Budget 2020: NDIS boost ‘guarantees scheme is fully funded’

The National Disability Insurance Scheme will be boosted by a further $3.9bn.

The National Disability Insurance Scheme will be boosted by a further $3.9bn, with Josh ­Frydenberg assuring Australians the scheme will always be fully funded.

The extra funding will ensure that the 400,000 who rely on the funding would have their services guaranteed, Disability Minister Stuart Robert said.

He said $5bn in support was delivered to people with disability in the last quarter alone.

The NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission also received an extra $92.9m over four years to ensure regulation of aged-care providers was rigorous and care support was safe.

Overall, the National Disability Insurance Agency and the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission would receive $798.8m over four years.

“The additional measures will support work to improve flexibility, consistency and certainty for NDIS participants,” Mr Robert said. “The NDIS … is providing people with disability with true choice and control, and ensuring all decisions about a person’s ­eligibility for the scheme … are made in an objective, consistent and transparent manner.”

The budget papers estimated that the NDIS scheme would eventually top out at 500,000 participants with significant and permanent disability.

The NDIS was a feature of the 2019 budget, with about $3bn of the proposed return to surplus due to an underspend on the scheme. This was attributed by the government to an overestimation of demand, but advocates said there had been a tightening of eligibility requirements and bottlenecks in the system.

The government has committed $27.9m over two years from 2019-20 to extend continuity of support for older Australians with a disability who are ineligible for the NDIS.