Where to from here?

Where to

From Here

Held just 10 days after the sudden announcement to ditch Independent Assessments, the timing was drop dead perfect for the Where To From Here conference. On screen and in discussion, we assembled 1,700 of the nation’s key NDIS decision makers and influencers to fill the void this question begs.

It was the first time the whole service sector has been together since 2015 and we expressed our dismay that after 8 years of the NDIS, the big ideas we hoped to achieve are still a long way off. As you would expect, we also acknowledged how incredibly difficult everything is right now. The mood got pretty bleak.

Then something happened about halfway through, Minister Reynolds began her speech by thanking Labor’s Jenny Macklin. In one short sentence she signalled a return to NDIS bipartisanship! The Minister even showed pride in the NDIS and demonstrated that she would promote it as an insurance scheme, not a welfare program. She then committed to: • restart the National Disability Strategy, the plan for all levels of government to address mainstream inclusion

• focus on Tier 2, the up till now missing piece of NDIS community development • address the needs of those not eligible for the NDIS, the 4.5 million people with disability outside the scheme • enhance plan flexibility • return to genuine co-design. A lot of the WTFH reaction was highly sceptical about the Minister’s commitments (that’s putting it nicely). While we agree it’s incredibly hard to have any faith in this government, at least these are the right commitments at the right time. They are promises that we can hold her accountable to. Most importantly, it shifts the debate from Minister Robert’s politics of fear and deliberate misinformation to focus on the issues that matter.

Right on the Minister’s heels, original NDIS leaders, Bruce Bonyhady and John Walsh reminded us of what the scheme is intended to do. It is a scheme for every Australian, a scheme that should build capacity at every level of the nation. They insisted that we use our collective energy to demand a return to focus on what the NDIS was meant to achieve. All the major newspapers immediately picked up and ran with this message.

With this momentum, speakers, the audience and even a singer and comedian all somehow coalesced. As a collective, we found the answers to where to from here?

The answers are this simple and this complex: The government and NDIA must do the hard yards to rebuild trust, focus on mainstream inclusion, deliver genuine co-design and reconnect with NDIS original purpose and intent. Organisations need to both demand and assist the government to hold true to their promises. We also need to hold our organisations true to purpose, and that purpose is that people with disability are in control of their lives. Whenever we stray from what we promised, we need to get back on track. And the word used most for WTFH was “Everyone”