Bill Shorten to give 'state of the union' address on the National Disability Insurance Scheme

Excerpts from the Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme Bill Shorten's planned speech to the National Press Club on Tuesday reveal the alarming details.

"It is sickening that criminal syndicates are stealing from people with disability," he is expected to say.

"I am determined that every dollar of NDIS funding goes to people with disability.

"And that is why we want to follow up every tip-off and prosecute every criminal."

The taskforce has 38 investigations under way, and received more than 1700 tip-offs in the last month alone, Mr Shorten's speech reveals.

The NDIS was established in July 2013, and provides funding for eligible people with a disability. It also connects anyone with a disability to services in their community.

But since it was set up, people with a disability, their families and support workers have called attention to its shortcomings.

The costs of delivering the scheme have also blown out and it is on track to cost $50 billion in 2025-26, and keep growing.

Read more from The Canberra Times' campaign examining the NDIS:

Mr Shorten will call his address a "state of the union" on the scheme, as he provides an update on the Albanese government's promised reforms.

"The NDIS is not what it should be," Mr Shorten is expected to say.

"It is not delivering the outcomes Australians with disability need and the Australian public expects.

"And that is why, to enable the NDIS to reach its potential, we need to - in essence - reboot."

An independent review of the scheme is under way, due to report its findings in October.

Mr Shorten plans to say the government has already begun work to "reboot" the NDIS, and improving the experience of participants "will reduce waste, inefficiency, and inflationary costs".

"In other words, we must ensure that every dollar in the scheme gets to the people for whom the scheme was initially created."

The government will also crack down on unethical practices by some providers, such as pressuring participants to ask for services they don't need, spending participant's money contrary to their plan or asking for additional fees.

The minister will also say there needs to be more National Disability Insurance Agency staff in place, with the skills to improve oversight of the scheme.

In his speech, Mr Shorten plans to highlight that the fundamental issue with the NDIS is that it is too rigid.

"It throws up Kafkaesque barriers to access, lacks empathy, gouges on prices, is too complex, and often traumatising to deal with," he is expected to say.

"As a consequence, people with disability often feel they are caught between some predatory providers on one hand and an impersonal government agency on the other."

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