get out.

They look to develop relationships. They create roles within these people's lives so that they can feel highly valued and can contribute. It allows them to develop competencies that they may not otherwise be able to see, simply because they do not have the opportunity to have those recognised. It also allows them to have community participation and inclusion, which is obviously a huge benefit and advantage in the quality of life of these people.

The other project that has been operating in South Australia and other states sets up microenterprise businesses. A group has set up within the community and talks to people about finding out what a disabled person really likes to do. We have one young girl in St Peters, in a suburb of Adelaide, who has set up her own microbusiness. Coincidentally her name is Fleur, French for flowers, and she has set up Fleur's Flowers. She goes around to small businesses—cafes and the like—every week and asks them if they want her to pop some flowers on their tables, and every week she goes back and she replaces those flowers. They pay her a reasonable, nominal amount. It is only just a little bit more than the cost of the flowers, but she has now got a purpose and so every morning she gets out of bed and goes down to the flower market. She buys her flowers and works out how many flowers she can do for the amount that she is charging each one of these businesses. She now has a productive purpose in life and she is actually earning a little bit of money. Even though she is certainly not removing the need for the assistance that she would otherwise have, she is actually supplementing her income and the support that she requires from outside by earning a little bit of money of her own.

Another amazing example of this particular project is a young man in Perth. When he was asked about the things he really liked to do, he said that he really liked waiting. Everybody thought, 'What do we do with somebody who really likes waiting?' They went through a myriad of other things that he might possibly like to do or might be interested in, but he was not interested. He just wanted to wait. Some inventive person actually came up with an idea. I do not know how many of you have been really annoyed when you need your telephone fixing or your power needs to be fixed and the guy at the utilities department says that they will be there sometime between nine o'clock and three o'clock in the afternoon. All of us have to go to work and it becomes very difficult, because you have to rush home or whatever. They have set up a microbusiness for this chap where he goes and sits in your house and waits for the tradesman to come along. He will let them in and then he will stand there and look after them and make sure that they are not damaging the house. He obviously gets paid a nominal amount for doing that, but he saves you the problem of actually having to stay home.

There are a lot of these inventive little businesses that some of these programs can look at. Those are the kinds of activities that we need to be looking at so that we can actually have a productive approach to how we deal with disabilities. It is about the efficient use of resources. It is about giving the people who know best—the people on the ground and who are dealing with these disabilities day in, day out, and even to some extent those people who do have disabilities—the opportunity to have a say in what happens to the money that is involved with disability. They are probably the people who are going to best placed to get the money spent where the money needs to be spent, instead of wasting it, as so often is the case in bureaucracy, on the administration—or people justifying the process of getting where they are going instead of spending money on productive outcomes for the people and places that need it.

Lastly, I want to talk about funding. The most important thing with any of these schemes is about getting the funding and getting on with the job. I notice that the Productivity Commission came out and suggested $3.9 billion. I understand at this stage that only $1 billion has been allocated. We need to get on with the job. We need to make a decision. We need to prioritise where this money is coming from and we need to get on with the job of implementing this program. We need the details about how it is going to get out there so that we can make sure that it is as efficient and as effective as it possibly can be.

I was just speaking this morning with a lady in South Australia, Judy Francis, who has a disabled son. In fact, she could not talk for terribly long because, even though he is 50 years old, she still has to take him to the doctor this morning. Judy was telling me that the scheme has been talked about for so long and many who are involved in disabilities—in Judy's case, in a first-hand way with her son—were all very excited when the project and the program was first raised and talked about. They thought, 'At last, at last, at last, we are going to see something happening in disabilities '. She has been working on getting appropriate housing because, like many parents who are ageing—and you can probably work out that if she has a 50-year-old son then Judy is at that stage in her life—she is looking towards achieving an ongoing care program for her son when she is no longer able to care for him. She saw the National Disability Insurance Scheme, when it was first touted, as a wonderful, wonderful opportunity where she could actually, with some comfort and some relief, have some opportunity for her son to be able to have a program put in place for when she was no longer able to care for him, as she and her husband currently do.

We need to get on with this. We certainly need to stop what Senator Kroger was talking about, which was young people with disability whose parents are no longer able to look after them who are then going into aged-care homes. That is a completely inappropriate place for our young disabled people to be located. In my own home town, when I was visiting the nursing home not that long ago, I ran into a wonderful lady who had been looking after her profoundly disabled daughter all of her life at home. She is now no longer able to look after herself and here she is in a nursing home with this young woman who is in an aged-care facility—a completely inappropriate place for her to be.

In saying that, I, like all of my colleagues, am very excited about the opportunity to do something good and innovative so that we can move on—and for the legacy of this parliament to be that we actually did something in support of the people in our society who need our help. It is a judgement that will be made. I am certainly happy to support this bill and commend that everybody support the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill.

Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill 2012. Today we are making history. Today we move, here in the Senate, to legislate a National Disability Insurance Scheme. At present, most people with a disability in Australia can expect to face a lifelong battle to achieve what the rest of us take for granted: they struggle to get the appropriate support to get out of bed, to get support for personal care with dignity, to leave their home if they have one, to get to school or work, to get a job, to be included and valued and to be part of the community.

We know we have to do better, because people with a disability deserve a fair go. We know that creating a more inclusive society is the right and decent thing to do and today, here in the Senate, we are taking a critical step in supporting people with disability to live their lives the way they want—supporting them in achieving their social and economic aspirations by having a truly inclusive Australia. Gone will be the days of pleading for assistance and having to describe one's circumstances in the worst possible light—a truly demoralising experience. Gone will be the cruel postcode lottery that currently exists. We will replace this with dignity and respect. We will transform disability services within Australia by building the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

It is a scheme that recognises that all people live within families and communities, and this will be considered throughout the planning process. The scheme will support individuals with disability to make informed decisions and therefore maintain these strong, resilient families and communities where real choices of service provider can be made to deliver client focused and tailored services.

To reach this point, to stand here today before the Senate with this bill, is a historic moment—a moment that has not just happened overnight. This has a history that dates back to the Whitlam Labor government. Forty years ago Prime Minister Whitlam sought to introduce a national compensation scheme, a fact that resonates with one of my advisers here today. And now, under another reformist Labor Prime Minister, we are here today to finish the job.

I have had the privilege of being party to some of the steps that got us here. In opposition I moved, on a number of occasions, a reference to inquire into the operation of the Commonwealth State Territory Disability Agreement, and was finally successful in 2006. This report was handed down in February 2007 and, once Labor formed government in November 2007, we got on with the job of implementing some of the recommendations. Establishing the new National Disability Agreement with dramatic increases in funding, focused outcomes and deliverables for disability programs and developing the National Disability Strategy were included in those recommendations and I am proud to say that, in true Labor fashion, we have delivered.

In July 2008 we signalled to the world our commitment to improving the lives of people with disability when we ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In Australia we have been working to fulfil our obligations under the UN convention to ensure that the mainstream service systems are focused on the principles of inclusion. In 2011, for the first time in our history, all governments—local, state, territory and our federal government—agreed to a National Disability Strategy, a unified, national approach to breaking down barriers faced by Australians with disability. Since this time we have been paving the way for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, a revolutionary reform to the way we provide care and support in our country.

The NDIS has been the goal of so many people with disability, their families and carers and the disability service sector for so many years. You have worked so hard and today is your day. Today we salute your drive and determination, your patience and persistence and your plain hard work. There are many people we need to thank for their role in this long journey: members of the National People with Disabilities and Carer Council; the Productivity Commission, notably Commissioner Patricia Scott and Associate Commissioner John Walsh; the National Disability Insurance Scheme Advisory Group; the members of the four expert working groups; the National Disability and Carer Alliance; and all our peak disability and carers bodies. Thank you to Every Australian Counts, including: the state bodies, the community campaigners and of course the 154,654 Australians who have signed up to this campaign; the 674 people who have had their say online via ndis.gov.au forums; and to all those people with disability, their family members and carers, and their service providers and advocates who have attended any one of the 70-plus forums that Minister Macklin and I have held across the country.

I also take this opportunity to put on the record my thanks to Senator Claire Moore and the members of the Community Affairs Legislation Committee for their work in recent months, talking to people right across the country and delivering a constructive and informative report. In doing so, I also thank the people who made the almost 1,600 submissions—again, we have heard you. Many tens of thousands of Australians have had a part in designing the NDIS, and it shows. To each and every one of you: you have made a significant contribution to this historic reform. Australia will be a better place for everyone because of your efforts and for that I thank you.

The National Disability Insurance Scheme will be an insurance scheme for all Australians, that will provide care and support services based on need to any Australian with a significant or profound disability regardless of how they acquired that disability, in much the same way as all Australians have access to social security and universal healthcare systems that provide entitlement to services based on need. This bill establishes the framework of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the National Disability Insurance Scheme Launch Transition Agency. It will enable the scheme to be launched and the agency to be established in five sites across Australia from July 2013. The first stage of the scheme will benefit around 26,000 people with disability and their families and carers living in South Australia, Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory, the Hunter region in New South Wales and the Barwon area of Victoria. The scheme established by this bill will transform the lives of people with disability and those of their families and carers. For the first time they will have their needs met in a way that truly supports them in living with choice and dignity. It will bring an end to the tragedy of services denied or delayed, and instead offer people with disability the care and support they need over their lifetimes. As was found by the Productivity Commission in its extensive inquiry, and I quote:

The current disability support system is underfunded, unfair, fragmented, and inefficient, and gives people with a disability little choice and no certainty of access to appropriate supports.

It needs to be fixed and it needs to be fixed now, and this bill will take a critical step in doing just that.

Every 30 minutes, on average, someone in Australia is diagnosed with a significant disability. This could be any of us, as disability does not discriminate. Only those with considerable wealth could possibly afford the costs of lifetime care that are required in response. Most Australians with a disability cannot carry this responsibility alone, nor should they be left to. This bill will implement the first stage of a nationwide, demand-driven system of care, tailored to the needs of each individual and established on a durable, long-term basis. The bill reflects the extensive work on design, funding and governance undertaken with states and territories, with people with disability, their families and carers, and with other key stakeholders, work which is ongoing as we continue to build and refine the scheme.

The current funding model, based on historical annual budget allocations, will be replaced by an insurance approach based on actuarial analysis of need and future costs. The scheme will respond to each individual's goals and aspirations for their lifetime, affording certainty and peace of mind for people with disability and their carers alike. The National Disability Insurance Scheme Launch Transition Agency will work with people to plan and to take account of their individual circumstances and needs. The scheme will give people the care and support that is objectively assessed as being reasonable and necessary over the course of their lifetime.

The bill sets out the objects and principles under which a National Disability Insurance Scheme will operate including giving people choice and control over the care and support they receive and giving effect, in part, to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. It sets out the process for a person becoming a participant in the scheme, how participants develop a personal, goal based plan with the agency and how reasonable and necessary supports will be assured to participants. People will be able to decide for themselves the type of care and support they receive and choose how they want to manage those supports. They will be able to access assistance from local coordinators, should they wish, and early intervention therapies and supports will be offered where they will improve a person's functioning or slow, or prevent, the progression of their disability over their lifetime. The bill also provides that the agency will be responsible for the provision of support to people with disability, their families and carers.

Again, I thank all of those who have contributed so far to this important debate. Some amendments have been made to the bill in the House of Representatives to address decisions made by the Council of Australian Governments, other agreements negotiated with the states and territories, and from ongoing engagement with people with disabilities, their families, carers, advocates and services providers. Those amendments also responded to some of the matters raised in submissions to the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee during its inquiry into the bill. Further amendments will be moved by the government here in the Senate. These amendments respond further to the recommendations in the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee's report on the bill, tabled last week. For example, one amendment revises the objects clause of the bill to reflect Australia's international human rights obligations more strongly and to ensure that this clause operates in conjunction with other laws. A further amendment will recognise the importance of advocacy in the lives of people with a disability.

In closing, I thank many departmental officials from FaHCSIA, including those working for the agency, Prime Minister and Cabinet, and other departments who have been engaged in the design process. Your work has been enormous. I also thank those state and territory officials from across Australia whose work has helped us to get to this point. This bill will be an enormous first step in bringing equality to people with disability, their families and carers. Our government will continue to work with people with a disability, and their families and carers, as we continue to establish a National Disability Insurance Scheme. I thank all senators who have spoken in this debate for their support of this historic legislation and commend the bill to the Senate.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.