In The Media | 21 April 2017

NDIS hiccups are expected, as with any large-scale social reform

The agreement to launch the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) in 2012 was met with great excitement. It also came with large expectations about the transformation this would bring in terms of services and outcomes for people with disability.

Disability services were widely recognised to be in a parlous state and there was bipartisan support for the development of a national scheme that would address their identified inadequacies. In recent months, this enthusiasm and excitement has been replaced by a more critical discourse. National rollout of the scheme began last year, but already there have been reports of the NDIS being “plagued with problems”.

However, one of the problems with judging success and failure is that they often look the same part way through. We shouldn’t be surprised that such a huge reform process is encountering challenges in the implementation process and these issues don’t mean that the NDIS is failing overall.

Source: The Conversation