An inquiry into the NDIS also heard today that actuaries have forecast death rates to rise among people with high support needs as a result of proposed reforms.
Forcing children and adults with disabilities to take psychotropic medication as a “chemical restraint” could become more common under proposed NDIS changes, an inquiry heard today.
The Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee hearing into the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026 heard from disability advocates and people with lived experience with disability who were all vehemently against the bill proceeding in its current form, describing it as “dangerous”.
Over 4000 submissions have been made to the inquiry, and the overwhelming majority of people appearing today called for the bill to be rejected completely or at least for more time for co-design with people with disability.
Children and Young People with Disability Australia CEO Skye Kakoschke-Moore said there were concerns around the requirement for an individual to undertake all appropriate treatment to meet the definition of permanence.
Ms Kakoschke-Moore said the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing had told CYDA that “appropriate treatment would be defined very broadly”.
“Based on that, it’s reasonable to suspect that treatment could include medication,” she said.
“Until the government is able to explicitly rule out a requirement for any person to have to take medication as a precursor to accessing the NDIS, that concern will remain.”
When asked by Greens Senator Jordon Steele-John to clarify who would require chemical restraint, Ms Kakoschke-Moore said she had asked the DoHDA whether the interpretation of treatment would include medication and the DoHDA had said yes.
“We know that chemical restraints or a chemical restrictive practice can occur when somebody is forced to take medication as a way to suppress particular behaviours or conduct,” Ms Kakoschke-Moore said.
“What we’re really concerned about, for children in particular, is an early adoption of chemical restraint as a way of satisfying appropriate treatment before non-chemical or medical or medication support is available to them.
“What we would really like to see is this bill paused in order for appropriate consultation to take place on things like the definition of appropriate treatment.”
Victorian Labor Senator Dr Michelle Ananda-Rajah told the inquiry that chemical restraints would not be “done on a frivolous basis”.
“It will be absolutely part of a technical discussion with an expert advisory group with representation from clinicians, participants, and others,” Dr Ananda-Rajah said.
“It should be about a tiered approach to treatment, and … only at the end there should be a consideration of last resort as to whether restraint is needed at all, and then there should be a suite of solutions.”
In response, Ms Kakoschke-Moore said: “Chemical restraint is real, and it does happen.”
Also in today’s edition:
- Health agencies lean on external consultants to the tune of $180m
- New rules for telehealth-only clinics coming before 2027
- Call for urgent overhaul of GP care in aged care homes
- NDIA legal costs rise to $66m as tribunal disputes continue
- NSW to examine expanded scope of practice for paramedics and allied health
Ms Kakoschke-Moore said she gave the DoDHA multiple opportunities to rule out chemical restraints within the definition of appropriate treatment.
“When I asked, ‘could this include a requirement for somebody to take medication?’ they said yes.”
Ms Kakoschke-Moore agreed with Senator Steele-John that until the government amended the legislation to explicitly exclude chemical restraint, the legislation created that potential pathway.
Ms Kakoschke-Moore said there were also questions around how parental responsibility would be defined and applied.
“We don’t yet have a definition or clarity over what that threshold is. When does parenting go beyond what is ordinarily expected?
“Expecting a parent to single-handedly provide the same level of care and support as a team of skilled, qualified, experienced support workers risks putting that family into further crisis, and may lead to increased instances of carer burnout.”
Ms Kakoschke-Moore said CYDA had heard from parents who were concerned that they would need to reduce their work hours or leave employment entirely.
“Seeing as we’re already in a cost-of-living crisis, the lower income families have, the deeper that crisis is going to become.”
Ms Kakoschke-Moore said there were also concerns around the reduction in funding for social and community participation, and the centralisation of power with the disability minister.
“On paper, these reforms are designed to achieve billions of dollars in savings,” she said.
“In reality, that will push more families into crisis, result in cost shifting to already oversubscribed or even non-existent services, and lead to poorer outcomes for people with disability.
“If the bill proceeds in its current form, it will represent some very dangerous changes that would impact the lives of people with disability.”
Inclusion Australia CEO Maeve Kennedy told the inquiry that “there is a real risk that psychotropic medication used as chemical restraint could be considered treatment for the purposes of scheme eligibility”.
“The Disability Royal Commission was clear about the harm caused by these practices, which disproportionately impact people with intellectual disability.”
Ms Kennedy said the presence of a technical advisory body in the development of an assessment framework for functional capacity would not mitigate that risk.
“The legislation should explicitly guard against that outcome.”
Ms Kennedy said the Disability Royal Commission heard evidence that the number and dosage levels of psychotropic medications administered to people with an intellectual disability were “sometimes so significant in themselves they constitute abuse”.
“It clearly found that there are disproportionate impacts on people with intellectual disability.”
The Disability Royal Commission also found that social isolation and exclusion increased the risk of violence, abuse, neglect, and exploitation, and that connection to community was protective.
“That goes directly to the impact of this bill,” Ms Kennedy said.
“For many people with intellectual disability, particularly those in supported independent living, social, community, and civic participation supports are not supplementary. They are how people maintain relationships, participate in ordinary life, and stay safe.
“Reducing those supports does not remove cost, it shifts it into health systems, crisis services, and onto families and carers who are already under sustained pressure. It also increases the risk of people becoming isolated and less visible in our community.”
Related
Naomi Anderson, legal practice owner of the community legal centre Villamanta Disability Rights Legal Service in Victoria, told the inquiry that the 2024-25 NDIS Annual Financial Sustainability Report showed increased mortality rates among people with high support needs.
“The bill before you has the potential to exacerbate the increase in unexpected mortality by increasing time frames for reassessments when things have changed, removing deemed decisions, which allow participants to have the matter reviewed if the legislated timeframe is not met … preventing people other than the participant or nominee requesting a reassessment … [and] allowing suspension of supports if a participant has not been contactable in 90 days.”
Ms Anderson said community participation funding helped an individual become a visible part of their community.
“Many NDIS participants are unable to engage in either education or employment and community participation funding provides the means for the development of an identity within the local area.
“Cutting this support in half is short-sighted and does not in any way improve the NDIS, reduce frauds and rorting, or achieve anything but helping the federal budget.
“This is a massive cost to ask people with disability to shoulder, and a complete reversal of what the NDIS was designed to achieve.”
People who need support to access the community need that support “regardless of whether it’s there or not”, Ms Anderson said.
“People who have that support removed will immediately be at risk. For some, it will be isolation. For some, it will be being unsafe in their home because there is nobody to support them.
“It pushes that need for support out everywhere else. It’s also going to push that need for support into the hospitals.”
Inclusion Australia policy officer Luke Nelsen has been on the NDIS since 2013 and said the NDIS has changed his life.
“It means I am able to live independently and go out into the community,” he said.
“I have been able to do some amazing things for my work, contribute to society, and earn a living because of the NDIS.
“I live an ordinary life because of the support I receive from the NDIS. If these cuts go ahead, I am afraid that people with an intellectual disability and their families will lose their human rights.”
Emergency physician Dr Dinesh Palipana OAM, who suffered a spinal cord injury at age 25 when he was studying medicine, said personal support was “incredibly intimate” and the government should not have the ultimate decision around who provides personal support.
“It should be the person’s choice … it’s about choice and control,” Dr Palipana said.
“We should all be afforded the opportunity to have choice and control over who touches our body, who helps achieve these things, like bowel and bladder care, and showering, for example, it should not be prescribed to us in a country like this.
“The contribution of unpaid carers into our system here in Australia is in the billions of dollars, and … I think their contribution should be acknowledged … like my mum.”
Allied Health Professions Australia CEO Bronwyn Morris-Donovan said expressions of interest for the Thriving Kids program were not open to small to medium private practices.
“The majority of allied health providers … don’t work in a hospital setting, they work outside of the hospital setting, in the broader community setting, in small to medium sized private practices.
“The Thriving Kids program … threatens the business model that we use to fund and deliver services across the community.
Hearings into the bill continue tomorrow and Thursday.