Imagining NDIS 2.0: What We Hope Butler Meant
Summary
The NDIS is changing because the government is worried about rising costs, fraud, and whether the scheme can keep working well into the future.
In light of recent announcements, we share our imagination for a hopeful NDIS 2.0 – one that is not just tighter, but clearer, fairer, more trustworthy, and more focused on whether supports are actually helping people.
How to protect the promise while fixing the pressure points - “too important to fail”
After the Global Financial Crisis, banks were described as “too big to fail”. The NDIS is different – but it is no less “too important to fail”. If a scheme like this loses public confidence, becomes administratively unworkable, or is seen as financially unsustainable, the people who will pay first are those who can least absorb the shock.
On 22 April 2026, Health Minister Mark Butler announced a package of changes to slow cost growth, tighten eligibility, and boost scheme integrity. Notable measures include stricter access tests (standardised assessments of “functional capacity”), limits on unscheduled reassessments, cuts to social participation and capacity-building budgets, higher quality requirements for plan managers & coordinators, expanded provider registration, and a new digital payments system. Spending will be capped at ~55 billion by 2030.
We have mapped each announcement onto what we call NDIS pressure points – sustainability, transparency, provider viability, integrity, and outcomes. For each pressure point we suggest a few practical reforms, which we hope is what Butler meant – such as reasoned decision letters, plan rollover limits, wage-indexed pricing, cross-agency data matching, and participant-reported outcomes tracking. We illustrate each with international examples, including the United States’ participant experience surveys, Sweden’s early identity checks, Germany’s fair provider wages, New Zealand’s flexible funding with safeguards, and the United Kingdom’s data matching to catch fraud.
We put together a comparison table that contrasts announced vs proposed reforms, and a timeline chart outlines expected implementation. Our goal: ensure that the big-picture intent of Butler’s reforms – protecting the NDIS for future generations – is fulfilled by equally ambitious detail that we colour in with our imagination, so the scheme remains both sustainable and true to its promise.
Pressure Points
Each announced measure can be mapped into our five “pressure points,” highlighting both progress and gaps:
1. Budget sustainability
Announced: Butler made cost control the centre of the package. He said the government will tighten unscheduled reassessments, reset spending on social and community participation back to last year’s level, and push scheme growth down sharply over the next few years. He also said the government wants NDIS spending closer to $55 billion in 2030 rather than more than $70 billion.
Gap: His speech said a lot about bringing costs down, but much less about the long-term design rules that would make budgets fairer and more predictable. There is still no clear public framework for default budget ranges, how exceptions will work, or how people with lower-intensity needs will be supported outside a full NDIS plan.
2. Reasonable & necessary transparency
Announced: Butler said the scheme will move away from diagnosis-based access and toward clearer eligibility rules focused on significant and permanent disability. He also said the government will work through new eligibility settings and a more certain planning system over the coming months.
Gap: The announcement still does not clearly say who will be making these decisions or whether they will be adequately trained in disability to determine what is reasonable and necessary. Also, would participants get plain-language reasons for why supports were approved, reduced, or declined. Without a simple explanation of the decision logic, the scheme may become tighter without becoming easier to understand or trust.
3. Provider ecosystem viability
Announced: Butler said the government will lift standards on intermediaries such as plan managers and support coordinators, move to a shortlist of accountable providers in some areas, expand mandatory registration for higher-risk supports, and rely more on digital claiming and oversight. He also flagged commissioning in areas like supported independent living, plan management and support coordination rather than leaving everything to a weak market.
Gap: His speech focused much more on cleaning up the market than on helping good providers stay viable. It said little about pricing, wage pressure, travel, supervision, or the cost of running a quality service, so the sustainability problem for ethical providers remains largely unanswered.
4. Integrity (fraud, waste, misuse)
Announced: This is Butler’s loudest theme. He said the scheme currently lacks evidence behind most claims, has weak invoice standards, and has opened the door to organised crime. In response, he flagged tighter provider registration, digital payments, and stronger visibility over claims and intermediaries.
Gaps: Better payment controls will help, but his speech said less about the enforcement architecture behind them. There is still little public detail on cross-agency data matching, proactive audit capacity, participant reporting channels, and how quickly suspected fraud will be investigated and acted on.
5. Weak visibility of outcomes:
Announced: Butler announced a $200 million Inclusive Communities Fund to rebuild community capability and give people more genuine participation options outside the current model. That points toward a broader view of support, not just individual plans and paid services.
Gap: The package still does not set out a clear way to measure whether supports are actually helping participants. There is no simple outcomes framework yet, no participant outcome survey, and no clear sign that tools such as the Canadian Occupational Performance Measure, Goal Attainment Scaling, or quality-of-life measures will be used to track whether supports are improving safety, stability, participation, or preventing decline.
What other countries are doing
It is worth looking at countries outside of Australia to see how they address these pressure points. International examples are most useful when we borrow mechanisms – not when we pretend there is a perfect overseas model.
United States: participant-reported outcomes
Some disability support programs ask participants directly about their experience. They use standard survey questions about whether support workers are reliable, respectful, and helping people work toward their goals. They also track things like community participation, choice, and rights. The lesson for the NDIS is to add a small set of person-centred measures – such as safety, wellbeing, and participation – alongside funding data, so the scheme can better see whether support is actually helping.
United Kingdom: the National Fraud Initiative
In the United Kingdom, the National Fraud Initiative is “data matching”: it compares one list with another to spot inconsistencies that may indicate fraud or error. A match is not an accusation – it’s a flag for checking.
For example, one match flags cases where a resident has died, but payments to a care home may still continue because the council wasn’t notified. That is a simple, adoptable idea for the NDIS: compare lists early, and investigate the small number of mismatches before money keeps flowing.
Germany: provider viability is built into funding rules
Germany’s long-term care system shows a practical lesson on provider viability. The Federal Ministry of Health says providers can only be admitted to bill long-term care insurance if they meet wage requirements tied to tariff-equivalent pay, and benefit amounts were increased by 4.5% from 1 January 2025. The lesson for the NDIS is simple: if government wants ethical providers to survive, it cannot ignore wage pressure and rising delivery costs. Provider viability has to be built into funding settings, not treated as an afterthought.
Sweden: identity and “welfare crime” controls
Sweden has launched work via the Government of Sweden to make personal assistance more resistant to “welfare crime” while also making decisions more predictable for individuals. The adoptable lesson for the NDIS is simple: do strong identity and credential checks early, so fewer fake providers or fake claims get paid in the first place.
New Zealand: hosted flexible funding
New Zealand uses “hosted” flexible funding through Disability Support Services: a person keeps choice, but a contracted host helps plan, track spending, and keep records. Support is tiered – lighter or heavier depending on what the person needs – and spending is monitored against a funding plan. That’s an adoptable mechanism for the NDIS where people want flexibility, but also want guardrails that prevent problems.
New Zealand also offers a useful lesson for outcomes visibility. Its funding plans make it clearer what the funding is for and what the support is intended to achieve. The value is not in reducing people’s lives to simple measures, but in creating a clearer link between the money, the purpose of the support, and the outcomes that matter to the person.
What we hope for NDIS 2.0
Mark Butler’s announcement signals that the government understands the NDIS cannot keep running as it has. But announcements alone do not tell us what the new design will look like in practice. This is where we want to exercise our imagination, fuelled with hope.
This table sets out the pressure points, the measures already flagged, and what a stronger NDIS would still need.
| Pressure Point | Butler’s announced measures | Our hope for NDIS 2.0 |
|---|---|---|
| Budget sustainability | Tighter unscheduled reassessments; growth target of about 2% per year; reset social and capacity budgets. |
|
| Reasonable and necessary transparency | Evidence-based functional capacity assessments for access; removal of diagnosis-based “access lists”. |
|
| Provider ecosystem viability | Higher standards for plan managers and support coordinators; more mandatory provider registration; digital payments that make auditing easier. |
|
| Integrity – fraud, waste and misuse | Crackdown on bad actors: tighter oversight of plan managers; digital payments with receipts for all claims; expanded provider checks. |
|
| Weak visibility of outcomes | New Inclusive Communities Fund ($200m) to support mainstream participation. No systematic outcomes framework announced. |
|
At the end of the day
NDIS 2.0 is not about replacing the scheme’s moral purpose with a spreadsheet. It is about building a system strong enough to protect that purpose over time.
Last month’s announcement from Mark Butler makes one thing clear: the government knows the NDIS cannot keep running as it has. But announcements are only the starting point. What matters now is whether these changes lead to a scheme that is not just tighter, but also fairer, clearer and more durable.
The NDIS is too important to fail. That is why reform cannot stop at slogans or cost control alone. It has to become practical: clearer budgets with clearer reasons, fairer decisions people can understand, a provider market where ethical and profitable can co-exist, integrity controls that stop misuse early without punishing ordinary use, and a better view of whether supports are actually making a difference.
If the NDIS is going to last, it needs both generosity and guardrails – designed together.
References
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Cabinet Office, & Public Sector Fraud Authority. (2025, March 12). National Fraud Initiative report 2022–2024. GOV.UK. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-fraud-initiative-reports/national-fraud-initiative-report-2022-2024-html
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. (n.d.). Home and Community-Based Services quality measures. Medicaid. https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/home-community-based-services/home-community-based-services-quality/home-community-based-services-quality-measures
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Disability Support Services. (2026, April 1). Tiers of host guidance for managing flexible funding. https://www.disabilitysupport.govt.nz/disabled-people/improvements-to-disability-support-services/flexible-funding/tiers-guidance
Government Offices of Sweden. (2025, April 22). Effektivare åtgärder mot välfärdsbrott och ökad förutsebarhet inom personlig assistans (Dir. 2025:40). https://www.regeringen.se/rattsliga-dokument/kommittedirektiv/2025/04/dir.-202540
Independent Review into the National Disability Insurance Scheme. (2023). Working together to deliver the NDIS: Final report. https://www.ndisreview.gov.au/sites/default/files/resource/download/working-together-ndis-review-final-report.pdf
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2024, December 2). Additional $110 million investment in NDIS fraud prevention. https://www.ndis.gov.au/news/10525-additional-110-million-investment-ndis-fraud-prevention
National Disability Insurance Agency. (2025, August 15). Stronger NDIS improving the lives of participants. https://www.ndis.gov.au/news/10850-stronger-ndis-improving-lives-participants
National Disability Insurance Agency. (n.d.). Pricing arrangements. https://www.ndis.gov.au/providers/pricing-arrangements
NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission. (n.d.). Worker screening. https://www.ndiscommission.gov.au/workforce/worker-screening
The Treasury. (2025). Budget Paper No. 1: Budget strategy and outlook 2025–26. Australian Government. https://budget.gov.au/content/bp1/download/bp1_2025-26.pdf
Bundesministerium für Gesundheit. (2022, January 28). Bezahlung mindestens in Tarifhöhe – Richtlinien für die Langzeitpflege treten in Kraft. https://www.bundesgesundheitsministerium.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/rl-tariflohn-langzeitpflege.html
