What in the NDIS now? LIVE 2025

On this very special LIVE episode, Hannah and Sam are joined by the always wonderful Justin MacDonald, Esther Syred, Julian Carmichael and Greg Facoory.

Thank you so much to our special guests, sponsors and the wonderful crowd that joined us on a scorching hot day in Brisbane in February 2025.

If you want to get in touch with us, you can:

Contact the podcast [e-mail]

Contact Hannah [e-mail]

Contact Sam [e-mail]

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
We acknowledge the original owners of the land on which we podcast,

(00:03):
whose stories were told for thousands of years. Today we are recording in Meanjin. We pay our
respects to elders past and present who may be listening. Sovereignty was never ceded.
A quick note before we get started that there may be some swearing in today's podcast. If
you don't like swearing or usually listen with children in the car, you have been warned.

(00:29):
And you're listening to What in the NDIS Now, a podcast where I, Hannah Redford, and my friend,
Sam Rosenbaum, interview participants and providers about all things NDIS.
Hey, how are you going? The episode you're about to hear is from our live show of 2025.

(00:51):
We were so excited to bring you the live show. It was so much fun and we had great discussions.
I hope you really love it. Right before we get into it, I do just want to thank all of our sponsors
so much. We couldn't have put on the afternoon without you. So in no particular order,

(01:15):
here are our amazing sponsors from the live show. Thank you to the Sunflower Hub. Thank you Just SDA.
Thank you to Amend Rehab. Thank you to Back to You Therapy. Thank you to QSSS. Thank you to
Plan Decoters. Thank you to Bella Linda Smart Displays. Thank you to Sage. Thank you to Goodrose

(01:41):
Support Coordination. Thank you to Growing Daily. Thank you so much to Girasole Support. Thank you so
much for coming so far to Seaside Support. Thank you to Alpha Care and Share. Thank you to Fuel
Your Life and a huge thank you to all the amazing young people and young at heart people who were

(02:08):
there from Coffee Nutz. The coffee was amazing and the cold drinks were definitely needed as it was
a very hot day. We really want to say thank you to Rex and Fran Ashenden for their support of the
podcast. They sponsored the live episode as well. So thank you so much to them. It's really awesome

(02:36):
to have that support to be able to put on these awesome events. We are so excited to bring you
this episode and I hope you enjoy.
Hello. Thank you so much all for being here. We are so, so excited that you're all here.

(02:56):
So first up, the crew here at What in the World is doing a great job. So I'm going to start with
the NDAs now. We are so, so excited that you're all here. So first up, the crew here at What in the
NDIS Now would like to acknowledge the Yagurra and Turrbal people whose land on which we podcast.

(03:22):
We acknowledge their elders past and present. Sovereignty was never ceded, always was,
always will be Aboriginal land. Okay. Let's get going. Please welcome to the stage the co...

(03:46):
First, before I do that actually, sorry. I want to thank so much our official photographers
who were Eleanor and Vy and Vy. And I want to thank Ellie, our amazing producer for plugging

(04:09):
in everything without whom the podcast could never ever happen and get out to all of you.
So I would like you all to give a big, warm welcome to the stage, the co-host who runs with
too many ideas at once. He's your favourite and mine, it's Sam Rosenbaum.

(04:33):
Thanks, Hannah. You did a costume change. Yes, I've got to keep them
brand. Outrageousness of style. For those who are not in the room today, I am wearing a ridiculously
bright multicoloured shirt with blue shorts. And this is my second costume change for the day,
keeping in style. And we had the first one was the emoji outfit that I think some of you listeners

(04:55):
might have tracked down from last Christmas. So I'm going to give you a little bit of a
look at the outfit. Same emoji outfit. Thank you, Hannah.
What have you been up to? Well, I have been enjoying meeting all the lovely people coming

(05:19):
today's session and meeting all the sponsors and getting organised and squeltering a little bit.
Hence why I'm very glad that I went for two outfits for today. Technically it was three
because I had a bumping shirt too. Yes, well, that's very true. Well, I've been protesting.
You have. There's been lots happening. Yeah, to make sure trans young people's

(05:44):
human rights are upheld because they're not being in the state of Queensland.
No, it's been a very disappointing week coming from the Queensland Government.
Yes. And hopefully you all listened to the episode that came out on Monday and you would have heard
the speech that I gave at the protest because that was kind of cool. It was. Well done for

(06:10):
doing that. Thank you. The community thanks you for your activism. Yeah, well, I just have to.
Yeah. Yeah. Sam, is there a musical instrument that you're good at doing the air version of?
No. No, no. Neither me either. I can pretend to drum roll.

(06:31):
Okay. So this fits in nicely with what I'm about to say because I like doing air drums,
but whenever I do air drums, I look like someone who's going through a cobweb
because I'm in the middle of the, which is really annoying for Ellie because she's actually a drummer.

(06:51):
Okay. So I guess it's time to introduce our panel. Yes. All right.
With 20 years working in governance, quality and risk for organisations who support and advocate
for the most vulnerable and at-risk people in society, he has the passion and drive to improve

(07:17):
the disability and aged care industry and to change the conversations we have as providers
in how we support those we are charged to serve. His current role is as QSSS Chief Operations
Officer. He works with an amazing team showing the rest of the sector how to be uniquely simple.

(07:38):
From episode 44, please welcome Greg Fackery.
Okay. Our next panellist was supposed to be Sarah Raffal, but she got sick.

(08:00):
So I'm going to say her intro anyway, just so when she hears this, she knows what I was going to say.
Our next panellist is our favourite speechie from New Zealand. She has worked in Scotland and Australia,
mostly focusing on acquired brain injury, stroke, neurodivergent conditions and swallowing disorders,

(08:24):
backed by her published research in the field of dysphasia. She currently leads the allied health
team at Amend Rehab from episode 24 all the way back in season one, That's About Sarah.
Who we have today who I asked at the last minute when they arrived, we have Esther Sired.

(08:51):
Please come to the stage.
Esther is an amazing behaviour support practitioner and has always has also been on the
podcast, although I can't remember which episode number that was. Okay. Our next panellist is the

(09:14):
founder and managing director of JustSDA. He has a passion for creating pathways for people with
disabilities to purchase and own their own homes. He serves on multiple boards for advocating for
people with disabilities facing barriers in employment and access to services. From episode

(09:36):
38, please welcome Justin McDonald. And last but not least, our next panellist today is a
physiotherapist who loves air pods. He not only has a bachelor of exercise science, but a master's of

(10:00):
physiotherapy and a graduate diploma of occupational health and safety. He has special interests in
working with people with neurological conditions. After starting back to e-therapy, he has quickly
expanded to offer OT services as well as taking on more physios so that he can reach more people.
He is a man of many talents. From episode 19, please welcome Julian Carmichael.

(10:33):
Did you like my joke? I did. Are you going to explain the air pods more?
Context is important. So the first time I ever met Julian, he gave me his brochure and I went,
oh, that's a good photo of you. You were wearing air pods. Was that deliberate? And he went, oh,
my God, I didn't notice. And I hoped no one else would either. So you're the first one to pick it

(11:00):
up straight away. I'm so annoying like that. So what we thought we'd do today, rather than have
a set lot of questions because our podcast always is pretty conversational. What we wanted to do is
just have more of a set of themes that we kind of want to talk about. So our first theme that we

(11:28):
wanted to talk about is home and living. Sam? Sorry, I was just asking Jason to close the
back door there. Thanks, Jason. Yeah, so, well, Justin, this is a big part in your department.

(11:48):
It's pretty much my life, really. Pretty simple. We've got an hour and a half, so we could probably
cover home and living within three minutes. Look, I feel like Esther beside me would enjoy the
attention of me taking off her. Well, as a speechie, I... And for those listening and wondering

(12:08):
about Esther's episode, it's episode 39. Oh, thank you. But, Justin, do you want to sort of
maybe go through, because this is about the NDIS has been changing very rapidly over the last
three months, six months and year and a bit. Deep breaths. But more so, we're seeing the outcomes

(12:30):
of the NDIS review, what the government is actually starting to look... What the government's
starting to look to put in place. And we're starting to see, for those of us that are live
and breathe this, we're starting to see what things could start to look like as well. And at
the centre of all of this is the person and the people that we support. What has been some of the

(12:53):
first big things with all the changes that you've heard participants screaming out,
what the hell? Or what has been the big reactions that you've seen in the space?
Yeah, it's... Where do we even... This is massive. So let's try and summarise as best we can. So I'm
still waiting for the response from the federal government on the quality... We did a royal
commission a while back. I don't know if you guys remember it. Just remembering, waiting for a

(13:16):
response on that too, because there hasn't really been a really well-descripted, well-articulated
response. And I think that will kind of help inform the framework on where we're going next,
because there's been a lot of, I guess, scaremongering, I think, over the last 12
months. And I don't know where everyone else feels in the sector, but for me, there's probably been
more change in the last 12 months than there has in the last 12 years in the sector. And I'm just
fatigued. I'm just exhausted about keeping up with the legislation, the changes and the yes list,

(13:40):
the no list, what's in, what's out, shake it all about. But yeah, the big things we're seeing is,
we are seeing some positive determinations in some of the SDA space, which is for people that don't
know SDA. If you look at the entire broader scheme of NDIS's 680,000 participants, SDA supports those
that may have extreme functional impairment or high care support needs, that can't live in mainstream

(14:04):
housing or won't thrive in mainstream housing. So we're talking about the supporting between 24
to 30,000 of the 680,000. So we're talking a very small niche. So what we're seeing is some of the
outcomes are positive, but they're taking a long time to get there. And what used to be three months
is now six months, which is now nine months. And we had a resident move in on Monday. She got her
approval Christmas Eve, not a bad Christmas present, I must say, but she had to wait 13 months for

(14:27):
that Christmas present. So the time it takes for that, the fatigue and the time and the interactions
between the agency to get an outcome has just been really exhausting. So that's good, but it's just
taking too long. I think the legislation change, how that was approached and how that was engaged
in a co-design or I'd probably argue maybe not a true co-design response, given that I teach co-design

(14:48):
and design thinking. But yeah, I think that could have been done a little bit better. And just this
focus on fraud, like it's everyone I speak to is just worried about this fraud thing. Whereas for
me, I think that's like a true magician. If you find a focus on the fraud side of thing, that takes
focus off the other inefficiencies, which for me is the actual articulating and running of the scheme,
because if I've got a follow up for that lady that moved in, every week we're making a phone call,

(15:12):
the individual's making a phone call, their support board makes them a phone call, someone's taking
that phone call and that's times 52 weeks of phone calls, that's a lot of hours, a lot of labour and
those things. Whereas if we've got that right, then we can actually save the scheme as well and stop
this whole scaremongering thing too. So I'm actually pretty optimistic on where we're at now.
Things have slowed down a bit and I like the thing that's planned. But I think what it actually is,

(15:34):
parliament haven't come back to house yet, or they have just, but we're about to go into caretaker
mode for the federal election as well. So that could be announced in, they're wrecking the end
of March or the end of May, is probably the dates at the moment. So if it's March, that's in the next
two weeks. So caretaker mode means the new minister that's been appointed, Amanda Richworth,
may not even have time to even put anything to action. So we'll see what happens as a result

(15:55):
of those changes and who knows what's going to happen there. But I'll just plant the election
seed there because that could have a big impact on our sector too. I do have quite the political
question that I want to ask, but I'm not going to because this is not necessarily the podcast
to ask about certain exiting ministers and the timeframe on that. Yeah, I think I called it the
seagull effect. For those who don't know the seagull reference, it's someone that might come

(16:19):
in and make a lot of noise, basically do certain things on everything and then just disappear.
And that seems to be how I kind of felt that's how that all happened and played as well and
just left a very big pile of stuff for someone else. Definitely. Well, I've said it before on
the podcast. But you did sort of mention specifically around that co-design. One thing

(16:39):
I've sort of started seeing within the quality space, especially with Natalie Wade coming in
as the assistant director, assistant commissioner for provider registration. It seems like they're
putting a lot more emphasis and talking around quality metrics within practice standards as well
specific within the home and living space. Have you seen too much on that? We haven't been exposed

(17:03):
too much at an SDA. I think the only interactions we've had are just some of these tasks all sort
of been created to kind of almost audit and just put checks and balances in around separation of
duties of control, which is really important with housing. So for those that aren't familiar, again,
you really want a housing provider as one separate party to the care provider so you don't have that
conflict of interest inherent. And there's a task force there, but the problem is that task force

(17:26):
has reached out to us and we need to provide every participant in every property and their address
when they moved in, all of those things for them to fulfil this work. So it's quite heavy and manual
and that's 200 hours I've got to find to be able to do that because we're looking after more and
more people and it's probably 45 data points per person. So I think it's welcome and it's good,
but there's no real support in place for a provider to be able to cope with that level of

(17:48):
information. And it's the Calling Safeguards Commission and they're kind of similar to the
NDIS and they can probably get the information across if they wanted to. But yeah.
It especially has been quite interesting on that information across because as you said at the start,
we haven't really had, we had a half-hearted response to the Age Care Commission, Royal Commission,

(18:09):
and then we've had quite, we've had nil set and response by, proxy response by action,
which doesn't necessarily align with what's meant to happen either. If I can open up to the rest of
the panel with where you've been engaging with participants and have been looking in that housing
living for applications with an OT, especially sort of points and also yourself, Greg, losing my

(18:30):
voice. And I see yourself, Greg, with participants. How has everything really been impacting the
people you guys are working with from the front baseline level? So from us, the biggest impact on
especially, I guess, our OTs is we're now getting directed or stated the amount of hours we can use

(18:53):
to write a certain report or something like that to have the application or provide that support.
And those hours are well under what our normal standard is. And so we're having to work out how
to provide the same detail of information in a much less time frame that we're given. So.

(19:15):
Okay. That's, how they, when they've been, because I haven't actually seen this yet,
so I'm going to go do some research and get back home. But.
It has, there's only, so we've only had two, it's happened twice in maybe the last two months.
Okay.
It's not every one, but there are ones where they're like, you need to provide

(19:36):
an FCA or an SDA report and this is the hours you've been given. And the support
coordinator is saying, this is from the NDIA. You're not getting any more hours.
Oh. Okay. Are they giving guidelines around how they're actually putting that out?
No. No. I have heard about this happening too. And it's, I think it puts OTs in a really tricky

(20:01):
spot because they're always wanting to provide really quality information. And I don't know an
OT who enjoys sitting for hours and hours writing useless information. They are only
writing useful information. And so for the NDIA to turn around and say, oh no, actually,

(20:28):
this isn't, you've got to do all of this information, but we're not going to give
you the time to do it. It's so disrespectful to our OTs and it really, really pisses me off that
that's some, you know, after they've gone after support coordinators and they've gone after plan

(20:51):
managers and to go after our OTs is mind blowing to me because they are only putting in reports
what they think is really necessary. And yes, sometimes that means a 40 page report
to get across what is needed. But, and also then to not give any hints about, well, you've only got

(21:18):
four hours to write this massive report. We're not going to tell you what we actually want written
in that report. You have to guess. It doesn't make any sense. I think there's a danger of a false
economy there too. Because if you get a report right and you kind of articulate all the components,
you do the research at the outset, you can actually set the right plans and schedules and

(21:41):
supports in place too. Now that's assuming that the reports are read in detail and those things. So
if you spend a little bit more at the outset, I don't know what you sort of feel about it, but
if you spend a bit more time at the outset, you could potentially save the scheme in some ways
because you're not overprescribing or just that one size fits all approach too. And it just gets
that more tailored approach, which is hard. And disability is so unique and so individual.

(22:02):
Just getting it, you can't just do a one size fits all. So I think just getting it right there
just saves time, saves effort. And actually probably if you're not reasonable, necessary,
and affordable, sustainable, that's the one, just makes it more sustainable. So I think it's almost
shooting yourself in the foot. Same with housing decisions. So that disrespect, it's more than just
the time in which an OT is allocated to or funded to do a report. It's also, the disrespect also

(22:29):
comes into, we'll fund you for X number of hours to do that report, but we'll take what appears to
be 15 minutes to read it. And it goes back to that esoterical list of criteria that the NDIS
does or doesn't have as to, does it tick a checkbox as to, I'm looking for these specific

(22:54):
buzzwords or these specific things. To the best of my knowledge, nobody really knows what that is.
For all we know, it doesn't say the word pineapple, so it doesn't count.
No, just put pineapple in every report.
I literally was talking to someone about this yesterday. I wish we could put a little code word

(23:17):
somewhere in the report and then a participant or their family can ask the planner to tell them the
code, the secret code word. Just make sure you have pineapple.
It's almost like we're in recruitment industry and we're having the ATS read our resumes.
But I guess the other issue is around NDIS literacy for those health professionals who

(23:42):
are doing those reports because to the best of my knowledge, and obviously I'm not an OT,
there's not that here's how to write a report for the NDIS ticking all the boxes that they are
looking for, regardless of what you're seeing in front of you, how do you word it in a way in which

(24:03):
they're going to stand up or sit up and listen? Even the most compelling cases fall by the wayside
because of whatever reason, whether it's because the skills of the assessor that's actually looking
at it or whether it's because it hasn't had pineapple in the report, it's really hard to
figure out where anybody stands when it comes to advocating for a participant for something that

(24:29):
it's clear as day that they need. You mentioned about the inefficiency,
and I think working in behaviour support, what I can say is that when there's a lot of delays
and when there's all this uncertainty of I feel like my whole life is going to fall apart if I
don't have this access to the funding I need and if that's over someone's head, then that is also

(24:51):
a lot of the specialist therapist time that is actually supporting someone through,
it feels odd to be an NDA funded support that's supporting someone when a lot of the underlying
kind of presentation is anxiety around the NDA funding. For some people it can feel a little

(25:12):
bit frustrating of how about not paying specialists their hourly rate, can we just have a bit more
flexibility in how this funding is used or that to meet their needs, because while we're waiting
for all of this, I think we've got to remember the human cost here as well, that this is someone's
life and their whole family, it can feel limbo. It can be really paralyzing.

(25:35):
It's words on a page, it's easy to disassociate yourself from someone when all you've got is
words on a page and a checklist and not yet. What we've been finding with that kind of,
what you're saying almost like with the pineapple and words on the page is that
they're taking single sentences out of a 40 page report and they're using that sentence

(25:57):
out of context to decline something. So they're taking a current book out of
Labor's and Liberals' early campaign strategies? Right. Not surprised.
I'm not biting into politics just yet. We'll give that a five minutes.
All right. Well, thank you very much everyone for that.

(26:23):
I was going to ask one thing about behaviour support, because you also have to write big
reports and are you finding it sometimes a struggle when you're not putting pineapple
in your report? I've started a trend. They're picking that up. Yeah. And a bit

(26:48):
like Julian pointed out, if it's got one sentence that is wrong, that person doesn't
get that funding. Are you finding that too? I think it's a little different because
the standard practice is that I talk to their behaviour support needs and for the most part,

(27:13):
I try to encourage that their other support needs are covered by a functional capacity
assessment by NOT or the other allied health. That's kind of their specialty. But obviously
when it's their behaviours or their restrictive practices that kind of then underpin their

(27:34):
support needs, I can speak to that. But I don't know, maybe I have a little bit more.
When there's restrictive practices, I think that sometimes because we can talk to that,
if that's their requirements, we can say, well, based on your own requirements,
we probably have that little thread to tug on, I guess. But I did make the mistake once of saying,

(27:59):
if you choose one-to-one funding, you're going to need a whole bunch of behaviour support. Or
the other way around, sorry, you won't really need that much. Things are crazy. It's okay. Or
if you are going to drastically change their funding, they're going to need so much behaviour
support. Unfortunately, what happened was their support funding was the lower amount, but the

(28:21):
behaviour support funding was also the lower amount. So it was kind of what you were saying
about maybe taking a few sentences. So I've learned not to do that again, not to give them a little
a la carte menu kind of a thing, but just to say. We've seen this really interestingly in the
housing and space. So with a physical disability, the agency can sort of see a chair and those sort
of things too, but the psychosocial space is really challenging. And I've been working with an amazing

(28:45):
care provider, one of my favourites in the world, and they've been supporting this individual on
their journey for 13 months to get SDA funding approval. So they got knocked back once, not for
robust funding, which is what they needed, but for any SDA funding in any shape or form. We went
back and challenged it again. It got knocked back again, and it's now sitting at the ART.
13 months has taken as well. And their argument was, because we've settled this individual into

(29:09):
this home, and he's got the right supports around him now, and he's thriving. He's done really,
really well. So we finally got the right care in package as well. They said, oh, well, everything
seems fine. You don't need the funding, was the kind of argument that came back. So we've now,
sadly, we've had to represent him back to hospital because we don't have the SDA supports in place.
We don't have the SIL supports in place, and we've got quite a lot of money going to a lot of people.

(29:32):
So he's now back in hospital in a horrible environment just because of the system just
failing him. And that's just one of many that we've dealt with over probably the last 12 months or so.
And that's 13 months of, again, the inefficiency of the phone calls, the messages, the emails.
The 19 stakeholders on a meeting with public guardian, public trustee, Greg, you know this
firsthand. It's tough. But are you seeing much of that in the space you're operating in as well

(29:54):
with the psychosocial space? Like the non-physical disabilities?
I'll go for the camera.
Well, from a support provision perspective, I mean, yeah, we do things a little bit differently
in that we've had experiences, similar to what you're talking about. We'll advocate on trying to

(30:18):
help put a case forward in getting someone in a better environment so that they can thrive
once again, clear as day that this is the right thing to do. But for whatever reason, it drags on
and drags on and drags on, you know, 12, 18 months. And, you know, it's, once again, it goes back to

(30:42):
the check boxes and all that sort of stuff. And yet the challenge is that here's a person who's
actually suffering in a situation that they shouldn't be in, might be separated from family,
might be isolated, whatever that picture looks like. And because of, you know, once again, that
theoretical check box, it's not ticking all of those boxes and it delays. And so we've been on

(31:06):
those Teams calls or Zoom calls with multiple different providers, all with different stakes,
all doing it, you know, pro bono, which is cool. I mean, I keep on saying, you know, if in this
industry, if you're not doing stuff pro bono, then are you actually sort of, you know, is your heart
in the right place? That might be a little bit unfair, but, you know, there's a reality to that.

(31:28):
But, you know, it's really challenging when here's a real person that we've met, we want to advocate
for, and yet for whatever reason, there's red tape in the way that actually is putting this person
at harm. It's challenging. Yeah. Well, I'm really grateful for, you know, everyone's input in that.

(31:54):
So I'm going to move us along and our next theme or subject is the dreaded yes no lists.
And in some ways, for some sectors, actually, it's useful. One of the very early, I think it's

(32:23):
episode four or five, we had my friend Carly, and she supports people with severe mental illness
to get access to the NDIS and a few other things. But anyway, she was talking about how having the

(32:46):
yes no list now sort of makes it slightly easier because sometimes some of the people she works with
actually want really big things that are just not going to happen. And when she says, no, look,
you're just not going to be funded for a jumping castle out the back, they get angry. And so being

(33:15):
able to say, look, this isn't me saying it, here's the yes no lists has significantly helped. Now,
that's a great way that it's been useful. There are many, many instances where it's

(33:36):
very frustrating because as we've already discussed, disability is very individual,
and to blanket say this is yes, this is no, I think is so anti the original idea of the NDIS

(33:56):
that it is so mind boggling why they did this. So, panel, any comments?
I think that it is so often in a really complex psychosocial space, especially, but in all spaces,

(34:16):
but creative problem solving is needed, right? So we might have someone who really struggles to
engage, and the only way they'll engage is on a long drive, but technically that transport is not,
maybe that's not a yes no list, but it's still not closely related enough, and that sort of
not being able to creatively problem solve can be difficult. But I'm always a big fan of

(34:39):
externalising bad news out of someone's direct support network, right? Which is so valuable for
stability, and so, yeah, sometimes being able to say, when we say, oh, look, I'm pretty sure the
NDIS is not going to fund that based on my extensive experience and what I've, with other

(35:00):
people and their communication, it sounds like you're saying no, right? But when you say this is
here, here it is on a no list, like that can be really helpful for, yeah, just for externalising
that, just for the stability of the support network can be, so, yeah. I think that's resonated a lot
with the support coordination providers that I work with, but as you're saying, Hannah, it's a bit

(35:25):
of a catch 22. It's a double edged sword. One hand, we've got clarity where those requests are
outrageous and not really realistic, but it is to that person, which is fine, but in the old ways,
we created this wonderful system where it was an open door of yeses and now having to kind of do

(35:46):
this claw back, although, mind you, some of the people that I might be referring to have also
opened those doors, but that's because the government never put structure in there to start
with and now we've got structure and they've gone too hard and too fast in some areas, gone way over
board in other areas, especially in some of the parenting and child safety supports as well,

(36:08):
where they're going, we're not going to fund you, but we're also not going to fund it if it's related
to a disability need or be inclusive and adaptive as well. So it is very hard on one hand and then
also kind of useful to go, hey, look, no, we're not going to fund you a pool in your backyard
or a trampoline. Trampoline is a different conversation. Or goat therapy. Goat therapy

(36:31):
is the one that's in the guide. Yeah, goat therapy. But if it's goat therapy delivered by
a qualified individual, then they can... If the goat's got...
Goat's not getting paid.
Psych-prack. No. So if it's still delivered by a qualified therapist, then if that's the modality

(36:52):
of their therapy, then it's still okay, right? I hope I'm not...
I guess it's... Well, yeah. I mean, I see a lot of debate around music therapy and art therapy.
Yeah. And without sort of dipping into your expertise, there is a place and a time and a
place for things like art therapy and music therapy, especially for those who are either

(37:15):
anxious and not wanting to talk to somebody or don't know how to express themselves. And maybe
that might be their way in which they express themselves. And so there is a place for certain
therapies. I do like that there is an empirical reliance. Now, when it comes to the question
about a qualified therapist, there's debates as to what that qualification looks like.

(37:43):
But it's a bit contradictory in my eyes from... So if you think about other government-funded
sort of sides of things, like just take simple Centrelink. People get paid for support on
Centrelink to prop themselves up, get employment, all that sort of stuff. Yet there aren't those
stipulations as to what you can spend your money on. There is sort of, in the lower socioeconomic

(38:09):
places around, here we'll give you a Visa card that you can spend on groceries. And that's a
trial sort of situation. But ultimately it's a little bit his money for you to do what you want.
And yet for something that is actually arguably for capacity building, that it will be used

(38:30):
responsibly, now we've got conditions on that. It's a little bit... It doesn't sit well, but I
can see why. I think it's missed the mark a bit. I think the intent was probably always there to,
okay, we need a bit of clarity and transparency. That's where I think it came from originally,
was, okay, well, we've got this confusion. We don't know what's in, we don't know what's out.

(38:51):
Can we do this? Can we not do that? A goat's in, goat's out. Cow therapy's okay, goat therapy's not.
Whatever it is. But I think they lost it in translation by nature of the complexity of the
sector that we're in. So it's hard to create black and white in an individualistic space. But I think
the intent there may be some rigor or at least a framework might be a starting point rather than

(39:11):
potentially an absolute no in certain areas. Like for SDA, for example, we're actually on the yes
and the no list because we're that cool. But there's some things and it comes down to things
like modifications. So they're happy to support modifications the first time they get installed,
subject to terms and conditions of supply and making it work and getting it approved. But
let's just pretend it's on the yes list so it's approved. But they'll do that. But then if that

(39:34):
person moves out, then they won't install the ceiling hoist in the second property because it's
not there. They either need to take it with them or this, that and the other. So it's just challenging.
But I think the intent, I don't think it was created there to create harm. Not that I want
to defend the agency, but I think the intent was there to create clarity, but I think they've kind
of missed the mark. I don't know if it's, is it better or worse? Like if it was never introduced,

(39:57):
was it better or worse? I'm not sure. But from my perspective, it's probably a little bit better.
Like I've got a little bit of clarity in some areas. Just from that, this is selfishly from a
housing perspective. But we've got a bit of clarity about what is not included. So I can push back on
owners or whatever it may be. And no jumping castles in the backyard? Only pineapple ones.

(40:19):
I think we've got that sticking now, Greg.
There's a drinking game in this. I feel like we can run it over the rest of this year's series
and every time we can just drop pineapple in every episode somewhere. I'll get my royalty checks later.
What about you, Julian? Whatever you've seen with the yes, no list.

(40:41):
So this might go into a topic that we're going into later around the replacement supports.
So that's where it's kind of come with us, where it is on the no list, but we can access it through
a replacement support. It is good to have that clarification to be able to talk to the participant

(41:04):
around this is now on the no list, but they don't understand all the time and they're really
frustrated of why can't I get this? Like I could get this three months ago, you're now telling me
I can't get this. So it's trying to explain to them that yeah, it's like this is out of our control.
This is not what we're doing. We can help support you as best we can and there is a way to get some

(41:30):
of these supports if we can use it as a replacement support. However, then that has its own issues
around do they have a support in place already that they will be able to reduce for the NDIS
to accept this and then whether these we've done one so far we haven't had an outcome yet.

(41:54):
So it's kind of also working out this next step of what works and what doesn't work in this new system.
Because once again they also haven't provided much clarity because I've been working with a few people
as well around this and looking at different AT that was originally a yes but now is not necessarily.
And just like trying to work out that navigation of how we put that up, how that application gets

(42:17):
put in and what's the next steps and also that lovely little trick bit about around adjusting
some if you can adjust some hours and you might get a yes a little bit more but how we
wherever you found that I think you just scratched everyone's going scribble scribble scribble
scribble listening because I am. Yeah and with the replacement supports you've also got to have had
something in place to start with but if you didn't and you need something that's on the no list

(42:45):
sometimes they're just coming back and saying well no because it's not replacing anything
but hang on like I didn't have it in the first place because I wasn't on the NDIS back then
like how do I like that that's also bits that are not making a whole lot of sense.

(43:10):
Yeah so there's been some talk in some community groups and things like that around like having to
then argue that if you don't fund this we're not replacing this support but we're going to need
this support in place so like you're going to have to fork up more money to pay for this support if
you don't do this because they're going to need something if even though we're not necessarily

(43:36):
replacing what's there it's replacing what's about to come essentially. And it's like manipulating
the line items just to make something work in that false economy again right just get the job done
get it done well set them up for success and then happy days right yeah sorry preaching to quiet.
Yeah we couldn't possibly do that far out.

(43:58):
Um cool all right I think we got that so um
something that is relatively new to the scheme that has
um that has really thrown us banner in the works I think is about the new impairments

(44:22):
and that there's now six impairments and um stuff you if your disability is across different
impairments um because you can guess what you can only pick one and so what is happening is that

(44:45):
people who joined the scheme from January are getting these impairment notices. Now the next
issue I have with impairment notices is that particularly allied health but also support
providers are now only allowed to work to support people on their you know impairment. Now if

(45:14):
someone doesn't show you their impairment notice so that you know exactly what they're on the NDIS
for and then you provide them with a service that is not technically connected to that impairment
you might not get paid by the NDIS and so my question is predominantly been around

(45:39):
yes there's privacy and the participants don't have to show you their impairment notice
but whether providers start putting in policies and procedures saying well you must show us your
impairment notice or we can't support you that's that's then my concern with it. Can I ask a

(46:05):
clarifying question that will probably betray how under prepared you were. You were a call in so
well thank you. Yeah exactly exactly um can I so so can I just ask a clarifying question so say
you have a physio right working with a participant who has specific like physio needs related to

(46:27):
their disability maybe you know that congenital kind of physical needs right and then if they
imagine they also have psychosocial disability right maybe yeah like BPD or CPTSD or something
and then imagine that they do that they get like injured like or something and so they're struggling

(46:51):
a bit more with their mobility or something it's not some really significant injury because
probably scope would become a bigger issue but hypothetically if then if but if due to their
psychosocial disability they're really not open they're not able not like willing but really not
able to go see a different physio for for that specific thing or something and it's because of

(47:14):
their their like it's yeah can you then provide support what I guess what I'm asking is that if
you if you if you're in place to provide disability support but because of someone's like disability
they're not able to access other support services can you then you know provide that support maybe

(47:34):
maybe a better example would be like a dietitian to that's in place to support swallowing and
someone has an eating disorder and they're due to their like really complex psychosocial disability
are not able to access other mainstream services can that dietitian then provide that support under
this impairment notice situation so guess what yeah for something different yeah they haven't

(48:02):
they haven't given a lot of clarity around that sort of thing okay yeah I hope but have no hope
that Minister Richworth will give us more information about this
so a scenario I came across was about someone with cerebral palsy because cerebral palsy you

(48:30):
know there's there's a lot of different ways and the ways it presents right and so does it fall
under physical does it fall under neurological does it fall under intellectual impairment like
where does it fall and in that case like if it's one and not another one then maybe your dietitian

(48:57):
is totally out of the picture or you like point blank cannot access the physio
julian so is is it that they can only be in one of those six categories they can't be across them
so I don't know yeah because it's so new yeah and part of it is that there is an operational

(49:26):
guideline that I've read through about it and it is only and once you get to the appendix
that it has like what's some conditions will fall under these categories as like a bit of a guide
and so far what that looks like is that you would then only be in one yeah so if it is only one

(49:52):
that's then a big issue because yeah a lot of different disabilities present across multiple
of those conditions of those impairments plus from a practitioner point of view the way the
each of the categories is described is

(50:13):
is they're trying to pin it down to one thing and it's just the way I say like the physical the
neurological is described is very narrow and even conditions that you would think would meet
that criteria might not meet that criteria so it's I haven't seen one yet and I don't know

(50:38):
anyone that's got one so it'd be interesting to see when that starts happening yeah it does pose
a really interesting challenge from full providers as you said whether or not they're actually going
to give it to us and it's probably something that we've spoken a few times about I know our
good friend Pinky Head Lady loves to go on about what your niche is but then that actually flows

(51:01):
into what your eligibility criteria for services yeah and I speak about this quite a bit but I
don't think it's I think it's getting to the point that the industry really needs to start
to think about who is it that we can actually serve who is eligible for our service and not
just whether or not they have an NDIS number and a plan but whether or not a we've said it before

(51:24):
whether or not you can meet needs but now it's more about how we go and short gap stop us the
provider from having issues with the agency and then all into also in turn by effect bringing the
participant into potential trouble as well because we've got to remember the people that we're dealing
with don't always have capacity or their representatives don't have the capacity to understand

(51:47):
or want to be able to provide that information in the first point and then us as a provider have
got to go all right well there's a bit of a risk here we've either going to have a financial risk
that the agency is not going to pay up there's going to be a potential financial risk to the
participant that they might have that agency might come claw money off them or might claw money off
us and then we might have to claw them off money off them and it's going to pose quite a very

(52:10):
interesting time moving forward there has been some stuff from the agency that I've seen kind
of make it like they're going to give us a card or a piece of paper that might help from a provider
side that give us enough to kind of go yes or no but how we're really going to be able to
manage and monitor and ensure that we're protecting both providers or sales as providers but also

(52:35):
ensuring that we're not financially putting detriment at the participant on that decision
as well and it's going to really show providers that go really well are going to and really care
about this industry are the ones that are going to have that challenging conversation because it's
not a tough conversation and all of us in the room and a lot of listeners are small business owners

(52:56):
and we need to make money to pay our rent to pay our staff to pay our mortgage or everything else
that we've got going on feed the dogs and the kids maybe not the kids i'll feed my dog
i also don't have kids so don't worry but um greg because this is real a service delivery
problem with ot's and speeches and housing it's pretty kind of the eligibility is straightforward

(53:23):
what do we need how are we going to do it can we fund it yes or no the service delivery space is
going to be where that we find the most difficulties on uh how this is going to play out what your
thoughts there greg sort of flies in the face of uh holistic care uh supports um because if you've
got somebody with a physical disability who also you know presents with psychosocial what takes

(53:47):
precedence um you know it does and how do you figure out which one you know is the primary disability
how do you support both if one's going to be recognized how do you prove that the psychosocial
might be related to the physical and you know um there's some you know as we know you know
there's there's countless of people with um you know disabilities who also have you know the the

(54:09):
cognitive the mental health the um the psychosocial challenges in their life and um and you know to
pin it down to one domain one aspect is um well it's actually you know once again can be quite
harmful um because you're ignoring a whole other part of their identity um i guess yeah and and

(54:30):
when it comes to the confidentiality of you know what is you know it's really tough to figure out
where your priorities and what your support where your supports lie if you don't have the
information to ensure that you're doing the right thing um we'll be always guided by the participant
as to what they what they need we we rely heavily on support coordinators but as we know support

(54:53):
coordinate there are support coordinators and there are support coordinators um there are some
who you know are quite happy to pick up a phone and there are some who don't some who you know
answer emails and some who don't and so if you're very diplomatic of you i speak well

(55:15):
no and and it makes it challenging because you know as a you know we pride ourselves being a
responsible provider we provide it we we pride ourselves on you know um the you know client
directed um supports and but if we're going to be directed by a a participant we also need to know

(55:35):
that you know what we're doing is actually part of their plan but if we're kept in the dark how
how do we know yeah it's not so much about the money side of things sure you know every every
provider needs to be able to um you know pay for your get paid for work done okay and like i said
yeah we do a lot of pro bono stuff and so probably so does every single person on this on this panel

(56:02):
but you know we need to make sure that we are also running a sustainable business because if we
don't then it's not just a person or a group of employees that that suffer it's actually the whole
of our you know all those people that we support all of those people that we employ everybody um but
but yeah um it can get a little bit tough if we don't have all the information and i think as a

(56:29):
business owner and i'm sure i agree greg is you know that level of uncertainty uncertainty always
just reduces confidence consumer confidence so you're less likely or less reluctant well you're
more reluctant i should say to to give more and we actually measure how much pro bono like 20% of
my time is actually pro bono support through guidance advocacy whatever it may be education
podcasts whatever it may be um but you know when that 20 becomes 25 and that 25 becomes 30 it's

(56:55):
like you know it's like an unpaid care really in some capacities well where it's kind of modern
slavery might be hard to describe that but um but i think you you kind of got to balance that too
and i think there'll be a lot more business owners out there more reluctant to take or have those
conversations when they don't have that clear cut answer of what it's going to be and that's what i
worry about because great providers like you greg and the team great providers like everyone else on

(57:17):
the panel um i think we want to do good we want to do the right thing we want to help support the
community but if we don't have a little bit of support to keep the food on the table then we're
going to leave and the ones that are going to thrive will be the larger organizations that can
basically carry that time and carry that loss um which is great but i don't really want to
an industry full of like very very large organizations i don't think that

(57:39):
that's what uh what the sector was built for well said
so let's talk we are getting close to time so i will say that we'll really quickly touch on
the next one but um i did want to talk about mandatory registration because i think so many

(58:03):
people have so many questions about this and once again there's so little information out there about
you know the ndia and the minister for the ndis amanda richworth have like their wish list of a

(58:25):
time frame and one thing i will say is that the ndis have never been able to achieve their time
frames which is good and bad right it's actually really good in some areas as well because they
can't crack down fast enough or you know have that oversight but very bad in most other ways yeah
yeah so how do like you spoke before about smaller providers um having to spend time with smaller

(58:54):
providers and having to spend money now to be a mand mandatory lea registered and we're starting
with support coordinators and seal providers and but longer term it's going to be everybody

(59:14):
there's again there's a huge risk that a lot of those smaller providers drop out of the sector
because registration is an expensive endeavour and i mean they are saying that the mandatory
registration task force are talking about that in order to do this the cost of registration does

(59:37):
have to come down but like to what and in what way and how how do you then change what the
registration process is to make it cheaper like what are you cutting out that's also my concern

(59:59):
well i actually know the answer to kind of how well i reckon i've got the answer on how it is
because it's on the tier system it's a fort which actually this is an exact same question i got
asked last time and i said i kind of said what your response was but i have a little bit more
information this time around i'd hope so after a year but the tier system that the um ndis review

(01:00:23):
and then the ndis registration task force have got is pretty much the same lines and if you go
through the appendices appendix or however you freaking say it and the rest of the supporting
documentation in the wonderful 300 and i'm looking at felinda 400 on page document um
the it does sort of give us this what that looks like and natalie wade being the commissioner for

(01:00:48):
all of this and the co-author for it where you can start sniffing where they want you to go the
question is ultimately how much what are they going to drop out because of the red tape and the
thing starting at level four which is your high complex just sdas your rear your specialist
support coordination positive behavioral support and implementation they're going to be done by

(01:01:08):
the commission the commission is going to set the benchmark of what it and so every other provider
in the auditor auditing company or business gets to go hang on if i'm not doing a level four i'm
not paying you that big money so auditing world is going to have a big shake up because we're
going to have a it's going to have a um a benchmark or a tier that we can't really go above because
the agency is going to be cheaper or it's going to be you're just going to go find a way to upgrade

(01:01:32):
into one of those specialties and get registered under the commission framework for it and you're
probably going to see a few of those auditors drop out because it's not going to be as profitable as
it once was who knows what's going to happen in that sort of market that's going to be a very
interesting field ultimately with the agency doing it a government department doing it it gets to
set a baseline of what the most expensive registration would look like because they're

(01:01:54):
the ones that do it everything else falls in a tier three which is the bulk of everyone you've
been registered for your very your certifications um that's what your tier three are going to be
looking like and then tier one and two have is kind of what i call it quasi fill in a form
slash quasi give me a bit of a diploma or some validation that you've done some extra certificates

(01:02:19):
or have a blue card or some other clearance and i really hope that they tidy up the state problem
around blue cards in all of this at the same time event on the blue card i think we manage
your registrations i still go back to the premise on why they wanted to bring it in um if if being
a registered provider eliminates fraud eliminates scams eliminates harm i'm all for it but you look

(01:02:41):
at the news headlines and a lot of the trauma i'm seeing or a lot of the incidents are occurring
are from registered providers so to me i know is a registration system working if i can buy an off
the shelf box company for x amount of dollars get my automatic done registration done and re-audit
straight away because i've got all my pre-populated documents that i've done there as well is that

(01:03:02):
actually checking what we need to check or is it just a box ticking exercise which is how i see
the registration process we're a registered provider we're very happily a registered provider
as well um but we work in a very complex sort of housing environment but for me it's a very
complex process and for me what's the point and what's the intent if the intent is to improve the
quality absolutely how are we going to check it how are we going to measure it um and how are we

(01:03:26):
going to define success what does success look like across that because at the moment i don't see
anyone that's a registered provider there are probably providers out there that i know of that
i would never work with and they're registered providers but they tick a box um and that that's
registration i think uh you know good to an extent i think it's proportionary response i think that's

(01:03:46):
good like gyms mowing probably don't need as much rigor for mowing someone's front lawn or someone
providing intimate care and you know um and change of uh change um uh morning morning routine
facilities or something like that so but yeah i just think it's the intent i think was originally
there but i think it's actually lost and i don't know how you guys feel about the registration
process but i don't feel that i'll walk away from that going i'm an amazing best practice

(01:04:08):
provider now i've just ticked all the boxes i've got my documents in check but i like the
accountability side of things i think that there is a lack of accountability from um the non-registered
side of things now you full disclosure we are certified registered um so you know i might be a
little bit biased on on that perspective but um i like the accountability side of things um when

(01:04:33):
it comes to the mandatory registration and um you know the auditing process and all that sort of
stuff i my brain goes to not so much who pays and how much but who's doing the auditing and what are
their qualifications we've seen a little bit of like that in the aged care space when after the
royal commission how they did a massive drive for um they stopped calling them auditors they called

(01:04:58):
them regulators in other words the police and the police were there to essentially not so much find
compliance but actually search for non-compliance and so they created a an environment in the aged
care space where a non-compliance was actually came from being a rarity to oh we only got three

(01:05:20):
this time um and that's not a reflection on actually you know the aged care you know um
industry as a whole there was more around well if you've come into somebody's home to look for or
if you've come into an environment actually looking for trouble or looking for bad you'll find bad
it might not be bad bad um there's no such thing as a perfect service and there's no such thing as

(01:05:44):
a as a perfect provider but you know you can at least see where they're coming from um but when
it comes to the qualifications and where they're going to find all these people to do this stuff um
you know i would hope that it's not like where they went with the aged care side of things around
you know people who have transferable regulatory sort of you know backgrounds because that is black

(01:06:10):
white um yes no right wrong um as opposed to as we know we work in a contextualized industry where
there it's it's not that clear cut and so there needs to be an understanding of you know the
context around why something is or why someone is like this or why you know just asking more
questions and if you don't have an understanding of the industry itself then you'll take that black

(01:06:34):
white yes no approach and you'll essentially punish providers who are actually doing the right
thing trying to do right um because once again the check sheet doesn't pan out and you'll get
people punished and and you know an exodus in the in the field and it'll be just um you know
people will be smacked around the face metaphorically from auditors or from the

(01:06:57):
commission or you know and um for trying to do right he did make a really good point there
around the quality of auditors part of my role with working with providers is
hand holding through audits and making sure that we're prepared you're all prepared for it um and
there are auditors that i'll go excellent that's a good auditor and there's ones that i will

(01:07:23):
just i'll do the face okay and i'll just walk away um where you have a good auditor it's not
about where you're where you're going wrong it's about what opportunities that you can they can
find because they get to see every thing from left to right so if you get a good auditor

(01:07:44):
they can help the world and go hey look i've seen this suggest you tweak it slightly and you can
probably do a lot because they see a lot of things and some really cool things really bad things
on the other hand as i said i've seen some auditors that don't necessarily care and tick
the box and send in the order report that you can clearly see they've copied and pasted four lines

(01:08:06):
of auditor has the documentation to support the required evidence under this practice standard
um or indicator um which goes into both your point and your point or sorry um people at home
um justin justin and greg um that it is around it is a really weird space is really complex
and it's around the people doing it whether or not we're being very nitpicky or if we're ticking

(01:08:30):
boxes or at the side of the hand you're trying to make the industry better it it's very hard
it's very hard it's very weird and i'm very much looking for some clarification as well
from the rest of it and i very much hope that we'll see some uh actual outcomes of a natalie
wade's appointment within the commissioner's office um and start seeing what all of this talk

(01:08:54):
is going to do because i feel like they're they're just starting to go through with showing us what
they're record what they're going to do with the recommend the ndis review rather than waiting for
the government especially with caretaker mode because natalie wade doesn't really take a note
for an answer she'll just roll on through the door she's the right girl for the job in my mind

(01:09:14):
so um i mean look the um the whole sort of there it is a skill to be an auditor um
i used to be one not for a disability but it's also a skill to actually be audited as well
know how to push back on an auditor know how to have that respectful conversation know how to

(01:09:36):
essentially challenge when you know that they don't either don't know what they're talking about
or might be misapplying something um to your service or to your you know what it is ever it
is they're they're reviewing they're not they're not they don't know everything they're still human
and so if you ask well where does it actually say that i need to have this or this is an this is a

(01:09:59):
misapplication or i you know you can always ask for clarification and challenge but i see services
and time and time again almost lay back and cop it which is sad because like i said it is a skill to
be audited and it is a skill to push back respectfully obviously you don't want to pick on a you know

(01:10:19):
pick a fight with an auditor because you'll lose um but yeah there is a way to have those conversations
that um you know you can all reach some sort of mutual understanding um as to what it is you're
trying to achieve now it is a good environment right now or reasonably good environment where
auditors do have the mindset that they're wanting you know some good audit the intention is for an

(01:10:45):
auditor to actually like what you're saying sam around yeah helping a service because they do see
a lot they see the good they've seen the bad and they can offer advice i'm hoping it doesn't move
into what has happened in like i was saying the aged care where they were actually prevented from
providing those advice and it was just we're not going to give you any feedback we're just walking

(01:11:06):
away um that's where the regulation sort of side of things comes but if you can pick up the brain
of an auditor who's clearly in it for the right reasons and clearly you can see that they have
got good intentions then by all means but don't be afraid to push back uh in the right way if your
communication skills are good that's a very very valuable point there and legitimately what people

(01:11:30):
pay me a decent amount of money just to sit there just to fill in that 15 minute gap um you can get
an auditor talking talking about just their home that you know just just do yeah squirrel butterfly
um sorry so are you saying that you you think that the the level four will be moving to the
commission yeah see the thing that make do we have time do i have time for a little bit of it okay

(01:11:55):
okay so the thing that makes me really nervous about that for behavior support is that assessing
quality and behavior support is very a very complicated sort of process um and at the moment
the indias's preferred quality evaluation is the bsp qe2 the behavior support plan quality evaluation
took tool two also a boat in england but anyway um and so and the issue is that that was designed

(01:12:22):
um for use with children in schools that was the original design of that um and it sort of has been
yeah shoehorned a bit into sort of broader behavior support for for everyone for adults in the
community for everyone um and there's very few um there's very little i guess evidence or support

(01:12:43):
for that and so where there is a little reference i've sort of keep clicking through the bsp bsp qe2
can also be used in the community and then you actually click on the link and it's really it's
it's a you know health direct.gov or like it's like a really it's not this really strong support
for it and the problem is is that uh within the this quality evaluation tool you actually um you

(01:13:06):
actually need to have this like power dynamic with a participant to to get the full score there's a
whole section on reinforcement and it has to be like contingent and i don't want to bore everyone
with the like nitty-gritty behavioral science but but basically to do that you need to be able to
only give something someone something when they're doing kind of what you're wanting them to do um

(01:13:29):
and kind of also the flip side of that is withhold it if they don't right and and there's huge
problems with that even to be honest for children like you know with more emerging understanding of
like pda for example can start to get a picture of that you know the standard strategies aren't
working like yeah okay probably for good reason um but yeah so there's a huge i think there's

(01:13:53):
huge problem and what i've seen is like um some of the participants that come to me with really
significant trauma around their like previous providers a lot of that i can say hey this plan
scored perfectly you know and here you and here you are and that was the outcome so for me i get
very nervous if if there's the increased regulation from there well it's because that's their

(01:14:15):
preference it only depends on what because based on what i'm seeing in the room not that we've
heard anything official is that practice standards are going to change there's going to be more is
going to yeah adjust to suit what the new sort of things coming out of the ndis review when that
comes who how long's the piece of string um but it is going to be compute concerning a it's going

(01:14:37):
to be done by the commission they've been a toothless soul for about a half of 10 or eight
eight years i don't know now um a while um but with the new commissioner it does bring some hope
that we're starting to see certain people in the right roles where we haven't had really strong
leadership and direction in those key places right now we've got more assistant and deputy

(01:15:02):
commissioners than we've ever had before we've got people looking at very specific elements
um i'm going to quote bill shawton here it's time to start doing and less of talking about it which
we can start seeing as we sort of discussed that obviously they're not necessarily doing that all
in the right way but at least we're starting to start to come towards a movement or a position

(01:15:24):
where we can start to see some outcomes of a lot of this good or bad and then we've just got to
keep on doing that excellent the push that we've been doing for like the last 15 25 years of how do
we change how do we improve this system and the people that are in there are people with lived
experience people that really listen across the board so i think do i say that i'm going to be

(01:15:49):
optimistic like i did last year because i ate those words end of last year i'm not going to
but who knows that lived experience the possibilities i was going to ask like when you say there's a good
change and yeah like a good direction is that with lived experience at the center because that
sorry for tapping the table yeah that that's so important so that i'll be optimistic with you

(01:16:13):
even if we're here in a year yeah i'm sure the optimism the nda board has got quite a strong
representation of lived experience yeah and i won't say anything else yeah everything happened last
year still happened oh that's true but the oh yeah okay we won't get into that otherwise become

(01:16:34):
sub-level for government policies so julian um did you have anything you wanted to talk about
with mandatory registration i don't really have anything to add to everyone else no that's all
cool i just wanted to double check because you didn't get a chance so we are going to end it here

(01:16:56):
so i want to say thank you to the panel you know these amazing people who agreed to come and stand
or sit in front of you and talk so thank you so much to our panel
um and another big thank you to ellie for her amazing work

(01:17:23):
and we want to shout out to bunnings capara for letting me steal their marquee weights for the
week from the weekend late bonus call around last after last night
awesome well that's it thank you thank you everyone come yes

(01:17:46):
bye thanks everyone
thank you for listening please share with people you know until next time
as the green brothers say don't forget to be awesome

(01:18:25):
bye