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Disability Minister Jenny McAllister has warned that delays to passing the government’s NDIS reforms could have “significant” consequences, after Opposition Leader Angus Taylor promised to “fight like hell” against Labor’s proposed tax changes.
Health Minister Mark Butler revealed in May about 160,000 people would be cut from the NDIS by the end of the decade.
These cuts are set to be driven by an eligibility crackdown and are expected to save the budget $35bn over four years.
These forthcoming savings subsequently underpin the government’s budget spending strategy, including its pledge to provide tax measures like the $6bn Working Australians Tax Offset.
Senator McAllister told Sky News Sunday Agenda the government still believed the NDIS was a “life-changing reform” but was enacting the changes to ensure it was “sustainable for the long term”.
“Right now, it just costs too much,” she said.
“The changes we propose do involve savings to the budget, and the consequences of delay are significant.”
Labor is locked in negotiations with the Coalition to pass the NDIS legislation through the Senate after the Greens ruled out support for the Bill.
But Mr Taylor’s vow to Liberal faithful this week, to tackle what he describes as Labor’s “war on aspiration” – namely its proposed changes to the capital gains tax and negative gearing, has raised questions about the extent to which the opposition will use the NDIS legislation as leverage in its tax fight.
“Now, the Coalition talk a lot about the need to restrain costs, if they’re serious about that, we hope that they’ll engage with us and get this bill through,” Senator McAllister said.
“I will say, to be fair to them, that they are engaging closely, constructively.
“My expectation is that we’ll continue to have very constructive engagements with (Shadow NDIS Minister) Melissa McIntosh, in particular.”
Mr Butler earlier described the NDIS in its current form as vulnerable to the “worst elements of organised crime”.
At a May Senate estimates hearing, Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission officials revealed a “significant number” of higher-end organised crime groups were targeting Australia, including through the NDIS.
“That broader trend across all of that organised crime activity is also reflected through to exploitation of NDIS in terms of the types of networks or actors that may be involved, as it does relate to a range of other domains in which they operate,” ACIC executive director, mission co-ordination and analysis Adam Meyer said.
Mr Meyer said exploitation of the NDIS was one element of a larger business model that was increasingly targeting government payment systems.
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