Government will offer standard interim plans for children who face long delays getting onto the scheme

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Disability advocates say the Morrison government’s new plan to reduce lengthy delays in the national disability insurance scheme should only be a stopgap measure.

In a bid to reduce waiting times to 50 days, the new NDIS minister, Stuart Robert, announced on Wednesday the government would offer interim plans for children aged six and under who were expected to face long delays to get onto the scheme.

The average waiting time for an NDIS plan to be finalised is more than 100 days, but Robert pledged the new policy would give those expected to wait longer than 50 days a $10,000 “standardised interim plan” while their full package was being worked out.

“I have been working with the NDIA to identify what more can be done to reduce the backlogs that are currently being experienced by families in some locations,” he said.

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The scheme – which now covers 280,000 participants, including 11,500 aged 0-6 who access the NDIS Early Childhood Early Intervention program – has been plagued by delays.

Some parents have complained about waiting nearly 12 months for access to a finalised plan, while MPs have said their offices have received reports of parents waiting more than six months for their first planning meeting.

Romola Hollywood, the director of policy and advocacy at People with Disability Australia, said the organisation was pleased the government had taken “the first steps” in addressing “considerable delays for people with disability in accessing supports through the NDIS”.

But she warned that Wednesday’s announcement should only be seen as a temporary fix.

“In addition, the introduction of standard interim plans while individual plans are being implemented must be seen as only a stopgap measure, and not as a move away from the individualised supports that people with disability need,” she told Guardian Australia.

“We also need to see measures to reduce delays, such as removing the staff cap at the NDIA, and better training for staff, introduced as soon as possible.”

The Council for Intellectual Disability chief executive, Justine O’Neill, also said the changes would “go some way to reduce the delays” but were a “stop-gap measure and not a solution”.

“It is encouraging that this announcement provides a better pathway for children with complex support needs with these children being immediately streamed to an NDIA Early Childhood specialist to develop their NDIS plan,” she told Guardian Australia.

Piers Gooding, an NDIS researcher at the University of Melbourne, said the changes were “a good thing” but would only help a small number of overall participants despite delays across the entire scheme.

A spokesman for Robert said the changes announced on Wednesday would be funded through existing NDIS operational funding.

The scheme recorded a $1.6bn underspend in the federal budget, which proved to be a major point of contention at the May election.

The government said the changes would give children who don’t currently receive state disability funding a “standard plan”. It would be replaced by their full package within six months (around 180 days).

Those who are currently receiving support from the states or territories would also get the $10,000 package, even if their existing plan was worth less than that.

The NDIA told Senate estimates last year children aged six and under were waiting an average of 107 days to to have their plans approved.

It said in its most recent quarterly report the delays were down to “rapidity of the roll-out in some jurisdictions”, where large numbers of files may be transferred on a single day”.