NDIS asks the impossible of those it serves

The mess that is the National Disability Insurance Scheme can be traced directly back to its many design faults.

The very foundations of the NDIS are extremely shaky since it is based on the erroneous ­assumption that direct funding can be given to people with disabilities who will then be able to devise their own plans, seek and compare service providers who might deliver their plans, and enter into contracts with the government. This capability is simply not an option for very many disabled people, especially those with mental disabilities.

The concept of user choice and competition may be somewhat appropriate for economic and business services but is ­rarely appropriate in the fields of health, welfare and even education. In these sectors a client simply does not have the knowledge, confidence, performance data or ­capacity to engage in such an ­exercise. Indeed it is a gross ­insult to tell a disabled person, ­especially the mentally disabled, to go and “shop around”.

The NDIS is also a slap in the face for charities and not-for-profits that had been more than capable of delivering services to disabled people with love, care and compassion for almost two centuries in Australia since the creation of our first charity, the Benevolent Society, in Sydney in 1813. Clients of charities and not-for-profits have trusted these charities that know their needs and aspirations from their close relationship with them and day-to-day contact. The NDIS has ­inserted a barrier between the client and the service provider, thereby threatening that trust.

The NDIS has been very disruptive, destructive and costly in the not-for-profit sector that has been faithfully delivering welfare and health services for governments for so long. Now forced to go touting for business, they have found that clients are simply ­incapable of devising their own plans and still require much ­assistance in this domain. Naturally those who do not seek ­assistance draw up unrealistic personal plans and this lies ­behind most of the cost blowout of the NDIS. As for advice, the irony is that after decoupling clients from their former not-for-profit providers, the governments have now created hundreds of jobs in the public services to ­attempt to provide such advice, which used to be part of the normal service of the not-for-profits.

And can you think of any other government program where clients are given open slather to work out a shopping list of their own to be funded by the taxpayer? It has become readily apparent that not-for-profits know best, and certainly know better than government bureaucrats when it comes to understanding client needs.

Of course all of this is symptomatic of the poor support that all Australian governments have been providing to not-for-profits. Despite the fact that the landmark Productivity Commission report revealed the outstanding contribution that not-for-­profits make to GDP, employment, ­investment, volunteerism and national wellbeing, all that successive governments of both persuasions have done since then is to tax them, regulate them and create a climate of mistrust in them. Some governments that have outsourced service delivery to not-for-profits have inserted clauses in their contract forbidding them from criticising governments or their policies. The Australian Not for Profits and Charities Commission, which the sector hoped would be a white knight and its advocate, has turned out to be just a mega-­regulator. Also, our creaking federal system has once again frustrated the design and implementation of such a worthy idea for the nation.

The solution is clear — the present system must be stopped and no more clients admitted to its confines. All new clients must be handled by a reversion to the former model where funding goes to not-for-profits that are trusted to care for the interests of their clients.

Meanwhile the recently announced Thodey inquiry into the commonwealth public service needs to identify why Australia has had so many policy delivery failures. Grand nationally ambitious schemes such as the NBN, home insulation (pink batts), national curriculum, laptops for students, Murray-Darling Basin, renewable energy and the NDIS have all faltered in their design and particularly delivery. Are the skills of policy design these days missing in the public service? Are public servants unable to identify intended and unintended consequences of policy? Do they not understand market forces and consumer response and behaviour? Are they unable to navigate the federal-state divide? Is it merely a case of Canberra’s isolation from the real world and lack of direct involvement in service delivery?

Or is it the politicisation of the public service that sees public servants unwilling to stand up to ministers, even prime ministers, who demand instant implementation of programs without time for careful planning, consultation and design?

The NDIS is a wonderful ­concept that needs urgent attention and rectification — and the not-for-profit sector can play a major part.

Emeritus professor Kenneth Wiltshire, of the UQ Business School, is co-editor of Transformational Leadership in Not for Profits and Social Enterprises (Routledge).