Problems with the NDIS are not just caused by a few bad providers. The current system is built like a marketplace where participants are expected to manage their own care. For many people, especially people with psychosocial disability, this creates serious risks because they may not have the support, information or power needed to stay safe.
Efforts to improve the NDIS have mostly focused on adding more rules and paperwork. However, this has increased stress and administration without making participants safer or improving outcomes. At the same time, regulators do not have enough resources, participants are often left to make complaints on their own, and many workers in the sector face insecure jobs and poor conditions.
We say real reform must go beyond tougher compliance measures. The Australian Government needs to address the deeper structural problems in the NDIS, including the over-reliance on market forces, the decline of public services, and the way responsibility and risk are pushed onto participants.
We are calling on the Australian Government to:
- Invest more in the public systems that support and regulate the NDIS
- Strengthen the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission so it can act early and proactively
- Increase monitoring and enforcement of providers doing the wrong thing
- Expand independent advocacy and supported decision-making for participants
- Ensure participants are not left to manage risks on their own
- Better fund Local Area Coordination so people get practical, ongoing support
- Reform provider registration to reduce unnecessary red tape for smaller community providers
- Reduce the dominance of large for-profit providers by investing in public services
- Improve pay, training, and job security for the NDIS workforce.