NDIS: NSW starts early to build housing stockpile

Disabled people living in part of NSW will have access to an early version of housing support worth millions.

Martin Ryan, with his mother Margaret. Martin lives in a new group home for the disabled in Miranda, NSW.

Disabled people living in part of NSW will have access to an early version of housing support worth millions of dollars after the state government decided it would not and could not wait for the $22 billion National Disability Insurance Scheme to get its act together on the issue.

When the full scheme is rolled out in 2018-19, about $700 million annually will be quarantined for housing and accommodation support, but this money will not be provided as one lump sum for the building of projects, but rather ­attached in portions to the individual plans of thousands of participants.

But state and federal government disability ministers have yet to agree on a formula for the calculation of how much people will receive and NSW Disability Services Minister John Ajaka told The Weekend Australian he would not wait for one.

He wants to get the jump on the NDIS to help people with disabilities move out of archaic residential institutions in the Hunter region and into modern group homes.

“The government has taken the position that we need to assist the non-government sector to continue to build its capacity and for that reason we need to see the sector commencing now, not waiting until the determination has been made,” he said.

“I was absolutely thrilled when it was agreed that we would commence our state-based (capital) programs. This will allow the non-government sector to approach us so that we can provide that in the individualised funding packages until the commonwealth comes in.

“And we have based our programs on the estimate of three years until the commonwealth comes in.”

The development of a plan for how housing would be treated under the flagship NDIS was ­delayed for 18 months as agencies grappled with how to administer funding presumed to be included in the $22bn package.

The ultimate design, called “user cost of capital”, won’t flow freely until 2018, which means the development of innovative housing solutions for people with disabilities may be significantly postponed.

The NSW government has foreshadowed deliberations of the Disability Reform Council and will calculate a housing loading based on the size and type of ­accommodation required, its age and the location.

The loading will be for people in the Hunter region and will ­include the land purchase price.

The government will soon launch an expression of interest to identify interested parties and then will contact those with expertise in the request-for-tender phase.

The NDIS will eventually include an extra 50,000 people in NSW than currently receive disability support services and combined state and federal funding will reach $6.4bn a year.

“That is the wonderful news. Then we give people choice and control,” Mr Ajaka said.

“Now all of that is great if you have got the infrastructure and the service providers and the necessary assistance to be able to cope and meet the extra demand. That is what we are working on. That is the key to this.”

The money will be paid to service providers to supply homes.

The Baird government has ­already provided about $58m over two budgets to buy land in the region, close to families whose children live in the large institutions.