For years, the NDIS has been a battleground of competing claims. Dubious therapies with glossy marketing have collided with desperate hopes of fulfilled lives. It’s left the NDIS struggling as it attempts to sort out genuine supports from wasted spending.

Now a NDIS Evidence Advisory Committee (EAC) of 43 experts - which includes, most critically, People with Disability - will do what’s been missing. This team will apply independent scrutiny to every support the scheme is paying for.

In her first interview since becoming Chair of the new decision-making committee, Professor Jill Duncan tells abilityNEWS the principle is simple.

Therapies and assistive technologies will be set against three tests. First, safety. Next, a rigorous academic examination of their effectiveness. And finally, whether a better support exists.

Only after this exhaustive investigation of what’s best for People with Disability will there be any consideration of cost.

This isn’t about rubber-stamping or addressing the economic pressures on the scheme. It really is about building a transparent architecture for decision-making, placing the voice of people with disability at the centre of the review.

After the first issue, safety, is addressed, university-trained experts will conduct comprehensive evidence reviews. Subcommittees will then weigh both assistive technology and capacity-building supports examining their effectiveness and need. After this cost-effectiveness will be assessed before recommendations proceed to the minister.

Duncan stresses this isn’t about yes or no answers.

“We want to provide help before people have to make decisions. That means offering real information that people can use.”

Billions of taxpayer dollars ride on these judgments. But more importantly, so do the lives of participants who depend on safe, effective supports.

The goal is straightforward: evidence, not hype. The NDIS Evidence Advisory Committee won’t simply hand down rulings. It’s designed to build trust by making every stage of its work visible.

_____________________________________

[continued from newsletter]

So what happened? And why do we need experts deciding what therapies should be covered by the NDIS anyway? Wasn’t the whole idea for people to choose their own supports?

When the NDIS began, it was accompanied by a powerful sales pitch. Bill Shorten stressed the individual nature of disability required individual answers. It was up to each person to find the therapy that was best for them.

It was a great idea. Unfortunately, like many great ideas, it didn’t translate into the real world.

People with disability felt they were missing out. If someone else with a particular condition was getting, for example, speech therapy, why should they be denied it?

This was accompanied by lurid reports of People with Disability indulging in ‘luxury cruises’. Or others receiving tarot card and gaming therapy, or free tattoos.

The scheme had lost its social license.

Shorten reacted by arbitrarily revoking particular treatments. Sex, for example, was out. The Minister simply stated it was neither ‘reasonable or necessary’. But what he never managed to do, however, was establish a system to determine what therapies actually were appropriate.

This is finally changing. The new Minister, Janny McAllister, understood that if the scheme was to survive it required rigour. It needed to prove the therapies that taxpayers were forking out for were really ones that would make a difference.

She also understood that sorting these out required something more than a choice arrived at by gut feeling in a Ministerial office.

The result is the new Evidence Advisory Committee, which will provide expert advice on which supports (or therapies) should receive funding.

It’s layered structure of decision-making matters. Too often, decisions about NDIS supports have been opaque, leaving participants to feel as if they’re missing out or ignored and providers uncertain. By combining lived experience with academic review and structured cost analysis, the EAC is attempting something different: a balanced, transparent process that recognises both evidence and people.

Duncan insists her committee’s mission is not to draw red lines but to provide clarity.

“We will not be providing ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers. We want to provide the most nuanced view possible so people can make informed choices.”

It’s a high bar. Therapies aren’t just treatments. They represent both hopes, livelihoods. They can also represent a huge waste of money that makes taxpayers resentful and generates negative headlines that erode support for the scheme. Duncan believes the EAC’s careful, multi-step architecture will stop such pressures.

“My heart is really in this,” she says. “We will be doing everything possible to ensure the safety and efficiency of the scheme.”

If the committee succeeds, the result won’t just be better supports. It will also be the foundation of a shared understanding of what the NDIS should be funding and why.