First Peoples Disability Network calls for ‘real engagement’

First Peoples Disability Network Australia has called on the Federal government to embed First Nations leadership in the design and rollout of proposed National Disability Insurance Scheme reforms announced on Wednesday by Health Minister Mark Butler at the National Press Club.

The organisation said the announcement lacked concrete engagement with the realities faced by First Nations people with disability and pressed for safeguards before any overhaul proceeds.

Key Points

First Peoples Disability Network Australia joined Australia’s Disability Representative Organisations in urging that people with disability lead the design of the changes outlined by Minister Butler. The organisation said it was “compelled” to address what it described as missing elements in the government’s statement, specifically the absence of “meaningful engagement with the reality facing First Nations people with disability”.

Health Minister Mark Butler announced reforms to the NDIS at the National Press Club.

The organisation noted that, while the Minister referred to returning the NDIS to its “original intent,” that intent “was never fully realised” for First Nations people with disability. It emphasised current participation and access gaps, stating that more than 63,000 First Nations people are now on the NDIS.

The organisation framed the proposed measures as a major shift for the scheme and warned of risks if First Nations perspectives are not central from the outset.

Access gaps and service shortfalls

According to the organisation, structural inequities persist across the scheme. It said fewer than one per cent of NDIS providers were First Nations organisations, despite First Nations people comprising eight per cent of all participants. In remote and very remote communities, it stated that more than one in three participants were not accessing the supports in their plans.

It added that First Nations Australians experienced disability at 1.9 times the rate of the general population and pointed to the Disability Royal Commission’s findings, which described the lack of NDIS services for First Nations people with disability as a national crisis.

Support for sustainability

The organisation said it supported a sustainable NDIS that delivers for the people it was built for, but raised concerns about how the reforms will affect First Nations people, particularly in areas where services are scarce or do not exist.

FPDN chief executive, Worimi man Damian Griffis, said the test for the Federal government’s changes would be whether they protected or further excluded the most marginalised Australians in communities where many services are not available.

He said the Minister invoked “nothing about us without us,” adding that the organisation intended to hold him to that standard. He welcomed reform to tackle fraud and waste, and said First Nations people are too often victims of a system that has failed to deliver culturally safe, quality supports.

The organisation cautioned that reforms designed in Canberra without First Nations input would repeat past mistakes. It also warned of the prospect of 160,000 people being moved off the scheme through a process that has not been designed with First Nations communities, into services that, in many cases, do not yet exist locally, and assessed by a tool that has not been validated for First Nations people.

Mr Griffis said reform should proceed but must be done right, emphasising that First Nations people with disability cannot be an afterthought in changes that will shape the scheme for a generation.

Five commitments FPDN says must come first

The organisation urged the Federal government to adopt five commitments before proceeding with NDIS reforms. It called for these measures to ensure cultural safety, protect access to supports, and align outcomes with national priorities:

• Cultural safety built into the new assessment tool from day one
• No First Nations participant transitioned off the NDIS until culturally safe alternatives exist locally
• Ring-fenced funding for Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations in foundational supports and Thriving Kids
• The immediate establishment of the First Nations Disability Forum and implementation of all Disability Royal Commission recommendations
• A First Nations outcomes framework reported against Closing the Gap

The organisation said these steps were necessary to avoid further exclusion and to ensure any redesign reflects the needs, voices, and rights of First Nations people with disability.

The FPDN said it would seek urgent meetings with Minister Butler, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme Jenny McAllister, and Minister Malarndirri McCarthy to discuss the First Nations implications of Wednesday’s announcement.