Australian Greens' Additional Comments

1.1The Australian Greens acknowledge and thank disabled people and disabled‑led organisations who have contributed to this important inquiry. This inquiry into the culture and capability of the National Disability Insurance Agency covered significant topics that impact the lives of disabled people daily. It is deeply concerning that the NDIA has not, in some instances, fulfilled the promises of the NDIS Act or Australia's international commitments. Additionally, it is disappointing that many of the same systemic problems continue to be raised through inquiries, indicating a lack of strong and immediate action from the Australian Government.

1.2The Australian Greens are submitting these additional comments relating to topics that were raised in the inquiry by disabled people and are not included in the final report.

Guardianship and financial administration

1.3The Australian Greens have been deeply moved by the unjust experiences that disabled people experience while under public guardianship and trustee orders. It is clear that the NDIA could better support participants who are under guardianship or trustee orders.

1.4Of great concern is the increase in the number of NDIS participants who are subject to guardianship and financial administration and the ramifications for their ability to exercise choice and control in relation to their NDIS plans and funded support.

1.5We share the concern of the community about the increasing role of the NDIA in public guardianship and trustee matters. Relating to recommendation 9, it is the Australian Greens' view that any further information sharing and recording keeping must uphold the rights of disabled people with clear provisions for supported decision-making.

1.6The Australian Greens make the following recommendation relating to guardianship and financial administration.

1.7The Australian Greens recommend that the Standing Council of Attorneys General expedite national consistency for public guardianship and trustees, including improving the lives of disabled people by considering removing the protection and confidentiality laws order, national consistency of fees, transparency of decision-making, and implementing supported decision making and reviews of orders.

Information, Linkages and Capacity Building

1.8It is the view of the Australian Greens that the Information Linkages and Capacity Building program needs much improvement to better meet the needs of NDIS participants. We acknowledge that the 2020 transfer of the ILC program from the NDIA to the Department of Social Services has been to the detriment of participants of the NDIS. As such, it is the Australian Greens' view that the best way forward is to return the responsibility for the program to the NDIA.

1.9The Australian Greens recommend that the ILC program be administered by the NDIA, with robust links with the Department of Social Services.

Short-Term Accommodation

1.10The Australian Greens do not support the use of the term 'respite' and subsequent deficit framing used in the report. While the Australian Greens support the intention of the recommendations relating to access to short-term accommodation, more appropriate language set for 6.46 would be “The committee understands that there is an important role for disabled people to be able to access Short Term Accommodation; including helping participants transition to supported independent living arrangements and facilitating participant engagement with the broader community.” And make the following amendment to recommendation 19:

1.11The Australian Greens recommend that the National Disability Insurance Agency ensure that planners fully explore current and future accommodation and support needs with participants during pre-planning, planning and plan review.

LGBTIQA+ disabled people

1.12The Australian Greens welcomed the evidence provided by LGBTIQA+ disabled people and support the recommendation in the report relating to the need for the NDIA to have an inclusive culture. From the evidence heard the Australian Greens make the following additional recommendation:

1.13The Australian Greens recommend the NDIA review processes to ensure they are inclusive of gender and sexuality, including exploring establishing supports such as shared safe spaces for LGBTIQA+ disabled people.

Technology and IT

1.14Several submitters likened NDIA processes and practices to those implemented under the Robodebt scheme. For example, a submitter with ME/CFS was alarmed at reports of government officials who had worked on the Robodebt scheme taking up positions with the NDIA's compliance division:

It seems that the same tactics used for Robodebt have been applied to the NDIA, resulting in harm to the most vulnerable members of our community and depriving them of the necessary support to enhance their quality of life.[1]

1.15The inquiry heard evidence from Ms Marie Johnson warning of risks to participants caused by automated technologies:

Algorithms based on 'behavioural insights' create a fiction, a persona comprised of assumed or typecast features whose fictional behaviours are used as a proxy in order to predict behaviours of real people, and for this prediction to be treated as fact. It makes huge generalisations, reductions and determinations on complex human conditions, experiences, and disparate factors … The NDIS legislation specifies that PLANS are INDIVIDUALISED and directed by the participant. That facilitates tailored and flexible responses to the individual goals and needs of the participant. The application of statistical averages in automated Roboplanning eliminates the individual person and their needs, transmuted instead to a fictional average, a fictional 'persona'.[2]

1.16Another submitter called on the NDIA to immediately cease any use of algorithmic technologies or automated decision-making with participants. They indicated that the NDIA should instead focus on creating individualised plans for each participant:

It is inhumane, unjust and dehumanising … Factoring in discriminatory information like my age, disability and what the NDIS think is my level of functioning into a computer program to lump me with other 'like' people into a pigeonhole entirely for the convenience of a 'system' is profoundly offensive … I've never met anyone like me because there is no-one like me.[3]

1.17The Australian Greens note the impact of algorithmic technologies, such as Robodebt and recommend that the NDIA and the Department of Social Services immediately cease any use of algorithmic technologies or automated decision-making with participants.

Tackling the culture of mistrust

1.18It is vital that as the Australian Government undertakes matters relating to the finances of the NDIA in a way that does not feed a public narrative that affects participants and the broader disability community. Financial transparency is a vital tool in ensuring there is not a culture of mistrust as such that Australian Greens recommend:

1.19The Australian Greens recommend the NDIA take steps to ensure financial transparency, including making available to the public the full Annual Financial Sustainability Reports.

Sexuality, Sexual Development, Sexual Expression

1.20The inquiry received evidence that neglecting the needs of disabled people regarding sexual development and sexual expression has severe negative effects. For many disabled people, their first experience of sex and sexuality is through being the victim-survivors of sexual violence.[4]

1.21Young disabled people can experience exclusion from sexual education provided to their peers. For example, Northcott gave evidence that disabled students are often removed from classrooms when sexual education is being provided in high schools.[5]

1.22For disabled people, an absence of proper supports for sexual education may leave them without understanding of appropriate behaviours. For example, Sexuality Education Counselling and Consultancy Agency (SECCA) gave evidence that:

A lot of our clients are involved in the justice system either, as I said, as a victim or as a person who's accused of committing a crime. A lot of the crimes that we see our clients having been accused of being a perpetrator of are what we would call accidental crimes—crimes where they haven't actually understood what the social rules are … There's an incredibly strong link between people having a cognitive or intellectual disability and their engagement with the justice system that's not understanding or supportive of what their needs are. As you've identified, we're needing to take those steps back to see that there's a huge gap in sexuality education and support that's essentially setting people up for failure and setting them up to be a part of these kinds of incidents and justice systems.[6]

1.23The inquiry received evidence that healthy and safe relationships and sexual activities can support participants' health, wellbeing, sense of belonging and inclusion. At a public hearing, People with Disability Australia (PWDA) emphasised that it was reasonable and necessary for the NDIS to provide supports relating to sexuality, relationships, sexual intimacy, and repairing the relationships that disabled people have with their own bodies, in safe and supportive environments.[7]

1.24Evidence indicates that disabled people have the same needs, wants and desires as everybody else in society, and the impact of their disability means that they need support. Northcott emphasised that:

This is equally true in the area of sexuality and relationships, because people with disability want to be engaged in relationships, explore their sexuality and find love—all those things that we all want to do—so our role is to support that.[8]

1.25Sexual Health and Family Planning ACT (SHFPACT) gave evidence that a rights-based approach should inform the sexual and reproductive health needs of disabled people:

We acknowledge a long history of maltreatment and harm caused by institutions, systems and the people operating within them—perhaps well intentioned but with disastrous impacts in the lives of people with disability. In our work in this area, we stress collaboration, transparency, support for self-advocacy, the right to safety, the right to bodily integrity and to sexual wellbeing, the presumption of ability and responsiveness to individual needs as ways in which we can continue to empower people with disabilities for full community, social and economic participation, including the right to form relationships, to sexual expression and to safety and respect.[9]

1.26Touching Base suggested a role for sex workers in supporting disabled people to recover from sexual abuse. Sex workers could provide a safe environment where participant's boundaries are respected, and they have the opportunity to gradually explore their own sexual expression.[10]

1.27Several submitters gave evidence that the personal views of NDIA staff may influence whether reasonable and necessary supports are provided for goals related to sexuality and sexual expression. For example, Touching Base submitted that 'prior Ministerial and NDIA CEO overreach and misinformation' had created a culture of fear and reluctance among many NDIA staff, affecting their willingness to consider sexual supports in participants' plans. This occurred even in situations where it was likely to be a reasonable and necessary disability-related support in the participants' circumstances.[11]

1.28Touching Base also suggested that NDIA leadership had not provided broader sexuality and relationship support guidance to assist staff to make person‑centred decisions when accessing related supports in a participant's NDIS plan. Guidelines and training are therefore required to address prior misinformation and staff attitudes affecting their ability to provide person-centred support around sexual expression and relationships. Touching Base also called for immediate clarification from the NDIA concerning which individual line items were available to document sex services support. Furthermore, they suggested that explicit and implicit line items should be made available to participants' privacy needs around the collection, storage, and disclosure of such sensitive personal information.[12]

1.29In response to questions on taken on notice at Senate Estimates, Minister Shorten stated that there was no Price Guideline item aligned with the provision of Sexual Activity Supports, and that it was therefore not possible to provide data on the number of Sexual Activity Support providers that have been funded by the NDIS.[13]

1.30The Australian Greens recommend that NDIA planners and coordinators are trained to engage with participants about relationships, gender, and sexual expression goals during the development of plans.

Senator Jordon Steele-John

Member

Footnotes

[1]Ms Catherine Walker, Supplementary Submission 86.2, p. 5.

[2]Ms Marie Johnson, Submission 137, Attachment 1, pp. 7–8.

[3]Name Withheld, Submission 81, p. 14.

[4]Mr Alex Varley, Head of Advocacy and Communications, Northcott, CommitteeHansard, 7November2023, p.19.

[5]Mr Alex Varley, Head of Advocacy and Communications, Northcott, CommitteeHansard, 7November2023, p.19.

[6]Ms Jordina Quain, Education Director, Sexuality Education Counselling and Consultancy Agency, CommitteeHansard, 7November 2023, p.31.

[7]Ms Nicole Lee, President, People with Disability Australia, Committee Hansard, 7November2023, p.1.

[8]Mr Alex Varley, Head of Advocacy and Communications, Northcott, Committee Hansard, 7November2023, p. 16.

[9]Mr Timothy Bavinton, Executive Director, Sexual Health and Family Planning ACT, CommitteeHansard, 7 November 2023, p. 22.

[10]Mr Saul Isbister, President, Touching Base, Committee Hansard, 7 November 2023, p. 9.

[11]Touching Base, Submission 123, p. 10.

[12]Touching Base, Submission 123, p. 13.

[13]The Hon Bill Shorten MP, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, answers to questions on notice NDIA SQ23-000153, Senate Community Affairs Budget Estimates 2023–24, 13 June 2023 (received 28 July 2023).