Despite blanket opposition to the NDIS cuts from disabled people and disability advocacy groups, Labor is determined to push ahead with its devastating plan to cut $38.1 billion from the scheme and kick 240,000 disabled people off it within five years.
The Senate inquiry into Labor’s proposed legislation to radically overhaul the NDIS has been extended until 14 August, delaying the passage of the bill. The Greens refused to pass Labor’s capital gains and negative gearing tax changes unless Labor allowed the inquiry to hear more evidence about the impacts on disabled people.
Although disabled people were originally given just two weeks’ notice there were 4000 submissions to the inquiry, with the committee admitting that “NDIS participants and their loved ones are experiencing real distress regarding their understanding of the proposed changes”.
Labor and the Minister for Disability and the NDIS Mark Butler have justified the cuts by saying that the scheme is rife with fraud and the growth in costs of the NDIS are “unsustainable”.
But Treasury modelling shows that just $900 million (2.4 per cent) of Labor’s proposed $38.1 billion in cuts over the next four years will come from cracking down on fraud.
Instead the ABC reports that, “60 per cent of those overall savings would come from the cutting of participant community participation and therapy budgets ($13.2 billion over four years) and tightening access to the scheme through a new functional capacity test ($9.3 billion).”
This includes cutting $7000 in social and community participation funding for every NDIS participant.
Disability activist, actress and author Hannah Diviney, who has cerebral palsy and is an NDIS participant, told the inquiry that “without social and community participation funding, I can’t attend crucial therapies that are important for my health, wellbeing and the maintenance of the skills and strength I do have, [or] attend appointments independently without support from my parents, both of whom are in the workforce”.
Alternative supports
Labor also wants to introduce a new eligibility test designed to prevent people from accessing the scheme who supposedly have “low and moderate support needs”. States and territories are supposed to provide alternative supports for those diverted from the NDIS.
But state and territory disability ministers told the inquiry in a joint statement that “there is a significant risk that people with disability will end up in hospitals or other settings that are inappropriate and unable to meet their needs or have no access to services at all.
“States and territories are not in a position, and have made no agreement, to deliver like-for-like services to people who are exited from the NDIS.”
The federal and state governments have agreed to spend a pitiful $2 billion a year on these alternative “foundational supports” for hundreds of thousands of people, including autism support for children through Thriving Kids.
Disabled people are already not receiving enough support through the NDIS. The inquiry heard from a participant with spina bifida who needs incontinence products. He was told that he should ask companies to give him free samples as the NDIS would only fund him for half of what he needs.
Hannah Diviney closed her testimony to the inquiry by saying, “When disabled people die as a direct result of this bill, and they will, their blood will be on your hands.
“How do I know people will die? Because you will have made it impossible for them to live in so many ways.”
Fund NDIS not war
Labor has found plenty of money for nuclear submarines and weapons, increasing the military budget by $53 billion over the next decade to a staggering total of $887 billion.
Labor is not interested in the effects the NDIS cuts will have on disabled people’s lives. Its priorities are on preparing for war on China and cutting the budget deficit.
National rallies against the NDIS cuts are planned for the weekend of 1 August through the Greens-initiated Protect our NDIS Alliance. We need to fight Labor’s cuts and demand it fund welfare not warfare.
By Luke Ottavi
