10390 – Individual submission

NDIS participants should get to choose who they would like to have develop their NDIS plan not just be allocated to an NDIA planner or the Local Area Coordination Services for the NDIS allocating NDIS participants to any Local Area Coordinator. NDIS participants should be given a list of NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators to choose from and then decide who they would like to have develop their NDIS plan. NDIS participants want planners and local area coordinators that are competent, have good listening skills, are an active listener, is person-centred, has a holistic approach and can get plans right. NDIS participants look for NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators who write in NDIS plans what participants ask for and fund what participants ask for not only look at documents that have been provided and take notes. NDIS participants want planners and local area coordinators who fund what participants say they want and ask suitable questions to NDIS participants. Planners and Local Area Coordinators should be asking NDIS participants what would you like funded in your plan? Were you previously funded by ADHC? What were you previously funded for? Was this for you and a support worker? At present there are lots of complaints, appeals and reviews because the NDIS is not matching what ADHC funded and because there are a lot of people who were previously funded for certain activities under the state system and since transitioning to the NDIS have not been able to do what they were able to do before transitioning to the NDIS this has led to more NDIS participants making complaints, more NDIS participants applying for reviews and more NDIS participants appealing decisions at the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. Had the NDIS funded everything that ADHC funded and not made people feel worse off and disadvantaged then there would not be a backlog of reviews, appeals and complaints. Unless changes are made there will continue to be more NDIS participants appealing decisions at the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and more people continuing to feel worse off and disadvantaged under the NDIS instead of getting better and changes being made to make the NDIS work for everyone instead NDIS participants will continue to send money back to the NDIA. The only way things will change is to change the legislation and what the NDIS funds. If the gaps are minimised between mainstream services and the NDIS then participants will have a lot more flexibility and will be able to do what they want to do while at the moment participants are unable to do what they did before they transitioned to the NDIS all because the NDIS will not fund what participants want to do.