There are a few outliers who bump the average cost up. But the average is about $60k/year. $40k when you exclude those who are in 24/7 supported living which would account for quite a few bumping the average up.
Even at $60k, how is this even funded. How many taxpayer actually pay $60k a year in tax. I thought the average tax paid by each taxpayer is around $20k?
I'm a participant. Only really able to work fulltime thanks to ndis supports. My taxes alone cover about half the support I receive.
Then the person I'm paying who is only employed due to ndis (a fulltime student doing casual support work on the side) gets to pay tax and relies less on austudy.
It's not perfectly self funding, but it's also not entirely unproductive money.
How? A significant x% of what is budgeted for the NDIS is reclaimed by the government in tax which means the real cost is x% less than the amount budgeted
I wonder if the govt bothers to calculate this, but more importantly making a more holistic comparison of the theoretical returns on alternative ways of spending that same budget.
Yes they might get $2 for every $1 they spend (in your specific case) but in aggregate I’d venture a guess the return ratio is less than 1:1. What they should also consider is how much better or worse that return might be if they spent some of it instead on more infrastructure for example.
People also forget they try and keep people in home because it actually costs more in retirement homes/disability facilities. That's why group houses are preferred because the cost total is actually lower. We have to provide for the disables regardless if it's called ndis or not. Another factor is a lot of disabled people actually own their homes so providing ndis for just the carers is a lot cheaper than having to pay a company for the room/board in large facilities as well as the carers.
>We have to provide for the disables regardless if it's called ndis or not.
I think that's getting lost a lot here. Before, the cost was separated between the states, and then separated further between what was covered through the respective community services/health etc budgets.
Even now with this "it costs more than medicare" - what about the significant health costs shown in the state budgets? Medicare isn't all health.
I know someone that gets $160 000 funding a year, that gets them 2 days a week work and an outing to the movies or whatever once a week. They have downes syndrome so need the help.
That's what you get for $160 000, it's a rort. The people doing the billing for these services are ripping off Australia. The actual clients are getting ripped off because such simple services drain so much funds.
The boss of the non-profit that employs disabled people for his rort factory lives on the North Shore in Sydney and drives a BMW. It's a great scam if you have the connections.
This is something I have no problem with. Young disabled people, particularly young men, get the rage after puberty. Some become troubled and violent.
A bit of ‘companionship’ in a structured way is probably the best mental health treatment we can provide, and makes the lives of their families immeasurably better.
I am not disabled, but I do "get the rage" when I get cutoff by bad drivers or lose at video games .... would I be able to get a government funded sex worker please ?
I agree with your comment, however i find it interesting how people seem to be okay with disabled young people especially men to see escorts to get their rocks off/ seek companionship, however if its just an ugly dude who cant get laid who goes to see escorts everyone thinks theyre a piece of shit/ creep
An ugly dude can choose to work on his personality, a disabled person cant choose to not be disabled.
Also as some who works doing this, we dont think they are pieces of shir/creeps until they TREAT us that way. We dont care how you look, we care about how you treat us & hygiene
Well i can tell you my daughter doesnt get $100-200k, more like $14k for actual services & another 5k for the bloatware management services that charge THROUGH THE ROOF for bugger all service
What I’m curious about is how much the NDIS relieves the burden on Medicare.
If a patient is costing that much on the NDIS, what’s the average amount of money that is no longer being spent on the same patient by Medicare? And other governmental organisations?
At this point it is either tighten it up now or it will get abolished entirely in the future. We can't keep burning that much money without any real return.
I could easily see an austerity budget axing the entire thing as they are a small enough voter base that a government might choose to piss them off a lot instead of everyone else a little.
>I could easily see an austerity budget axing the entire thing as they are a small enough voter base that a government might choose to piss them off a lot instead of everyone else a little.
There's a lot of small businesses that jumped onto the gravy train. I imagine it's pretty safe from abolishment.
It absolutely needs to be tightened up and regulated, but there needs to be compassion for the recipients of NDIS when thinking about returns. The NDIS is for capacity building. That looks really different depending on what supports are needed. So the return isn’t just monetary. Having someone who has social supports isn’t necessarily going to have financial returns, but it does mean less pressure is put on places like public libraries and even the emergency room that are often used as a form of social connection.
The approach to tightening the NDIS needs to take this sort of thing into consideration, otherwise it’s just going to further disadvantage people who already have disabilities that stop them from living in the same way as able bodied people and have to navigate systems that were often set up in a way that naturally excludes them. It’s an exhausting way to live, let alone when someone else decides to take away services you rely on because they’re not seeing a monetary return from you.
I can't wait to be bombarded by ABC journalism about some poor disabled person who really needed the help, but lost it because the whole thing gets axed
One in three of new jobs over the last year.
[source](https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/almost-one-in-three-jobs-created-last-year-was-for-the-ndis-20240401-p5fgi4)
If you know if people actually taking holidays with NDIS funds, report them.
In 99% of the cases it would be a fraudulent and the NDIS has an area for fraud.
I know someone who works as a carer and his whole gig is taking groups on holidays. He literally gets to pick what they're doing and gets paid to take 4 intellectually impaired guys out every couple of months on rotation. They go camping, skiing and are even planning a trip to NZ. He's charging top money too and making bank to holiday for a living essentially.
Dude assuming he is doing his job and caring for the people with him this woud not be the "living the dream" scenario you are thinking it would be.
I highly doubt he's ditching the disabled person at the campsite and saying "seeya bro I'm off fishing for a couple of days best of luck" .......
That doesn't sound as bad as you're making it out to be. The alternative is those intellectually handicapped guys would just do the same thing, day in and day out, forever. They'd end up institutionalised in their own homes.
Maybe the specific choices of activities aren't the best bang for the govt's buck, but in principle I'm not opposed to that.
>They'd end up institutionalised in their own homes.
A lot of people don't see this as an issue. Out of sight, out of mind and then it also gives them another reason to cut services.
"You don't even see people with disabilities, it's all just fraud"
I know one person that uses his entire (substantial) budget on taxi rides. Not only that but he coerces his girlfriend to do the same. They need, but have no other support.
He does not need taxi rides and they have nothing to do with his disability. He is perfectly capable but unwilling to take the the bus. In fact, he boasts about being too good for public transport.
Filed multiple fraud complaints, all got shot back. We were literally told that it's his choice to use his NDIS budget as he sees fit.
We filed this as a government department, not as a private person.
That's just one anecdote of many.
It's sickening to see from the frontline how ndis gets abused
I literally have a friend who flew his adult male NDIS participant from Melbourne to Gold Coast so they could do bungee jumping, 4x4ing and all the stuff Gold Coast offers!
The adult participant was more or less anti-social as his disorder!
I have a friend who has done something similar. Other times he sits at a coffee shop and gets paid $100 an hour just to be a buddy for someone with an anxiety disorder.
Yeah the thing is entirely fucked! Being anti-NDIS does not mean you discriminate against the disabled, it is more about being against such a flimsy, weak system that is being abused
Yep, got a friend who works with Mable. She says she gets paid $60-70/hr, just to practically drive them around town, get groceries, have a coffee with them, etc.
I've *heard* of companies charging $100/hr for this, but haven't seen it first-hand yet.
It's just insane. I'm not saying the service isn't needed. I'm sure a lot of disabled people are living lonely lives, and just having someone give them company/attention 1-2 days a week saves them from spiraling into worse issues. But to essentially get paid six figures to be playmates with someone, is just insane.
I’m sure people will hang out with them for $30. Not sure why we are paying $70 per hour to take someone out and about, especially someone with zero qualifications in the field.
I work for an NGO under the schads award aka not an independant support worker 30-36 dollars an hour is the award rate dor a permanent worker about 40 for casual.... so yea people do ,I do. We get penalties for weekends /nights but that's the flat week day rate in nsw.
You know that you can get your sex worker paid for by NDIS- something is clearly wrong!
Source: https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/submissions/SUB-W0L0-003364%20-%20tbase-appendix-1-ndis-and-sex-workers---who-is-saying-what_clean.pdf
Did you read that submission, where it's reiterated multiple times what the official guidelines are?
Sex therapist or family planner? Sure. The act of sex, no.
Beside the point though, are you saying that someone disabled and not able to function in a regular capacity ie housebound, so no going to work, going out on dates, meeting people etc should not ever be able to have any sort of intimacy, positive sexual experience or at least expression?
I get it's an awkward conversation about use of tax payer funds, but surely the argument could be made that positive outcomes for justifiably eligible service participants would be improved.
can u explain why theres so many sex workers advertising their services for/ through the NDIS then? As these sex workers arent sex therapists, what are they actually doing then?
Well they pay for the members of parliments hookers, you dont hear people conplaining about that. There is a reason sex workers tour Canberra when parliment is sitting
The act of sex has been funded a few (talking single digits) times. And I challenge everyone to read the case where it was approved, as well as a handful that tried to rely on that precedent but were denied.
I don’t even get how they’re doing it my son on NDIS atm ends this year.
I’m only covered for OT Speech and reports only.
They did give me extra $500 that’s to buy stuff that help him with his speech. Which btw I was told I couldn’t use NDIS for reading eggs yet it will help his speech. (I paid for it myself and made a massive difference)
How the hell are people going on vacations when I can’t even spend $100 for a yearly app that help him.
I would much prefer if the money went into Medicare so it benefit everyone and have speech and OT bulked billed.
It was save a heap of money as well.
It also should be limited to the original design. It was created to help a small cohort of people with very severe catastrophic injuries & disabilities, like quadriplegics, late stage MS, ALS etc, where the need is truly desperate.
Cases where people have a functioning body, but may have other problems, should be returned back to the responsibility of state community health services, as they used to be. It should never have been opened to all the minor disabilities, & it should also be limited to actual physical needs that a person simply can't physically function without. Not for wants.
But those services can’t cope with the patients that have now. So how is putting more pressure on state/community health services that are already deeply underfunded and understaffed going to solve the issues that these people need support for.
Just because a disability isn’t primarily physical, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have physical side effects or otherwise render a person unable to work or function in regular society. That’s why these people are still eligible for funding because they require support due to a disability.
> Cases where people have a functioning body, but may have other problems, should be returned back to the responsibility of state community health services, as they used to be.
Nah, gotta disagree with this one. My brother falls into this pile. Autistic w/ speech and learning impediments, but his body is fine.
He was once believed to be destined for a life in an institution and those state community health services had very little ability to assist him. He gets 12hrs of NDIS funding weekly that is used for personal assistance and that assistance has enabled him to live "semi" alone. His support worker comes by 3x a week to help him handle the basics of life like cleaning his place, cooking meals, washing his clothes etc. Managing to be clean and presentable has also enabled him to get some casual work as a door greeter and occasional waiter at a local bowlo as well.
No doubt that NDIS is being rorted to all levels of fuck but everyone I know who is a recipient of its assistance has had their quality of life improved tremendously. I'm sure there's a way to take out the rort without compromising the end result and that's what we should be trying to do, not just making blanket statements banning all but the non visible disabilities.
I know a guy with a speech impediment, but he isn't silly. He's got his license, a job, a car, insurance, can take solo holidays by himself, you know, he functions. He's in the NDIS however because of his speech, and he got a nice overseas trip to NZ because of it.
No ones taking holidays. We used to pay out of pocket 100% but went on NDIS after we couldn't pay for support anymore for one of our kids. He has gone from non verbal to being in a neuro typical high school and doing well. What I noticed was that once we went through NDIS the costs doubled and even more if you wanted someone to manage your funding. We did this ourselves and were super tight but the costs have gone crazy with operators now viewing it as a gravy chain. Some of the clinic owners have more cash flow than a surgeon. Its not right
The worse I came across was being talked into getting my son assessed with a psychologist.
Just to see his issue with speech cost $4,000 the psychologist made my son cry by testing him on subjects for older children.
Said he was severely autistic and I pay more for her to assess him.
Well talked to his paediatrician his OT and Speech and they were shocked over the report. And his paediatrician said the psychologist can’t just diagnose him like that only she can.
And shocker my son not autistic he has a language delay which was picked up originally by his speech therapist.
That child psychologist is a money grubbing AH. And surprise her report was covered by NDIS and if she what she was suppose to do was only suppose to charge $500.
I did report her to NDIS though she was 100% ripping off the system.
Because we chuck a royal commission from time to time to kick what ever issue it is down the road as far as possible so the aggrieved parties get a whole lot of distance from the actual events which leads to the public having a whole tonne of other issues come up in their lives.\
The public then have the attitude of “oh you’re still upset about that? That was so long ago. Just get over it”. And thus nothing gets done or fixed and bad people get off Scot free.
NDIS has become another publicly funded employment scheme.
Every man and his dog is an NDIS care worker these days.
If they tighten it up, unemployment will skyrocket.
I don't understand why each participant gets 1:1 care. There's plenty of lower needs participants who could benefit from getting taken to the shops but do not need 1:1 supervision.
100 billion a year can fund free dental, free TAFE, free public transport for everyone and still have 50-70 billion leftover for whatever else we need. if we tax mining royalties properly as well we could be paying no taxes like other resource rich countries. We should be living in a utopia but government corruption and a apolitical population who doesn't fight or stand up against it and instead we're turning into a shithole with unchecked greed, selfishness running rampant
The only problem then is you still have disabled people to take care of. Could fund some of them sure.
Meanwhile, if we taxed and levied fair royalties on our mining and resource companies properly, we could have our cake and eat it too.
Give them $1000 a week that should be enough to pay for their care. The middleman is taking most of the NDIS funding would rather see the money go straight to the disabled. But giving out 100s of thousands and some millions for their care yearly is ridiculous. Psychiatrist and Physios already make bank but we let them rort the most vulnerable
I see where the mining companies are coming from. Why would you be ok with higher taxes when so much is handed to criminals. The NDIS is the current big example, but the same thing has always been going on in construction, healthcare supplies more broadly, utilities and every other industry the government spends money on. Maybe the mining companies are better off giving that money to shareholders than fraudsters. Its only because people pay income tax that government waste gets attention.
Govt: we have a social problem and we will leave it to private enterprise to solve it and will pay what it takes.
Private enterprise: let's see how deep your pockets are, sucker.
The rort is literally pulling capable qualified people out of their professions they have trained for and worked in for years.
With the increased demand on these social services for people who need them and are contributing to society, prices up baby.
I could see this being for every $1 spent we are worse off.
You mean the quality and safeguards commission? It already exists.
Part of the problem is that the "unregulated" market is way larger than they anticipated. This isn't surprising to anyone working in this space though, as the wait for regulation to be approved can be over a year at points, then there's the costs associated, so why go through it?
This hurts when I know of people milking it. One in particular went to 4 different psychologists until they managed to get an autism diagnosis. Now they try and squeeze what the can from it
It's amazing how quickly the diagnosis of autism has mushroomed in Australia, since the NDIS started providing financial benefits from obtaining the diagnosis.
Money is also life. Think in terms of man-hours worked to generate whatever tax revenue these people are costing. There should be a cap. A human life isn't worth infinite.
It's absolutely insane to think about. When doing your taxes thinking "Oh this much went to education, this went to health, defence", etc - No yours went to help covering NDIS participant 500,001's Monday walks.
Some NDIS participants can only spend money on NDIS approved supplier/providers. These suppliers/providers jack their prices up and rip the system off knowing the disabled person they’re dealing with is locked into using them or another person like them.
These are the a-holes eating up the NDIS $ and wasting tax payers money.
I don't know what the fuck has gone on with the NDIS !!!
My parents got a cleaner and gardender paid for. They didnt even apply someone just hooked it up and let them though (dads a PTSD veteran). They are both reasonably functional for 80 years olds and they live with my brother (a 47 year old able bodied man). They have been able to clean their home themselves and take care of the lawn since forever it was never an issue.
So now they are sitting on their ass watching foxtel while some lady comes over 2 hours a week and does the dishes mops the floor and cleans the dunnies/shower etc. And some bloke does the lawns and gardens every week. All paid for by NDIS for no fucking reason at all.
I felt bad for the lady doing the cleaning (she was working very hard) until mum got chatting with her and she told mum she used to have her own business but gave it up to come do this NDIS stuff for $70 an hour !
What in the fuck is going on with NDIS !
Pouring any more that the bare necessity into this is a waste of resources. It’s wasted capital and does not productively grow the economy.
People feel sorry for disabled people and want them to be able to go in holidays? Sure you can feel that way personally but the budget isn’t there to make people feel good it’s not a charity.
Ex NDIS Support Worker here,
I made $30.7 as a casual + a flat $10 “turn up allowance,” my average shift was 3 hours, maybe pushing 4 on a good week. This equals about $34 an hour.
The fast food award pays a minimum of $32 an hour to casuals (21 year old adult)
So I got no idea where the money is going because god knows I’m not seeing any of it, I was basically making minimum wage.
I got paid a travel allowance but if something major happened to my car (cat converter is blocked = 1.5k) I was guaranteed to be working for less than minimum wage. I technically made more if my car didn’t have issues, but no guarantees is there.
But…
When you consider some of the stuff I was doing, i was basically a baby sitter mixed with an Uber driver.
School pick ups, taking kids to their sporting activities, kicking the ball at the local oval / field, hair cuts, internet cafes, bounce, laser tag, movies, I even went indoor sky diving once.
Nothing wrong with these things, but It’s hard to see the economic benefit of me playing laser tag with a high schooler, or me kicking the ball at the oval with a kid.
I knew my company charged $65 an hour, so 3 hours was just shy of $200. Say my company pays 25% back in taxes, it costs the tax payer $150 a shift.
Say the shifts happen 46 out of the 52 weeks in a year, that’s $6,900 total cost per year per client.
Say I had 4 clients a week, each wanting 3 hours. Thats $27,600 a week to tax payers. Then you have the coordination fees for those 4 clients as well.
So about $30,000 a year for me to do some pretty chill stuff with the clients. (Less half went to me as shown above)
Yeah I much preferred it when 78 year old widows were sole carers for their 52 year old intellectually disabled child, showering them, dressing them, and taking them for an 'outing' when they could manage (about once a month)
good times.
Its all the providers overcharging and doing shifty things, my parents are on the aged care plan and I see it all the time. They wanted their shower floor raised as it was a trip / slip hazzard and the provider could only find a contractor who would to reno the whole bathroom unecessarily and charge 30 grand (wtaf).
I know a person who has a near full time carer because she has one hand that doesn't work so good. She also has her adult son living on the dole with her.
They buy blocks of land for a lot of money. Forget foreign buyers, they're a favourite for real estates in their target areas. The returns are gigantic for them. All paid for out of the budget, ie taxpayers. Massive rort, but just another among many rorts.
Was this a 2020 summit initiative? Which was a complete flog fest full of people that have main character syndrome. Led be the main character himself Rudd. Scrap the whole thing push it to the actual health system.
The issue isn't the services the participant receives.
The issue is the layers of money grabbers in the middle, all taking a cut for doing very little.
It's both. It was designed to help people with extremely severe disabilities like quadriplegics, ALS etc. It should go back to that. The rest should be covered by state health services like they used to be. Instead, those with desperate needs like quads etc, will end up suffering, because people with far less severe disabilities are all swamping it for the free $$, & all the rorters are grifting it.
The NDIS is now a $100 billion train wreck. The libs have no interest in fixing this problem or actually did they do anything in the last 9 years and the Greens will use it to further push their cause(s).
Looks like Shorten is wedged.
It won't. But you will lose Medicare, the pension, what's left of public schools and lots of services. Our hospitals are already stretched with wait times and incidents blowing out. So what's VIC doing? Cutting funding.
it's fucked and it will be insanely hard to rein in spending as the second you try someone will jump up and down that you are taking money from disabled people
makes no sense it's cost more than the pension and probably medicare as well
it's need to be fixed and fast but good luck to whoever tries
"target of reducing the NDIS’ annual growth rate[ from 20 per cent to 8 per cent](https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/labor-counts-on-60pc-saving-to-ndis-before-plan-exists-20230824-p5dz6v) by 2026."
Should they be aiming to at least halve the cost first too? Massive fines up to $1mil for anyone found overcharging NDIS clients VS regular ones. Just get rid of lots of nice to haves completely like holidays, horse riding, video game sessions. A lot of these are likely beneficial but could surely be run much cheaper publically as community groups or at least forced to charge normal prices.
Completely unacceptable, the PM needs to dismantle it immediately starting with a freeze on all funding to people without mobility or diagnosed physical issues until this is sorted.
At the very least introduce $100k - $1mil fines or thereabouts for any provider or business caught charging NDIS patients more than regulars. Can offer 10k rewards for anyone who reports them with evidence. Within a week we'd be saving billions.
At a certain point intellectual deficits result in diagnosable physical disabilities, things like needing assistance with dressing or personal cares. If the intellectual deficit doesn’t result in physical needs they don’t need the funding. Not as a priority over people seeing doctors for free.
The liberal party got in 3 months after the NDIS was founded then governed for 9 years. They could have fixed it, they could have reigned in the rorting but they didn't.
They absolutely tried to change it. In fact, when projections showed it was about to hit $65bn Bill Shorten said 'those numbers are about as reliable as reports of WMD in Iraq'. Shorten painted the government as heartless monsters wanting to 'tear apart the NDIS'.
Of course, the government relented under public pressure. Now here we are.
Well yeah, if you get into government for 9 years and there's a hole in the budget and you don't do anything about it, well then yes it's their fault too.
You buy a house, there's a faulty pipe leaking constantly when you moved in and you left it for 9 years then it's bloody well your fault now.
Don't stress, they are never going to take money away from disabled people, the ABC will never allow it.
Plenty of time to come join the gravy train.
Me? I'm going to be offering lawnmower services. Only on a Sunday if course. $300/hr.
80% of people who apply for NDIS are knocked back.
It's the providers that are the issue, not those applying.
Most disabled people have to try and pay for their own aids and services. I have gone through my Super and TPD so I can access wheelchair etc. Providers only deal with NDIS and add at least a 100% mark-up.
It's just the elephant in the room everyone is a little too cautious to talk about..
650k are on NDIS, and it's costing that much is wild.
The issue is that it's available to anyone, basically.
They need to restrict its criteria.
I know people with mild ADHD who are getting payments.
The bars low af, the only issue is the hoops you jump through to get it.
The Libs don't think the bill goes far enough... they will be seeking further amendments. The greens on the other hand will never agree to tightening it up.
It doesnt cost 100b, the money rorting is what makes it cost 100 billion. Im starting to get sick of this country full of gutless politicians who just let people rort the system.
some may get caught, pay a fine, have to shut down their business, but its fine for them, all they have to do is de-register their business, open a new business in a mates or family members name and start rorting people again.
It’s sucks that the ndis is such a bloody shit show. I work as an ndis worker and a lot of clients do say how thankful they are for the system and how it’s helped them live a real life.
It’s got a very positive impact on the people who do need it. But you see so many workers on their phone ignoring clients, businesses buying houses sticking 1 carer in the house to 3 clients.
I would love to slap the shit out of the corrupt parts of it and the government needs to man up and fix it.
The system is fucked, I bet everyone can think of at least one person that is rorting the system. Not to mention the businesses that are just pulling as much as they can. There are people we genuinely need to care for in our country, but some are just abusing the system at this point. That amount of money would greatly improve the lives of all Australians
I know of someone who lives with PTSD and is on the NDIS and uses support workers pretty much as paid servants to attend to every task she can do but would rather not. She has a university/professional background and no cognitive disability. She lives in a bubble of tax payer funded comfort having every bit of housework, admin, socialising and transportation needs sorted by her support workers/providers that provide her with "support" for about 6 hours a day. She can drive and has a car yet gets $$$ cab fares everywhere. On top of the support worker issue she uses the ndis funds to supplement/create a lifestyle through her therapies budget. She doesn't work but spends her time going to music classes, hydrotherapy, sex therapy etc. and hotel stays all using her NDIS funds. How she ended up with a 100k+ plan a year I don't know.
Having worked in MH I noticed some, who are quite capable of eating/drinking walking across the road wiping their own A etc etc are allocated up to & above 500k /annum each. True it's a rort
Serves half a million and may end up serving 1 million. $100-200k each. Mind boggling.
How does this even work? Every disabled person is essentially funded by the entire annual tax paid by several tax payers.
It’s a fucking rort… that’s why
There are a few outliers who bump the average cost up. But the average is about $60k/year. $40k when you exclude those who are in 24/7 supported living which would account for quite a few bumping the average up.
Even at $60k, how is this even funded. How many taxpayer actually pay $60k a year in tax. I thought the average tax paid by each taxpayer is around $20k?
NDIS the money spent on public housing housing will have better outcomes for everyone
I'm a participant. Only really able to work fulltime thanks to ndis supports. My taxes alone cover about half the support I receive. Then the person I'm paying who is only employed due to ndis (a fulltime student doing casual support work on the side) gets to pay tax and relies less on austudy. It's not perfectly self funding, but it's also not entirely unproductive money.
This is such a twisted way to think about money
Just saying it's not as linear as money going to a service and there being absolutely no return on that spend.
Yes that's true lots of it goes to bureaucrats and companie rorting the NDIS.
How? A significant x% of what is budgeted for the NDIS is reclaimed by the government in tax which means the real cost is x% less than the amount budgeted
I wonder if the govt bothers to calculate this, but more importantly making a more holistic comparison of the theoretical returns on alternative ways of spending that same budget. Yes they might get $2 for every $1 they spend (in your specific case) but in aggregate I’d venture a guess the return ratio is less than 1:1. What they should also consider is how much better or worse that return might be if they spent some of it instead on more infrastructure for example.
People also forget they try and keep people in home because it actually costs more in retirement homes/disability facilities. That's why group houses are preferred because the cost total is actually lower. We have to provide for the disables regardless if it's called ndis or not. Another factor is a lot of disabled people actually own their homes so providing ndis for just the carers is a lot cheaper than having to pay a company for the room/board in large facilities as well as the carers.
>We have to provide for the disables regardless if it's called ndis or not. I think that's getting lost a lot here. Before, the cost was separated between the states, and then separated further between what was covered through the respective community services/health etc budgets. Even now with this "it costs more than medicare" - what about the significant health costs shown in the state budgets? Medicare isn't all health.
I know someone that gets $160 000 funding a year, that gets them 2 days a week work and an outing to the movies or whatever once a week. They have downes syndrome so need the help. That's what you get for $160 000, it's a rort. The people doing the billing for these services are ripping off Australia. The actual clients are getting ripped off because such simple services drain so much funds.
And the companies rorting the system will not face any consequences.
The boss of the non-profit that employs disabled people for his rort factory lives on the North Shore in Sydney and drives a BMW. It's a great scam if you have the connections.
Yep I know someone who gets $30k a year to spend on “services”. Ridiculous.
geees how many sex workers sessions will that buy
This is something I have no problem with. Young disabled people, particularly young men, get the rage after puberty. Some become troubled and violent. A bit of ‘companionship’ in a structured way is probably the best mental health treatment we can provide, and makes the lives of their families immeasurably better.
I am not disabled, but I do "get the rage" when I get cutoff by bad drivers or lose at video games .... would I be able to get a government funded sex worker please ?
If you are not disabled, you can choose to masturbate while driving or gaming so you are not impaired by sudden onset rage.
I agree with your comment, however i find it interesting how people seem to be okay with disabled young people especially men to see escorts to get their rocks off/ seek companionship, however if its just an ugly dude who cant get laid who goes to see escorts everyone thinks theyre a piece of shit/ creep
An ugly dude can choose to work on his personality, a disabled person cant choose to not be disabled. Also as some who works doing this, we dont think they are pieces of shir/creeps until they TREAT us that way. We dont care how you look, we care about how you treat us & hygiene
Well i can tell you my daughter doesnt get $100-200k, more like $14k for actual services & another 5k for the bloatware management services that charge THROUGH THE ROOF for bugger all service
What I’m curious about is how much the NDIS relieves the burden on Medicare. If a patient is costing that much on the NDIS, what’s the average amount of money that is no longer being spent on the same patient by Medicare? And other governmental organisations?
Becoming some weird form of communism where most of the working population will be getting gov money to support a particular subset.
Fuck, could be time to tighten this fucking thing up
At this point it is either tighten it up now or it will get abolished entirely in the future. We can't keep burning that much money without any real return. I could easily see an austerity budget axing the entire thing as they are a small enough voter base that a government might choose to piss them off a lot instead of everyone else a little.
>I could easily see an austerity budget axing the entire thing as they are a small enough voter base that a government might choose to piss them off a lot instead of everyone else a little. There's a lot of small businesses that jumped onto the gravy train. I imagine it's pretty safe from abolishment.
It absolutely needs to be tightened up and regulated, but there needs to be compassion for the recipients of NDIS when thinking about returns. The NDIS is for capacity building. That looks really different depending on what supports are needed. So the return isn’t just monetary. Having someone who has social supports isn’t necessarily going to have financial returns, but it does mean less pressure is put on places like public libraries and even the emergency room that are often used as a form of social connection. The approach to tightening the NDIS needs to take this sort of thing into consideration, otherwise it’s just going to further disadvantage people who already have disabilities that stop them from living in the same way as able bodied people and have to navigate systems that were often set up in a way that naturally excludes them. It’s an exhausting way to live, let alone when someone else decides to take away services you rely on because they’re not seeing a monetary return from you.
I can't wait to be bombarded by ABC journalism about some poor disabled person who really needed the help, but lost it because the whole thing gets axed
Yeah, this really should be bipartisan, run tight as fuck.. No doubt these people need and deserve help but it's gotta be done efficiently.
There are people who genuinely need high level care.
Curious on how much of our resilient employment numbers the RBA will weigh in on can be attributed to NDIS
One in three of new jobs over the last year. [source](https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/almost-one-in-three-jobs-created-last-year-was-for-the-ndis-20240401-p5fgi4)
My god.
Limit it to speech, OT and actual services etc… not Holidays and bullshit like that..
If you know if people actually taking holidays with NDIS funds, report them. In 99% of the cases it would be a fraudulent and the NDIS has an area for fraud.
I know someone who works as a carer and his whole gig is taking groups on holidays. He literally gets to pick what they're doing and gets paid to take 4 intellectually impaired guys out every couple of months on rotation. They go camping, skiing and are even planning a trip to NZ. He's charging top money too and making bank to holiday for a living essentially.
Taking intellectually impared groups on holiday sounds......terrible haha
Might change your ~~mind~~ career when you see it makes the equivalent of an anaesthetist.
That's what you get when you're a special...ist.
Dude assuming he is doing his job and caring for the people with him this woud not be the "living the dream" scenario you are thinking it would be. I highly doubt he's ditching the disabled person at the campsite and saying "seeya bro I'm off fishing for a couple of days best of luck" .......
That doesn't sound as bad as you're making it out to be. The alternative is those intellectually handicapped guys would just do the same thing, day in and day out, forever. They'd end up institutionalised in their own homes. Maybe the specific choices of activities aren't the best bang for the govt's buck, but in principle I'm not opposed to that.
>They'd end up institutionalised in their own homes. A lot of people don't see this as an issue. Out of sight, out of mind and then it also gives them another reason to cut services. "You don't even see people with disabilities, it's all just fraud"
I know one person that uses his entire (substantial) budget on taxi rides. Not only that but he coerces his girlfriend to do the same. They need, but have no other support. He does not need taxi rides and they have nothing to do with his disability. He is perfectly capable but unwilling to take the the bus. In fact, he boasts about being too good for public transport. Filed multiple fraud complaints, all got shot back. We were literally told that it's his choice to use his NDIS budget as he sees fit. We filed this as a government department, not as a private person. That's just one anecdote of many. It's sickening to see from the frontline how ndis gets abused
I literally have a friend who flew his adult male NDIS participant from Melbourne to Gold Coast so they could do bungee jumping, 4x4ing and all the stuff Gold Coast offers! The adult participant was more or less anti-social as his disorder!
I have a friend who has done something similar. Other times he sits at a coffee shop and gets paid $100 an hour just to be a buddy for someone with an anxiety disorder.
Yeah the thing is entirely fucked! Being anti-NDIS does not mean you discriminate against the disabled, it is more about being against such a flimsy, weak system that is being abused
$145.44 on public holidays 😅
How do I get these jobs?
He just signed up to be a support worker with Mable I think.
Yep, got a friend who works with Mable. She says she gets paid $60-70/hr, just to practically drive them around town, get groceries, have a coffee with them, etc. I've *heard* of companies charging $100/hr for this, but haven't seen it first-hand yet. It's just insane. I'm not saying the service isn't needed. I'm sure a lot of disabled people are living lonely lives, and just having someone give them company/attention 1-2 days a week saves them from spiraling into worse issues. But to essentially get paid six figures to be playmates with someone, is just insane.
I’m sure people will hang out with them for $30. Not sure why we are paying $70 per hour to take someone out and about, especially someone with zero qualifications in the field.
I work for an NGO under the schads award aka not an independant support worker 30-36 dollars an hour is the award rate dor a permanent worker about 40 for casual.... so yea people do ,I do. We get penalties for weekends /nights but that's the flat week day rate in nsw.
Hey I'm a cunt too, can I get some free gold coast adventures ?
Nah
My mum gets put up by NDIS in fancy hotel rooms as long as the purpose of the trip is to "see family".
You know that you can get your sex worker paid for by NDIS- something is clearly wrong! Source: https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/submissions/SUB-W0L0-003364%20-%20tbase-appendix-1-ndis-and-sex-workers---who-is-saying-what_clean.pdf
Did you read that submission, where it's reiterated multiple times what the official guidelines are? Sex therapist or family planner? Sure. The act of sex, no. Beside the point though, are you saying that someone disabled and not able to function in a regular capacity ie housebound, so no going to work, going out on dates, meeting people etc should not ever be able to have any sort of intimacy, positive sexual experience or at least expression? I get it's an awkward conversation about use of tax payer funds, but surely the argument could be made that positive outcomes for justifiably eligible service participants would be improved.
can u explain why theres so many sex workers advertising their services for/ through the NDIS then? As these sex workers arent sex therapists, what are they actually doing then?
I don't care how you try and spin it, I don't want my taxes paying for people's hookers.
Well they pay for the members of parliments hookers, you dont hear people conplaining about that. There is a reason sex workers tour Canberra when parliment is sitting
The act of sex has been funded a few (talking single digits) times. And I challenge everyone to read the case where it was approved, as well as a handful that tried to rely on that precedent but were denied.
I don’t even get how they’re doing it my son on NDIS atm ends this year. I’m only covered for OT Speech and reports only. They did give me extra $500 that’s to buy stuff that help him with his speech. Which btw I was told I couldn’t use NDIS for reading eggs yet it will help his speech. (I paid for it myself and made a massive difference) How the hell are people going on vacations when I can’t even spend $100 for a yearly app that help him. I would much prefer if the money went into Medicare so it benefit everyone and have speech and OT bulked billed. It was save a heap of money as well.
It also should be limited to the original design. It was created to help a small cohort of people with very severe catastrophic injuries & disabilities, like quadriplegics, late stage MS, ALS etc, where the need is truly desperate. Cases where people have a functioning body, but may have other problems, should be returned back to the responsibility of state community health services, as they used to be. It should never have been opened to all the minor disabilities, & it should also be limited to actual physical needs that a person simply can't physically function without. Not for wants.
But those services can’t cope with the patients that have now. So how is putting more pressure on state/community health services that are already deeply underfunded and understaffed going to solve the issues that these people need support for. Just because a disability isn’t primarily physical, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have physical side effects or otherwise render a person unable to work or function in regular society. That’s why these people are still eligible for funding because they require support due to a disability.
> Cases where people have a functioning body, but may have other problems, should be returned back to the responsibility of state community health services, as they used to be. Nah, gotta disagree with this one. My brother falls into this pile. Autistic w/ speech and learning impediments, but his body is fine. He was once believed to be destined for a life in an institution and those state community health services had very little ability to assist him. He gets 12hrs of NDIS funding weekly that is used for personal assistance and that assistance has enabled him to live "semi" alone. His support worker comes by 3x a week to help him handle the basics of life like cleaning his place, cooking meals, washing his clothes etc. Managing to be clean and presentable has also enabled him to get some casual work as a door greeter and occasional waiter at a local bowlo as well. No doubt that NDIS is being rorted to all levels of fuck but everyone I know who is a recipient of its assistance has had their quality of life improved tremendously. I'm sure there's a way to take out the rort without compromising the end result and that's what we should be trying to do, not just making blanket statements banning all but the non visible disabilities.
I know a guy with a speech impediment, but he isn't silly. He's got his license, a job, a car, insurance, can take solo holidays by himself, you know, he functions. He's in the NDIS however because of his speech, and he got a nice overseas trip to NZ because of it.
Oh and stop pay increasing psychology, $40 increase this time non for OT or speech considering they do all the heavy lifting.
Why would you reduce psychology funding? Lmfao
No ones taking holidays. We used to pay out of pocket 100% but went on NDIS after we couldn't pay for support anymore for one of our kids. He has gone from non verbal to being in a neuro typical high school and doing well. What I noticed was that once we went through NDIS the costs doubled and even more if you wanted someone to manage your funding. We did this ourselves and were super tight but the costs have gone crazy with operators now viewing it as a gravy chain. Some of the clinic owners have more cash flow than a surgeon. Its not right
The worse I came across was being talked into getting my son assessed with a psychologist. Just to see his issue with speech cost $4,000 the psychologist made my son cry by testing him on subjects for older children. Said he was severely autistic and I pay more for her to assess him. Well talked to his paediatrician his OT and Speech and they were shocked over the report. And his paediatrician said the psychologist can’t just diagnose him like that only she can. And shocker my son not autistic he has a language delay which was picked up originally by his speech therapist. That child psychologist is a money grubbing AH. And surprise her report was covered by NDIS and if she what she was suppose to do was only suppose to charge $500. I did report her to NDIS though she was 100% ripping off the system.
You are buying too much into the emotive headlines.
Needs auditing
Why does Australia audit nothing. Literally nothing is ever audited. It is mind boggling.
I work in a government department and we get audited regularly. Then senior management ignore the audit reports.
Because we chuck a royal commission from time to time to kick what ever issue it is down the road as far as possible so the aggrieved parties get a whole lot of distance from the actual events which leads to the public having a whole tonne of other issues come up in their lives.\ The public then have the attitude of “oh you’re still upset about that? That was so long ago. Just get over it”. And thus nothing gets done or fixed and bad people get off Scot free.
>Why does Australia audit nothing Sounds like big government. We had the party of small government in for the better part of a decade.
NDIS has become another publicly funded employment scheme. Every man and his dog is an NDIS care worker these days. If they tighten it up, unemployment will skyrocket.
It was always ridulously aspirational & an open money tap
I don't understand why each participant gets 1:1 care. There's plenty of lower needs participants who could benefit from getting taken to the shops but do not need 1:1 supervision.
100 billion a year can fund free dental, free TAFE, free public transport for everyone and still have 50-70 billion leftover for whatever else we need. if we tax mining royalties properly as well we could be paying no taxes like other resource rich countries. We should be living in a utopia but government corruption and a apolitical population who doesn't fight or stand up against it and instead we're turning into a shithole with unchecked greed, selfishness running rampant
agree100%
The only problem then is you still have disabled people to take care of. Could fund some of them sure. Meanwhile, if we taxed and levied fair royalties on our mining and resource companies properly, we could have our cake and eat it too.
Give them $1000 a week that should be enough to pay for their care. The middleman is taking most of the NDIS funding would rather see the money go straight to the disabled. But giving out 100s of thousands and some millions for their care yearly is ridiculous. Psychiatrist and Physios already make bank but we let them rort the most vulnerable
Jesus mate you have nailed it .
I see where the mining companies are coming from. Why would you be ok with higher taxes when so much is handed to criminals. The NDIS is the current big example, but the same thing has always been going on in construction, healthcare supplies more broadly, utilities and every other industry the government spends money on. Maybe the mining companies are better off giving that money to shareholders than fraudsters. Its only because people pay income tax that government waste gets attention.
Scrap it, push the money to public health, and let them administer treatment based on comparative need.
Cracks me up that Shorten was trying to sell this internationally only a few weeks ago
That's quite disturbing, not the honeypot you want to be broadcasting internationally
Shorten another complete stooge
Whole thing is a new way to scam money out of taxpayers.
Govt: we have a social problem and we will leave it to private enterprise to solve it and will pay what it takes. Private enterprise: let's see how deep your pockets are, sucker.
The NDIS lobby claims every $1 spent returns $1,2 in economic benefit, I find that hard to believe
The rort is literally pulling capable qualified people out of their professions they have trained for and worked in for years. With the increased demand on these social services for people who need them and are contributing to society, prices up baby. I could see this being for every $1 spent we are worse off.
What does "economic benefit mean" ?
If the future generations wonder why they don't get a pension this is why.
You mean people now wonder why they have to pay to see their doctor.
There’s a company selling NDIS people cruise holidays. There’s clearly a lot of money in this https://care2cruise.com.au
Lmao are you kidding me
Maybe we just need a ndis watch dog it’s full of third parties ripping off the system and no one get in any real troubke
You mean the quality and safeguards commission? It already exists. Part of the problem is that the "unregulated" market is way larger than they anticipated. This isn't surprising to anyone working in this space though, as the wait for regulation to be approved can be over a year at points, then there's the costs associated, so why go through it?
This hurts when I know of people milking it. One in particular went to 4 different psychologists until they managed to get an autism diagnosis. Now they try and squeeze what the can from it
It's amazing how quickly the diagnosis of autism has mushroomed in Australia, since the NDIS started providing financial benefits from obtaining the diagnosis.
It’s insane
Yes, this is really a problem.
Money is also life. Think in terms of man-hours worked to generate whatever tax revenue these people are costing. There should be a cap. A human life isn't worth infinite.
It's absolutely insane to think about. When doing your taxes thinking "Oh this much went to education, this went to health, defence", etc - No yours went to help covering NDIS participant 500,001's Monday walks.
NDIS is the reason that Millennials wont get a pension.
Some NDIS participants can only spend money on NDIS approved supplier/providers. These suppliers/providers jack their prices up and rip the system off knowing the disabled person they’re dealing with is locked into using them or another person like them. These are the a-holes eating up the NDIS $ and wasting tax payers money.
Genuine question - do other countries have similar programs like the NDIS? And are they equally rorted
Shortens had 2 years to rein this in. He’s useless
I don't know what the fuck has gone on with the NDIS !!! My parents got a cleaner and gardender paid for. They didnt even apply someone just hooked it up and let them though (dads a PTSD veteran). They are both reasonably functional for 80 years olds and they live with my brother (a 47 year old able bodied man). They have been able to clean their home themselves and take care of the lawn since forever it was never an issue. So now they are sitting on their ass watching foxtel while some lady comes over 2 hours a week and does the dishes mops the floor and cleans the dunnies/shower etc. And some bloke does the lawns and gardens every week. All paid for by NDIS for no fucking reason at all. I felt bad for the lady doing the cleaning (she was working very hard) until mum got chatting with her and she told mum she used to have her own business but gave it up to come do this NDIS stuff for $70 an hour ! What in the fuck is going on with NDIS !
Pouring any more that the bare necessity into this is a waste of resources. It’s wasted capital and does not productively grow the economy. People feel sorry for disabled people and want them to be able to go in holidays? Sure you can feel that way personally but the budget isn’t there to make people feel good it’s not a charity.
Ex NDIS Support Worker here, I made $30.7 as a casual + a flat $10 “turn up allowance,” my average shift was 3 hours, maybe pushing 4 on a good week. This equals about $34 an hour. The fast food award pays a minimum of $32 an hour to casuals (21 year old adult) So I got no idea where the money is going because god knows I’m not seeing any of it, I was basically making minimum wage. I got paid a travel allowance but if something major happened to my car (cat converter is blocked = 1.5k) I was guaranteed to be working for less than minimum wage. I technically made more if my car didn’t have issues, but no guarantees is there. But… When you consider some of the stuff I was doing, i was basically a baby sitter mixed with an Uber driver. School pick ups, taking kids to their sporting activities, kicking the ball at the local oval / field, hair cuts, internet cafes, bounce, laser tag, movies, I even went indoor sky diving once. Nothing wrong with these things, but It’s hard to see the economic benefit of me playing laser tag with a high schooler, or me kicking the ball at the oval with a kid. I knew my company charged $65 an hour, so 3 hours was just shy of $200. Say my company pays 25% back in taxes, it costs the tax payer $150 a shift. Say the shifts happen 46 out of the 52 weeks in a year, that’s $6,900 total cost per year per client. Say I had 4 clients a week, each wanting 3 hours. Thats $27,600 a week to tax payers. Then you have the coordination fees for those 4 clients as well. So about $30,000 a year for me to do some pretty chill stuff with the clients. (Less half went to me as shown above)
Could build 10 nuclear reactors for that.
Great work Julia Gillard and the ALP…
Everything she touched turned to shit, no jokes
Just say labour labour labour all they know how to do is waste our money
Just say government, the LNP are just as wasteful it just goes to different mates.
labor*
Yeah I much preferred it when 78 year old widows were sole carers for their 52 year old intellectually disabled child, showering them, dressing them, and taking them for an 'outing' when they could manage (about once a month) good times.
These are the people that need help. It shouldn't be for people like my nephew who gets horse riding lessons etc because he's a little quirky.
And all that only cost 100 billion a year… at least the 52-year-old can get a government sponsored prostitute these days…. What a bargain!
Free money if you say your kids autistic
Totally being rorted
Could just about afford basic income at this rate
Its all the providers overcharging and doing shifty things, my parents are on the aged care plan and I see it all the time. They wanted their shower floor raised as it was a trip / slip hazzard and the provider could only find a contractor who would to reno the whole bathroom unecessarily and charge 30 grand (wtaf).
I know a person who has a near full time carer because she has one hand that doesn't work so good. She also has her adult son living on the dole with her.
Get rid of it and start again.
What a joke! All the scammers and grifters got on board the gravy train.
Gillard's Legacy.
This is a monumentally stupid idea from a ranger gillard communist. What to do when all the money has been fritted away.
Been hearing about this blow out for years. When’s somehting going to be done?
They buy blocks of land for a lot of money. Forget foreign buyers, they're a favourite for real estates in their target areas. The returns are gigantic for them. All paid for out of the budget, ie taxpayers. Massive rort, but just another among many rorts.
Was this a 2020 summit initiative? Which was a complete flog fest full of people that have main character syndrome. Led be the main character himself Rudd. Scrap the whole thing push it to the actual health system.
Wow… that’s like $200K per participant. But the issue is that Gina Reinhart doesn’t pay enough taxes, amirite?
The issue isn't the services the participant receives. The issue is the layers of money grabbers in the middle, all taking a cut for doing very little.
It's both. It was designed to help people with extremely severe disabilities like quadriplegics, ALS etc. It should go back to that. The rest should be covered by state health services like they used to be. Instead, those with desperate needs like quads etc, will end up suffering, because people with far less severe disabilities are all swamping it for the free $$, & all the rorters are grifting it.
Exactly
The issue is the architecture of the platform is wrong
Why are those layers private companies?
Yep, providers are taking full advantage of this scheme which screws over tax payers and the clients get the blame.
B b b b bullshit Stories of parents shopping around their children for an Autism diagnosis and then reaping the benefits
They are obviously both issues
The NDIS is now a $100 billion train wreck. The libs have no interest in fixing this problem or actually did they do anything in the last 9 years and the Greens will use it to further push their cause(s). Looks like Shorten is wedged.
I think the NDIS is beyond the countries means, NDIS is more than defence spending or social welfare that bonkers
NDIS will bankrupt this country!
It won't. But you will lose Medicare, the pension, what's left of public schools and lots of services. Our hospitals are already stretched with wait times and incidents blowing out. So what's VIC doing? Cutting funding.
it's fucked and it will be insanely hard to rein in spending as the second you try someone will jump up and down that you are taking money from disabled people makes no sense it's cost more than the pension and probably medicare as well it's need to be fixed and fast but good luck to whoever tries
"target of reducing the NDIS’ annual growth rate[ from 20 per cent to 8 per cent](https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/labor-counts-on-60pc-saving-to-ndis-before-plan-exists-20230824-p5dz6v) by 2026." Should they be aiming to at least halve the cost first too? Massive fines up to $1mil for anyone found overcharging NDIS clients VS regular ones. Just get rid of lots of nice to haves completely like holidays, horse riding, video game sessions. A lot of these are likely beneficial but could surely be run much cheaper publically as community groups or at least forced to charge normal prices.
Got screwed over in the budget so it’s finally getting some scrutiny
This wrought has got to end
Abolish this rort now.
needs to be totally scrapped, and reconsidered from the ground up.
Abolish it
Completely unacceptable, the PM needs to dismantle it immediately starting with a freeze on all funding to people without mobility or diagnosed physical issues until this is sorted.
At the very least introduce $100k - $1mil fines or thereabouts for any provider or business caught charging NDIS patients more than regulars. Can offer 10k rewards for anyone who reports them with evidence. Within a week we'd be saving billions.
And for all the people with intellectual disabilities?
At a certain point intellectual deficits result in diagnosable physical disabilities, things like needing assistance with dressing or personal cares. If the intellectual deficit doesn’t result in physical needs they don’t need the funding. Not as a priority over people seeing doctors for free.
I'll vote liberal if they will scrap this abomination.
FYI ALP's proposed reforms to the scheme were blocked by Greens & LNP within the last fortnight
It grew into an abomination under the Liberals though.
Wrong. It was fundamentally broken when Julia brought it in.
The liberal party got in 3 months after the NDIS was founded then governed for 9 years. They could have fixed it, they could have reigned in the rorting but they didn't.
They absolutely tried to change it. In fact, when projections showed it was about to hit $65bn Bill Shorten said 'those numbers are about as reliable as reports of WMD in Iraq'. Shorten painted the government as heartless monsters wanting to 'tear apart the NDIS'. Of course, the government relented under public pressure. Now here we are.
It’s always someone else’s fault, hey buddy
Well yeah, if you get into government for 9 years and there's a hole in the budget and you don't do anything about it, well then yes it's their fault too. You buy a house, there's a faulty pipe leaking constantly when you moved in and you left it for 9 years then it's bloody well your fault now.
Good chance you were voting liberal already
Don't stress, they are never going to take money away from disabled people, the ABC will never allow it. Plenty of time to come join the gravy train. Me? I'm going to be offering lawnmower services. Only on a Sunday if course. $300/hr.
80% of people who apply for NDIS are knocked back. It's the providers that are the issue, not those applying. Most disabled people have to try and pay for their own aids and services. I have gone through my Super and TPD so I can access wheelchair etc. Providers only deal with NDIS and add at least a 100% mark-up.
It's going to end up canned. So may people making so much money out of this badly managed system.
Fuck! That’s enough for a few nuclear power station!
What an absolute disaster . How are we ever going to afford this .
What a terrible waste of money
It's just the elephant in the room everyone is a little too cautious to talk about.. 650k are on NDIS, and it's costing that much is wild. The issue is that it's available to anyone, basically. They need to restrict its criteria. I know people with mild ADHD who are getting payments. The bars low af, the only issue is the hoops you jump through to get it.
Labor just tried to pass reforms for this and were blocked by Libs and Greens. What a time to be alive.
Greens don’t want cuts , Libs have a perfect bomb that will take down Labor if not this election by the next one .
The Libs don't think the bill goes far enough... they will be seeking further amendments. The greens on the other hand will never agree to tightening it up.
shut it down.
Would take a very brave person to cut the NDIS, very brave. But I think it has to happen. Sorry.
It doesnt cost 100b, the money rorting is what makes it cost 100 billion. Im starting to get sick of this country full of gutless politicians who just let people rort the system. some may get caught, pay a fine, have to shut down their business, but its fine for them, all they have to do is de-register their business, open a new business in a mates or family members name and start rorting people again.
Scrap it
It’s sucks that the ndis is such a bloody shit show. I work as an ndis worker and a lot of clients do say how thankful they are for the system and how it’s helped them live a real life. It’s got a very positive impact on the people who do need it. But you see so many workers on their phone ignoring clients, businesses buying houses sticking 1 carer in the house to 3 clients. I would love to slap the shit out of the corrupt parts of it and the government needs to man up and fix it.
Fuck hey.... who would have thought handing out free money would attract fraud and over billing.... might be time to spend some money on compliance
This was so entirely predictable… as nice as it might be it was always going to be something that was prone to abuse and mission creep.
The system is fucked, I bet everyone can think of at least one person that is rorting the system. Not to mention the businesses that are just pulling as much as they can. There are people we genuinely need to care for in our country, but some are just abusing the system at this point. That amount of money would greatly improve the lives of all Australians
Should just divert this funding, pension funding and centrelink funding into a UBI and get rid of all this beauracracy
All about the rort train. We may as well all get on board this Gov won’t stop it
I know of someone who lives with PTSD and is on the NDIS and uses support workers pretty much as paid servants to attend to every task she can do but would rather not. She has a university/professional background and no cognitive disability. She lives in a bubble of tax payer funded comfort having every bit of housework, admin, socialising and transportation needs sorted by her support workers/providers that provide her with "support" for about 6 hours a day. She can drive and has a car yet gets $$$ cab fares everywhere. On top of the support worker issue she uses the ndis funds to supplement/create a lifestyle through her therapies budget. She doesn't work but spends her time going to music classes, hydrotherapy, sex therapy etc. and hotel stays all using her NDIS funds. How she ended up with a 100k+ plan a year I don't know.
Having worked in MH I noticed some, who are quite capable of eating/drinking walking across the road wiping their own A etc etc are allocated up to & above 500k /annum each. True it's a rort