NDIS checks ‘a danger to disabled’

Claims by the agency administering the NDIS that ‘sympathy bias’ by doctors could be inflating claims by applicants is not backed by evidence, a peak disability advocacy body has warned.

Claims by the agency administering the NDIS that “sympathy bias” by doctors could be inflating claims by applicants in the $21bn-a-year scheme is not backed by evidence, a peak disability advocacy body has warned.

In its submission to an ongoing parliamentary inquiry on the NDIS, People with Disability Australia joined more than 100 disability groups to slam the government’s plan for the scheme’s 430,000 participants to undertake mandatory independent assessments by a team of outsourced health professionals, warning it is a one-size-fits-all ­approach for people with vastly different requirements.

“We are very concerned this ­increasingly automated process will not adequately consider individual need and circumstance,” the PWDA submission reads.

The group also critiqued a submission to the inquiry by the ­National Disability Insurance Agency, which raised concerns about inappropriate funding outcomes due to “sympathy bias” in the assessment system, in which a person’s own health professionals support their application for NDIS eligibility and funding level.

The NDIA submission said “health professionals who have been supporting an individual are often placed in a difficult position when asked to undertake an ­assessment that relates to a person’s eligibility for NDIS”.

“The potential for overstating an individual’s needs by a health professional who has known a person for a period of time, even if it is unintentional, poses a risk for appropriate and equitable decision making,” it said.

But PWDA said there was “no evidence that this has ever been a phenomenon and it is not evidenced in literature or research.”

“There is far more risk … with using unmatched clinicians who are working outside their specialist area with unproven assessment tools,” it said in a supplementary submission as yet unreleased by the committee.

The independent assessment proposal, first mooted by previous NDIS minister Stuart Robert, has attracted significant criticism from disability advocates, worried the three-hour assessments were part of a broader cost-cutting agenda.

The scheme, which is budgeted for $21bn this year, has increased in cost by 23 per cent annually over the past two years. And it is continuing to expand, with eligible participant numbers expected to grow to 530,000 by June 2023.

New minister Linda Reynolds has put a pause on going ahead with legislation to introduce the system until at least July, saying she wanted to consult further with the sector and with state governments who bear half the cost of the NDIS.

Opposition NDIS spokesman Bill Shorten said the government “had been asleep at the wheel of the NDIS for nearly eight years (and) need to explain how they messed up the books so badly”.

“Now that their compulsory ­independent assessments plan is proving too unpopular to steamroll through, expect to hear a lot more about how the fiscal sky is falling in on the NDIS,” Mr Shorten said. “That’s quite a surprise from the same government that 18 months ago was banking a $4.6bn underspend in the scheme.

“There are ways to find efficiencies in the scheme, including better crackdowns on rorters and criminal networks, that don’t hurt Australians with disability.”

The joint standing committee continues to hear from stakeholders, and will hold a hearing in Western Australia on Tuesday.