NDIS trial ‘bungle’ amid ballooning autism rates

The national disability insurance scheme trial dramatically underestimated demand for early intervention services.

Autism SA chief executive Barrie Elvish. ‘I would hope they all learn from what has happened here.’

There are about 1000 new cases of autism being diagnosed in South Australia each year, putting pressure on the $22 billion national disability insurance scheme trial, which dramatically underestimated the demand for early intervention services.

Autism SA chief executive Barrie Elvish said the rate had been rising for the past four or five years, although the pace of growth had been slowing.

Mr Elvish strengthened his language around a bureaucratic bungling of the numbers in the South Australian trial, telling The Weekend Australian he was now “very confident” the Department of Communities and Social Inclusion had access to the true figures of how many children would be eligible for the trial, which blew out from 5000 to about 10,000.

“Not only did they have access to the numbers, we proactively provided them with the information as part of our normal funding agreement, normal acquittal processes,” he said.

“I am very confident they had the information from us to give them the correct data.”

Disability SA chief executive David Caudrey told a service provider forum this year that be believed 8000 children would have plans by the end of June in 2017, a full year after the state trial was due to end. The number is also apparently lower than the projections for the number of children under 14 who would be eligible during the trial phase.

According to a government report, Mr Caudrey said he believed the assessments for the NDIS were “over-inclusive” and called for an evaluation of the criteria, citing the fact that nearly half the children in the trial were diagnosed with autism.

Mr Elvish said there were a total of 9000 people of all ages on the books of his agency.

“If the governments, other state governments, get their data and they are rigorous in their data acquisition, if they go to all kinds of different sources then I think (the NDIS) will be OK,” he said.

“If they try and do a quick and dirty analysis we may have the potential for another South Australia situation again. I would hope they all learn from what has happened here.”

The new Social Services portfolio, now headed by Christian Porter, no longer has responsibility for childcare or ageing, so the minister will be able to focus on delivering the scheme.

“The NDIS is one of the largest social policy reforms in Australia’s history and it will provide choice and control to around 460,000 Australians with disability,” Mr Porter said this week. “It is now at the absolute centre of my portfolio responsibilities.”

The National Disability Insurance Agency did not respond to a request for comment.