The NDIS reforms bill is expected to pass, thanks to the support of the Opposition in the upper house.
The fate of the NDIS legislation has become a political football, with the Coalition supporting Labor’s NDIS amendments on the condition that Labor’s “widow tax” is abolished.
The Senate passed the NDIS bill – designed to save around $37.8 billion over four years – late on Tuesday night. It returned to the House of Representatives for final consideration on Wednesday.
Federal health minister Mark Butler told media on Tuesday evening that the government had reached an amendments agreement with the Coalition to secure the passage of the bill.
“I’m confident [the bill] will pass the Senate tonight,” he said.
“The bill will be substantially amended, with 33 amendments in the Senate, following the 30 amendments that we supported in the House of Representatives.
“Some are relatively technical, but some are relatively substantial as well. They will ensure that this bill is the best version it can be.”
Minister for the NDIS Jenny McAllister told media that they had reached an agreement to pass the reforms.
“I believe that they will deliver an NDIS which is strong, safe, sustainable and has a strong social licence,” she said.
On Monday, Opposition Leader Angus Taylor said he had written to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese demanding that the government fix a loophole in its grandfathered negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions when property is transferred after death or divorce.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said he was open to discussions about the widow tax if it meant getting the NDIS legislation through the Senate.
“The government has already made it abundantly clear, crystal clear, that we are addressing some of those issues raised in that draft legislation that I put out some time ago, and that we have consulted on,” Mr Chalmers told reporters at Parliament House.
“If the Opposition’s main ask is that we pass the government’s legislation quicker, then obviously I’m up for that discussion.”
Under this year’s Budget legislation, negative gearing is restricted on properties bought after 12 May, while properties bought before that date keep their negative gearing concessions under grandfathering provisions.
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But under the “widow tax” loophole, someone who inherits a property as a result of death or divorce does not have access to those grandfathering protections as they would be considered a new owner of the property.
While the government has committed to introducing legislation to fix that loophole in coming weeks, Mr Chalmers said on Tuesday that the government would fast-track the legislation this week if the Coalition supported the NDIS reforms.
Speaking in the Senate, Greens Senator Jordon Steele-John said the ministerial power granted by the NDIS legislation was “unprecedented”.
“Through this legislation, a minister in Canberra will take into their hands the power to slash the supports relied on by disabled people to go beyond their doorstep, to buy groceries with the support of a support worker, to be able to go out and see their family members, to be able to pursue a higher education or upskill themselves through a tertiary process,” Senator Steele-John said.
“This funding enables you to live your life, to live a life with meaning.
“We have heard so clearly through the course of the inquiry into this bill that these powers are inappropriate, held in the hands of a politician here in Canberra.
“To cut these supports for disabled people by 50% as is intended by this government will do incredible harm to disabled people and our families, will result in so many of us being placed back within the very types of closed settings that we so desperately fought for so long to leave.”
Senator Steele-John said the Labor and Liberal parties were coming together to “unite in a grand act of dismissal”.
One woman with lived experience had told the NDIS legislation inquiry that her community participation support had been cut from 41 hours a week to four, Senator Steele-John said.
“The excuse they gave her [was] ‘ah, well, your family should be providing this support, this informal support’.
“That’s a completely inappropriate thing for a government to suggest that an adult should have to rely on their parents to go out and live their life to be able to do … the basic essential things this support enables.
“You shouldn’t have to ring up your mum and dad every time you need to buy food or go to the pharmacy.
“That’s not something that should be required of disabled people. [It] flies in the face of the independence and dignity promised when the NDIS was established.
“This woman sat before us in tears, talking about the impact of this on her life. And this bill and these ministerial powers will enable a minister in Canberra to take those four hours of support and cut them down to two.”
Senator Steele-John said the requirement for disabled people to undergo all appropriate treatments before accessing NDIS support did not take into account whether an individual could access those treatments.
“Questions of whether that treatment would constitute a financial burden, or is geographically available, or is appropriate in the broader circumstances of the individual … are things which the minister of the day is prevented from considering when defining what is appropriate.”
Ms McAllister told the Senate that the legislation clarified that appropriate treatment would not include restrictive practices involving seclusion, chemical restraint, mechanical restraint, physical restraint or environment restraint.
“It also makes clear that an available treatment would be one that is available that is funded through public health arrangements such as the MBS.”
But Senator Steele-John said those additional protections regarding appropriate treatments were the result of Greens amendments.
“Those were not the original words of this legislation,” he said.
“The NDIS, from its very beginning … has been based on the idea that a disabled person should be able to access individualised supports … that meet their specific needs.
“What constitutes a reasonable and necessary support should be decided on a case-by-case basis because disabled people are not all the same.
“We do not fit into tiny little boxes, and even though that annoys government politicians and bureaucrats, that is the reality.
“That is why the principle was placed within the foundational act of the National Disability Insurance Scheme that people should be able to access reasonable and necessary individualised supports, and this legislation rips that heartstring out of the scheme and replaces it with government mandate, with government control.”
