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Fears about ‘traumatising’ home visits after changes in the ministry
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Fears about ‘traumatising’ home visits after changes in the ministry

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Disability advocates have urged the government to “come clean” on the details of recently announced changes to the way National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) participants over the age of 16 have their support needs assessed.
Until now, NDIS participants have largely relied on reports written by health professionals to apply for certain levels of funding.
However, from mid-2026, these reports will increasingly be replaced by interviews lasting between one and three hours, conducted by disability agency staff, NDIS Minister Jenny McAllister announced at the end of September.
McAllister said the new method will be “fairer, more consistent and easier to navigate for participants.”

“We want providers and therapists to be freed up to spend time delivering support to participants, not writing reports,” she told SBS News.

The new assessment process will also use a digital tool – the I-CAN – a modified version of which has been used for almost five years in the Disability Support for Older Australians program, McAllister said.
The tool will be applied alongside questionnaires that assess each individual’s personal and environmental circumstances, with further targeted assessments for those with more complex disability support needs.

However, disability advocates have said McAllister must provide further clarity, warning that the new system could “traumatise” participants if their input is not taken into account.

Trauma is ‘real and it’s big’

NDIS participant and lawyer Jarrod Sandell-Hay is alarmed at the prospect of NDIS assessors entering people’s homes, something he said would be necessary if they were to truly understand people’s needs.
“To do a thorough assessment of someone’s needs, you really have to go into all aspects of their life,” said Sandell-Hey, who has cerebral palsy and uses a power wheelchair.

“How would you feel if you were a woman with a disability who has a 70 percent chance of being a survivor of sexual assault and had someone come into your bathroom and ask you questions about how you shower or how often you get undressed or things like that, from a person you’ve never met before and a person who probably doesn’t make you safe?

Jarrod Sandell-Hay has warned that making the NDIS assessment process less considerate could lead to a “situation where it might not be worth it” for some participants. Source: Delivered

“And in the back of your mind, you understand that these three hours could make or break your next five years of funding – that’s extremely traumatizing.

“The trauma involved is real and it is great.”
Another NDIS participant and lawyer, Stevie Lang Howson, described the possibility of home visits from assessors as “humiliating”.
“Disabled people – and most Australians – aren’t keen on the idea of ​​a nice person from the government coming to your house to look around and watch you make a cup of tea or get on or off the toilet,” Lang Howson said.

“This is why it is essential that participants maintain their right to have assessments from qualified practitioners who we trust and have built a relationship with.”

A man with short brown hair sits in a sleek black manual wheelchair and looks directly at the camera with a neutral expression. He wears a dark red long-sleeved button-up shirt and dark gray jeans, placed on a paved walkway in front of a brick house.

Stevie Lang Howson told SBS News: “At the moment, when I need an assessment of the NDIS, my occupational therapist who knows me will do it in a way that is sensitive to my individual needs.” Source: Delivered

McAllister did not provide a specific answer to an SBS news question about whether the new system would involve in-person visits.

However, she said the government was “committed to ongoing consultation” on the implementation of the plan, which was being rolled out in phases to allow participants to provide real-time feedback.

“The NDIA [National Disability Insurance Agency, which administers the NDIS] Will continue to engage with participants, families, carers and the wider disability community to ensure that when support needs assessments are introduced from mid-2026, they work for everyone. “

‘Doesn’t make much sense’

The government has promoted the changes by pointing out that preparing professional reports from GPs or allied health professionals is cost prohibitive for some participants.
“It means that the level of support a person receives does not depend on whether they can afford to make a report,” McAllister told SBS News.
However, the changes are also partly motivated by the NDIA’s capacity, disability advocates say.
“They’ve already told the public they don’t have time to read our massive reports that are very detailed,” Sandell-Hay said.
Former NDIA chief executive Rebecca Falkingham told Senate Estimates in February that her staff “cannot read the 280-page reports they are given”.
Sandell-Hay said, “They’re not that big, and if they are big, the reason they’re big is because the agency doesn’t take our needs and our assessments seriously.”

“Many of us said, ‘Yes, okay, if you want to do these assessments, no worries, but you have to allow us to give you reports and other evidence as well, and that evidence should be equally considered.’

He also said the system moving away from professional reports to self-reporting “doesn’t make sense in my mind.”
“If you look at recent decisions by the NDIS in legal proceedings, they talk about how they don’t really value participant self-assessment.
“So it’s a bit confusing: why they would choose a tool (i-can) that relies on-the majority of the tool relies on-the participant providing a self-assessment,” he said.
Lang Howson agreed, saying: “We know the NDIA doesn’t trust us to say what our support needs are without good evidence.”
“If they trusted disabled people to simply have a conversation about what we need, we wouldn’t be seeing a 76 per cent increase in the number of participants in the tribunal today.

“Some people have disabilities that make it more difficult to self-report. And we know the NDIA already assumes people are exaggerating their needs.”

However, it remains unclear whether assessors have an obligation to consider professional reports submitted under the new system.
“Participants will be able to submit their own reports to help the support needs assessor understand their situation,” McAllister said, while not directly answering questions about whether they would be required to read these reports.
“We are developing a comprehensive needs assessment that reduces the need for individuals to provide additional information or supporting evidence.”
Lang Howson said McAllister “needs to come clean on how our NDIS budgets will be calculated and what evidence will be used and explain the full extent of any automation, templates or algorithmic inputs”.
“I don’t believe for a moment that they will decide whether we get zero dollars or $200,000 in our NDIS budget based on a ‘conversation’,” he said.
SBS News asked the minister whether the way budgets are calculated under the new system would be transparent, but did not receive a direct answer.

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