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Post by bear on Oct 3, 2022 3:23:10 GMT 7
Bill Shorten resets the NDIS
New board appointments mark a major reset for the $30 billion disability program, but the key appointment is former Victorian and NSW official Rebecca Falkingham.
Government Services Minister Bill Shorten has wasted no time putting the broom through the National Disability Insurance Scheme.The board of the National Disability Insurance Agency, which oversees the NDIS, is to be chaired by Paralympian Kurt Fearnley, the first disabled person to lead the $30 billion scheme. Newly appointed National Disability Insurance Agency CEO Rebecca Falkingham, right, stood quietly in the background as minister Bill Shorten and NDIA board members spoke to media this week. Fearnley is promising to humanise the organisation, after it fell into the trap of becoming a welfare rationing agency amid ballooning participation numbers and costs. Fearnley was bang on with his observations that restoring trust with the 500,000 seriously disabled people who take part in the NDIS will be key to enabling any changes and reforms. That is no easy feat, given the complexity of issues that need to be dealt with to stabilise the program. The feds fork out almost $68 billion on disability services and income support for the disabled. That is just short of the Queensland state budget, the nation’s third-largest provincial jurisdiction. Much of this federal spending has come after the states pulled back disability supports and programs as the NDIS took over the disability space. Strategic thinkingGraeme Innes, who is blind, joins the board and brings much-needed strategic thinking about how the NDIS best fits with other governmental systems, such as education and housing. Another blind person, Maryanne Diamond, also comes onto the board. Diamond is a long-time disability advocate and was president of the World Blind Union from 2014-16. Until recently, she led stakeholder engagement for the NDIA. Arguably the most important appointment is Rebecca Falkingham as the NDIA’s new chief executive. She stood quietly in the background on Monday as Shorten, Fearnley and Innes took questions this week in the Parliament House lobby. Falkingham hails from the Victorian public service where she runs the sprawling Department of Justice and Community Safety. The justice cluster is the centre of Victoria’s attempt to reduce family violence, and includes police, corrections, emergency services, integrity and Indigenous justice. The tough-minded Falkingham spent time in the Victorian and NSW premiers’ departments focused on service reform, and is highly rated by her secretarial peers in both jurisdictions. She is a major get for the beleaguered NDIA, after former CEO Martin Hoffman was let go when Labor took power. Redesigning the massive and complex program around its users will be Falkingham’s key management challenge. Shorten is determined to get the program back on track, but it will be Falkingham and the policy boffins in the disability and carers division at the Department of Social Services who will do the heavy lifting. Finding an appropriate gateway system to manage participants is arguably the key structural reform needed to ensure the program’s long-term viability. Getting better underlying data to properly track the scheme’s effectiveness and to better understand the drivers that have resulted in a surge of children entering the scheme – mostly with autism and developmental delays – is also key to winning the confidence of political and central agency leaders. The NDIS currently costs $31 billion, but that is predicted to rise to an eye-watering $59.3 billion per annum by the end of the decade. www.afr.com/politics/federal/bill-shorten-resets-the-ndis-20220929-p5bm0b
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Post by bear on Oct 6, 2022 3:48:21 GMT 7
Class action for disabled elderly could be most expensive ever
Older Australians are challenging their exclusion from the National Disability Insurance Scheme in a class action against the federal government that could be the most expensive on record.
Taxpayers could be out of pocket hundreds of millions of dollars if the case is successful, potentially eclipsing the cost of the federal government’s Robodebt settlement. About 330 over-65s have already signed up to the class action in the fortnight since it launched and a “beauty parade” of litigation funders are lining up to finance the case, Mitry Lawyers partner Rick Mitry told The Australian Financial Review. NDIS Minister Bill Shorten has said including the over 65s in the scheme would be “very expensive.” Alex Ellinghausen Mr Mitry said roughly 100 over-65s per week were signing up to the class action. “We are getting people from all over Australia,” Mr Mitry said. “At this stage, it could end up being in the thousands the way it’s going.” Eligibility rules for the NDIS require a person to be younger than 65 on the day they make their application. A person who is already on the scheme can keep receiving support after they turn 65. The suit alleges the age limit is inconsistent with the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities, while the staggered rollout of the NDIS is also alleged to have breached constitutional provisions against state-based discrimination. There is also a secondary claim for “misleading and deceptive conduct” because of the federal government’s alleged failure to inform people with a disability about the NDIS. Lost paymentsMitry Lawyers estimates the average annual loss for people who cannot access the NDIS is in the tens of thousands of dollars. The average NDIS participant gets $111,000 per year while the means-tested aged care scheme is limited to $56,000. Claimants are also seeking backpay for the years of lost payments since the NDIS was launched by the Gillard government in 2013. Mr Mitry said more than 5000 people could join the class action and the case could cost the federal government more than the Robodebt settlement, which required the Commonwealth to pay $112 million to victims, refund welfare recipients $752 million and abandon the pursuit of another $1 billion in false debt claims. Over-65s are not included in the NDIS because the program was designed to assist people whose disability was not acquired due to age. The program was also not envisaged as a welfare program, but a targeted scheme to lift the capability and potential workforce opportunities for working-age people with a disability. Asked about the class action last week, Disability Minister Bill Shorten said the cost of including over-65s on the scheme would be “very expensive” but he did not provide a figure. “There are people in the community who say that the quality of disability care after the age of 65 is inferior to the quality of disability care before 65,” Mr Shorten said. “Whether or not the solution is an NDIS, which would be very expensive, or an improvement in the quality of disability care in aged care, that’ll be a matter for the whole of the government to talk through.” The potential inclusion of over-65s in the scheme would put additional pressure on the NDIS’ already-stretched budget, with official forecasts showing its annual cost poised to double to $60 billion by 2030. The forecasts reflect strong growth in the number of people using the scheme and the average payments made to participants, which outstrip projections made by the Productivity Commission. As of March 2022, there were 518,668 NDIS participants, with the National Disability Insurance Agency’s annual financial sustainability report projecting this number to increase to 670,000 by June 2025 and almost 860,000 by June 2030. Paralympian Kurt Fearnley will chair the agency overseeing the $29 billion National Disability Insurance Scheme as the federal government faces a potentially costly class action over the exclusion of over-65s from the program. www.afr.com/politics/ndis-class-action-for-over-65s-could-be-most-expensive-ever-20220929-p5bm1h
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Post by JJJ88 on Oct 6, 2022 15:23:35 GMT 7
Bill Shorten resets the NDIS
New board appointments mark a major reset for the $30 billion disability program, but the key appointment is former Victorian and NSW official Rebecca Falkingham.
Government Services Minister Bill Shorten has wasted no time putting the broom through the National Disability Insurance Scheme.The board of the National Disability Insurance Agency, which oversees the NDIS, is to be chaired by Paralympian Kurt Fearnley, the first disabled person to lead the $30 billion scheme. Newly appointed National Disability Insurance Agency CEO Rebecca Falkingham, right, stood quietly in the background as minister Bill Shorten and NDIA board members spoke to media this week. Fearnley is promising to humanise the organisation, after it fell into the trap of becoming a welfare rationing agency amid ballooning participation numbers and costs. Fearnley was bang on with his observations that restoring trust with the 500,000 seriously disabled people who take part in the NDIS will be key to enabling any changes and reforms. That is no easy feat, given the complexity of issues that need to be dealt with to stabilise the program. The feds fork out almost $68 billion on disability services and income support for the disabled. That is just short of the Queensland state budget, the nation’s third-largest provincial jurisdiction. Much of this federal spending has come after the states pulled back disability supports and programs as the NDIS took over the disability space. Strategic thinkingGraeme Innes, who is blind, joins the board and brings much-needed strategic thinking about how the NDIS best fits with other governmental systems, such as education and housing. Another blind person, Maryanne Diamond, also comes onto the board. Diamond is a long-time disability advocate and was president of the World Blind Union from 2014-16. Until recently, she led stakeholder engagement for the NDIA. Arguably the most important appointment is Rebecca Falkingham as the NDIA’s new chief executive. She stood quietly in the background on Monday as Shorten, Fearnley and Innes took questions this week in the Parliament House lobby. Falkingham hails from the Victorian public service where she runs the sprawling Department of Justice and Community Safety. The justice cluster is the centre of Victoria’s attempt to reduce family violence, and includes police, corrections, emergency services, integrity and Indigenous justice. The tough-minded Falkingham spent time in the Victorian and NSW premiers’ departments focused on service reform, and is highly rated by her secretarial peers in both jurisdictions. She is a major get for the beleaguered NDIA, after former CEO Martin Hoffman was let go when Labor took power. Redesigning the massive and complex program around its users will be Falkingham’s key management challenge. Shorten is determined to get the program back on track, but it will be Falkingham and the policy boffins in the disability and carers division at the Department of Social Services who will do the heavy lifting. Finding an appropriate gateway system to manage participants is arguably the key structural reform needed to ensure the program’s long-term viability. Getting better underlying data to properly track the scheme’s effectiveness and to better understand the drivers that have resulted in a surge of children entering the scheme – mostly with autism and developmental delays – is also key to winning the confidence of political and central agency leaders. The NDIS currently costs $31 billion, but that is predicted to rise to an eye-watering $59.3 billion per annum by the end of the decade. www.afr.com/politics/federal/bill-shorten-resets-the-ndis-20220929-p5bm0b Could do with NDIS for OAPers aswel as DSPers who are overseas for the longterm. Comon Labor what do you reckon? Cheers J |
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Post by nomadic on Oct 6, 2022 20:30:15 GMT 7
I reckon you are dreaming J. We can't even get rental assistance and they take our energy supplements also. No chance of getting anything else. Oz is the only country where you pay rent and need electricity.
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Post by JJJ88 on Oct 7, 2022 17:20:12 GMT 7
We have housing and electricity to pay overseas aswel Nomadic. Maybe I am dreaming lol, but the pension isn't enough here in a country that's about half the price in the way of cost of living in Australia. I really don't know how people soley on the pension can afford to live down under.
As the Japanese say; "It's so so security"
Cheers
J
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Post by itsmylife08 on Oct 8, 2022 16:47:17 GMT 7
That's the thing jjj88 you can't live on a pension in Australia its impossible, I tried it, but not a chance mate. I stayed for almost 4 months I had barely enough for the rent where we were staying. I am back in the Pines again hallelujah brother  Cheers Itsa |
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Post by nomadic on Oct 9, 2022 20:49:47 GMT 7
We have housing and electricity to pay overseas aswel Nomadic. Maybe I am dreaming lol, but the pension isn't enough here in a country that's about half the price in the way of cost of living in Australia. I really don't know how people soley on the pension can afford to live down under. As the Japanese say; "It's so so security" Cheers J I was being sarcastic J. No idea why they take the money off us. But still very livable even without them here. Wooda thought pines the same. I can still save here in Thailand. But homeless in Oz other than a dingey boarding house or gov aged care. So no thanks from them for saving them the cost of the latter one. They still want it all. But we have far more happiness than they ever will. Always remember that. They are rich but miserable. |
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Post by nomadic on Oct 9, 2022 20:52:24 GMT 7
That's the thing jjj88 you can't live on a pension in Australia its impossible, I tried it, but not a chance mate. I stayed for almost 4 months I had barely enough for the rent where we were staying. I am back in the Pines again hallelujah brother Welcome back Itsa. I didn't realise. Was thinking of a beer in Perth maybe one day. Cheers Itsa |
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Post by itsmylife08 on Oct 12, 2022 18:10:20 GMT 7
I've been back 4 months now mate, spending 4 months in Oz 1 month in Brisbane, and 3 months in Perth, in short it was a disaster couldn't find a place because of all the requirements +++, I feel depressed just thinking about it!!! Cheers Itsa  |
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Post by JJJ88 on Oct 12, 2022 18:43:29 GMT 7
I've been back 4 months now mate, spending 4 months in Oz 1 month in Brisbane, and 3 months in Perth, in short it was a disaster couldn't find a place because of all the requirements +++, I feel depressed just thinking about it!!! Cheers Itsa Don't feel depressed Itsa. At least you got to go back for a while. Vacation if you like. At least your back and in a good place with some of the best beaches in the world. 7000+ Islands! Cheers J |
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Post by nomadic on Oct 12, 2022 20:40:31 GMT 7
So sad in reality though. When you can't even live in your own country that is so wealthy. A blessing in disguise maybe though. At least it is for some of us who prefer it here even if we won lotto. We found our peace of heaven because politicians forced us to.
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Post by bear on Oct 13, 2022 4:47:56 GMT 7
CHINWAG would be a better board to have this discussion on imho. Cheers 🐻  |
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