Page 955 - Week 03 - Thursday, 23 March 2017
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update on the trial phase of the NDIS. Any updates from here on in will be on the progress of the ACT as we transition to full scheme. The national transition is expected to occur by 1 July 2019.
I am pleased to note that we are on track for transition to full scheme. We now have more than 5,000 Canberrans who have become NDIS participants. The progress to date has not been without hurdles. As members will be aware, the National Disability Insurance Agency, the NDIA, stopped accepting new clients for one week in October 2016. The Community Services Directorate took action as soon as it became aware of this decision and Canberrans were able to be quickly reassured that the NDIS is not a capped scheme.
I can assure members that the NDIA is continuing to accept new clients, but this episode highlights the importance of clear and ongoing communication with the NDIA and federal officials and ministers as the NDIS rolls out.
We recognise that the ACT government continues to have a responsibility to monitor the NDIS rollout and to stand up for local participants and providers. Indeed, the ACT remains a significant financial contributor to the scheme. This financial year we are investing $120 million, which equates to 59.1 per cent of the scheme’s funding in the ACT. Total investment in the ACT continues to grow and will be $342 million by 2019-20, of which the ACT will contribute 49 per cent, or $167 million.
In this new world of the NDIS, service provision is not the role of government, but ensuring quality and safeguards absolutely is. At the December 2016 COAG meeting, all jurisdictions agreed to a national approach to quality and safeguards that will take effect as all states and territories enter full scheme. The commonwealth will be responsible for a national registrar to ensure consistency in registered services. It will also be responsible for a national complaints system and a national senior practitioner to ensure safe and careful management of restrictive practices. The states and territories will have responsibility for worker screening and for authorising restrictive practices. In the ACT these changes will take effect from 1 July 2018.
As the first jurisdiction to fully transition to the NDIS, the ACT has been leading the nation on how we invest in the community and sector to make this transition. That means the government has had the opportunity to intensively support our community, individuals and providers.
The NDIS sector development fund invested $12 million in grants and workshops to assist people to apply for the NDIS, to develop their roles as decision-makers and decision supporters, and to support our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community in the ways that they wanted and needed to be supported. In 2014 the ACT had 64 specialist service providers, and that has now grown to over 320 specialist providers.
Building the workforce is a key part of our ongoing work. As individuals are able to exercise greater control over the supports they receive, it is appropriate that the workforce grows to meet those diverse needs. We expect to need over 500 new workers each year until 2018 to meet the growing need.
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