Canberra, states must move quickly to limit NDIS uncertainty

April 25, 2026 — 5:00am

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In January last year, as outgoing minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, former Labor leader Bill Shorten declared the scheme was no longer the government’s “major problem child”, adding “there is bipartisan agreement about the path of sustainability”.

The “child” delivered by Julia Gillard’s government in 2013 is now a teenager, and its problems are still very much with us. When Health Minister Mark Butler fronted the National Press Club this week to set out the government’s latest thinking on “the path of sustainability”, the message was startling.

The Albanese government inherited an NDIS on a 23 per cent growth curve. By the time of Shorten’s parting message, that figure had been pared back to 8 per cent. Butler wants that number down to 4 per cent this year and 1 per cent in the years to follow.

The number of people on the scheme would, in this vision, be reduced to 600,000 by this decade’s end. That’s down 160,000 people from where we are now, but given projections would have 900,000 people on the scheme by 2030, it represents 300,000 people who might otherwise have expected some form of assistance.

It has long been clear something is seriously awry with........

© Brisbane Times