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Speaker 1: My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda

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Speaker 1: Bunjelung Calcuttin woman from Gadigol Country. The Daily oz acknowledges

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Speaker 1: that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the

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Speaker 1: Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres

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Speaker 1: Strait Island and nations. We pay our respects to the

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Speaker 1: first peoples of these countries, both past and present.

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Speaker 2: Good morning and welcome to the Daily os. It's Wednesday,

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Speaker 2: the nineteenth of April. I'm Sam and today I'm not

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Speaker 2: joined by Zara but by Nina.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Zara went after Mexico, soy has stuck with me.

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Speaker 2: Nina's normally our podcast producer, hiding behind the desk, so

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Speaker 2: it's nice to get you out here in the studio

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Speaker 2: with me. Today we're going to talk about the National

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Speaker 2: Disability Insurance Scheme. Bill Shorten, the Minister for the NCAS,

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Speaker 2: announced an overhaul of the system.

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Speaker 4: The INDIAS is not what it should be. It needs

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Speaker 4: a reboot.

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Speaker 2: In today's deep dive, we're going to look at what's

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Speaker 2: gone wrong and how the government proposes to fix. But first, Nina,

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Speaker 2: what is in the news this morning?

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Speaker 3: Senator Jacinta Nampajimpa Price has been appointed as the Shadow

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Speaker 3: Minister for Indigenous Australians by Opposition leader Peter Dutton. Price's predecessor,

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Speaker 3: Julian Lisa, left the role over disagreements on The Indigenous

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Speaker 3: Voice earlier this month, and we did a whole deep

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Speaker 3: dive on that, so if you want a bit more detailed,

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Speaker 3: check out the show notes. The reshuffle also saw former

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Speaker 3: Shadow Home Affairs Minister Karen Andrews leave the front bench

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Speaker 3: as she plans in retiring from politics at the next election.

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Speaker 2: A Basketball Australia panel has ruled a trans woman is

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Speaker 2: ineligible to play at an elite level. Lexi Rodgers applied

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Speaker 2: to play for the Kilsynth Cobras in the semi professional

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Speaker 2: nbl IE Women's competition, but her application was struck down

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Speaker 2: after the panel found that she failed to meet the

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Speaker 2: criteria to play. Rogers said on social media that she

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Speaker 2: was saddened by the potential implications the decision could send

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Speaker 2: sugender diverse people and that she hoped BA could eventually

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Speaker 2: quote replicate the inclusion and acceptance I have found on

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Speaker 2: the court with my teammates.

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Speaker 3: Two New York residents have been arrested after being accused

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Speaker 3: of creating and operating an illegal overseas police station on

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Speaker 3: behalf of the Chinese government. The two defendants, aged sixty

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Speaker 3: one and fifty nine, have been charged with conspiring to

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Speaker 3: act as an agent of the Chinese government and for

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Speaker 3: destroying evidence when confronted by the FBI. The pair allegedly

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Speaker 3: occupied a flaw in a building in Manhattan's Chinatown and

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Speaker 3: acted under the control of the Chinese government. It closed

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Speaker 3: last year after becoming aware of the FBI's investigation.

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Speaker 2: And today's good news. Australian Paralympic gold medalist and straight

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Speaker 2: up legend Madison de Rosario earned her third podium finish

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Speaker 2: in the Boston Marathon this week. She finished second in

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Speaker 2: the women's wheelchair race. De Rosario finished five seconds behind

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Speaker 2: American Susanna Scaroni. It comes after she finished third in

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty two and twenty nineteen. The National Disability Insurance

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Speaker 2: Scheme has lost its way. That's according to the federal

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Speaker 2: minister responsible for the scheme, Bill Shorten. So he spoke

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Speaker 2: at the National Press Club yesterday and outlined what he

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Speaker 2: thinks has gone wrong and where the government plans to

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Speaker 2: go from here, But keep in mind we haven't heard

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Speaker 2: any budget commitments just yet. Sam.

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Speaker 3: For those who don't know, can you just explain what

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Speaker 3: the NDIS actually is.

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Speaker 2: So, the NDIS supports over five hundred thousand Australians with

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Speaker 2: a disability and the way it works is by providing

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Speaker 2: funding to eligible people with disability to help in all

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Speaker 2: aspects of their life. So we're not talking here just

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Speaker 2: about a scheme that helps with medical assistance or treatments,

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Speaker 2: but more of a holistic support framework. It helps people

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Speaker 2: be more independent, to learn a skill, or to find

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Speaker 2: employment or volunteering opportunities. This is a message we got

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Speaker 2: from Robbie about how the NDIS has helped his family.

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Speaker 5: Dis has been hugely influential for our little boy. He

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Speaker 5: had a severe speech delay and the NAS have been

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Speaker 5: able to support him with funding that we would otherwise

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Speaker 5: be enable to access. He's able to go to speech

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Speaker 5: therapy once a week and his speech has come on

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Speaker 5: fantastic now, so we are really thankful for it.

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Speaker 3: Sam. Can you take me back to the start. What

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Speaker 3: did the NDIS set out to do well?

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Speaker 2: It was formally rolled out in twenty sixteen on the

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Speaker 2: back of a twenty eleven Productivity Commission report that found

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Speaker 2: the previous system of disability services were and this is

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Speaker 2: a quote from that report, underfunded, unfair, fragmented and inefficient.

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Speaker 2: Not a good run.

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Speaker 3: Just to be clear, we're talking about the former system, right,

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Speaker 3: the one that the NDAES.

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Speaker 2: Replaced exactly, and that was replaced in twenty sixteen. Instead

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Speaker 2: of a federal scheme like the NDIS, the previous system

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Speaker 2: was run by states and territories, so they varied in

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Speaker 2: between state and territory lines, but generally speaking, support was

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Speaker 2: quite prescriptive and pretty inflexible, so people would typically be

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Speaker 2: assigned to a service provider and limited to the type

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Speaker 2: of support which that agency prove. The Productivity Commission report

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Speaker 2: in twenty eleven also found the system was under resourced,

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Speaker 2: with many missing out on funding altogether. So the report

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Speaker 2: recommended a new national scheme, and this was to be

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Speaker 2: called the NDIS, which would create consistency across Australia, but

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Speaker 2: also give participants in the scheme more choice and autonomy

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Speaker 2: to make independent choices about what kind of support they

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Speaker 2: think will work best for them. The report also proposed

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Speaker 2: almost doubling the annual spend on disability support by government

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Speaker 2: to allow for more certainty of funding based on need,

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Speaker 2: and all of that is what led to the NDIS

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Speaker 2: as we know it today.

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Speaker 3: So that sounds like some positive changes, or at least

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Speaker 3: they intended to be positive changes, putting people first, increasing funding.

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Speaker 3: But we wouldn't be talking about the NDAs today if

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Speaker 3: there weren't some issues that had been raised. What's gone wrong?

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Speaker 2: Well, the real reason we're talking about this today is

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Speaker 2: because Bill Shorten, who's the federal minister responsible for the scheme,

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Speaker 2: he got up at the National Press Club yesterday and

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Speaker 2: outline some of the issues the government has identified in

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Speaker 2: the NDAs.

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Speaker 4: The system is too rigid, it throws up cafokate yes,

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Speaker 4: barriers to access, it, lacks empathy, gouters on prices, is

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Speaker 4: way too complex, and it's traumatizing for people to deal with.

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Speaker 4: People of disability have often felt caught between some predatory

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Speaker 4: providers and a historically impersonal government agency. We've got to

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Speaker 4: improve the participant experience.

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Speaker 2: So Shortan's basically indicating some of the government's key concerns

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Speaker 2: about the system, and these concerns are echoed by people

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Speaker 2: who interact with the NDAs day to day, like Rachel

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Speaker 2: who sent us this message yesterday.

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Speaker 6: So I work in the disability services sector and trying

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Speaker 6: to advocate for indie ICE participants is the most frustrating

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Speaker 6: part of my job. They don't have enough people working there.

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Speaker 6: They don't answer the phones. The people that do answer

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Speaker 6: give you conflicting information. People that respond to emails for

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Speaker 6: weeks at a time. People don't get their indie ICE

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Speaker 6: plans back for weeks, if not months. We constantly have

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Speaker 6: to advocate or even get legal aid involved for the

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Speaker 6: poor decisions that they've made. Decisions are made inconsistently between

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Speaker 6: different plans and honesty. It is just it's a necessary system,

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Speaker 6: but an incredibly poorly managed one.

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Speaker 2: So there's definitely a sense across the boards that there's

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Speaker 2: too much bureaucracy stopping the NDIS from functioning properly. We're

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Speaker 2: also hearing people are being cut from their NDIS plans,

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Speaker 2: increasing pressure on an appeals process built into the system.

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Speaker 2: There's also an issue of people with disabilities in regional

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Speaker 2: rule and remote errors who are struggling to get the

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Speaker 2: support they need because of shortages of service providers. Also,

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Speaker 2: Bill Shorten was keen to highlight that there are people

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Speaker 2: and organizations taking advantage of the system on purpose, and

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Speaker 2: that's either through service providers gouging prices so increasing their

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Speaker 2: fees because they know the NDAs is picking up the bill.

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Speaker 4: And remember if one provider's overcharging for their service and

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Speaker 4: means a participant cannot afford another service they might need.

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Speaker 2: But also what Bill Shorton is calling criminal syndicates that

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Speaker 2: are taking advantage of the NDIS system.

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Speaker 4: I can't go into detail about the investigations, but it's

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Speaker 4: personally infuriating that some Australians think that they should be

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Speaker 4: allowed to steal from people with disability.

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Speaker 3: So those are some pretty big issues that you've run

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Speaker 3: through there, and I'm sure we've barely scratched the surface.

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Speaker 2: I'm sure that.

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Speaker 3: People with disabilities who are living with the system every

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Speaker 3: day would have a myriad of stories to tell us.

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Speaker 3: But you know, what we heard from short in is

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Speaker 3: what the government is going to be focusing on. What

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Speaker 3: solutions have they proposed, What have they come forward as

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Speaker 3: saying they want to actually do to fix these problems.

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Speaker 2: Well, there's two things that preface before I go into

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Speaker 2: what Shorten announced. The first is that there wasn't an

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Speaker 2: announcement yesterday of any new spending in regards to the NDIS.

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Speaker 2: We're going to have to wait until May for some

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Speaker 2: of that information in the federal budget exactly, but I

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Speaker 2: would say it seems like the government is flagging. It'll

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Speaker 2: be put on the agenda. The other thing here is

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Speaker 2: that the government has already announced a review which is

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Speaker 2: currently underway looking at how the NDIS is operating, and

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Speaker 2: it's up to that review to make more specific recommendations.

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Speaker 2: But generally speaking, yesterday the Press Club Bill Shorten outlines

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Speaker 2: a couple of broader areas of policy that the government's

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Speaker 2: going to focus on. I'm not going to listen them

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Speaker 2: all right now, but they include things like increasing the

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Speaker 2: workforce in and around the NDIS to try and ease

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Speaker 2: some of that bureaucracy that we spoke about. He also

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Speaker 2: flagged the government is going to look at filling service

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Speaker 2: gaps in regional areas, as well as how to crack

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Speaker 2: down on the bad behavior, the price gouging and those

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Speaker 2: so called criminal syndicates.

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Speaker 3: So the government's flagged what they're going to look at

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Speaker 3: moving forward, what are the next steps here?

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Speaker 2: So we're waiting for that review into the NDIS and

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Speaker 2: a final report there and that will give us some

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Speaker 2: more recommendations and the government some more direction in terms

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Speaker 2: of how to move forward. But it's going to be

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Speaker 2: interesting to see what comes out of this May budget.

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Speaker 2: We know that the NDIS is one of the most

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Speaker 2: expensive federally funded programs in Australia, and also demand for

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Speaker 2: the NDIS is increasing all the time. So I guess

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Speaker 2: while Bill Shorton gave us some clues about ways the

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Speaker 2: government can try to save money, and I think the

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Speaker 2: biggest thing that jumped out to me was the elimination

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Speaker 2: of fraud and price gouging. We're not really going to

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Speaker 2: know how much reform will be possible until we know

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Speaker 2: how much of the pie the government's willing to commit

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Speaker 2: to implementing its plans.

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Speaker 3: Right so we've heard from the government. They've said they're

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Speaker 3: going to try reduce some of the wastage in the system,

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Speaker 3: but we haven't heard yet if they're willing to actually

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Speaker 3: come to the table and put more money down.

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Speaker 2: Or to be revealed in the federal budget.

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Speaker 3: I guess we'll see what happens. I don't normally get

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Speaker 3: to see this. I feel very powerful, But if you

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Speaker 3: like the podcast, please tell your friends about us. Please

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Speaker 3: give us a review, scream it from the rooftops, whatever

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Speaker 3: you like. It makes us really happy, but also it

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Speaker 3: just helps other people to find us, and when you're

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Speaker 3: a small startup like the Daily Ohs, it means a lot.

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Speaker 2: Nice. That was good.

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Speaker 3: I just made it up.