One Bill, five peak bodies, four positions. The Securing the NDIS for Future Generations Bill, decoded

Updated 25 August 2026. The Bill this page describes is now an Act. It finally passed both Houses on 19 August 2026 and received assent on 20 August 2026 as Act No. 66 of 2026, and the Federal Register lists it as in force. The Senate agreed 32 government amendments before it passed. We have set out what the Senate changed, and when each part starts. The positions set out below were taken while the Bill was before the Parliament, and they are left exactly as published, because what each organisation argued for is the record of this debate. Several of the concerns they raised were answered by the Senate amendments rather than by the House ones the committee relied on, which is the subject of the new piece.

What the Bill is, and what it is not

Per the government’s own page, the Bill makes changes to the NDIS Act 2013 focused on three things: clarifying eligibility and the supports the NDIS funds … addressing fraud within the NDIS … updating governance and administrative arrangements. It should not be confused with the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Getting the NDIS Back on Track No. 1) Act 2024, which commenced on 3 October 2024 and is already law. This is the next instalment, and it is live now.

One provision has had less attention than its weight deserves. The NDIA’s own pricing updates page states: The Bill proposes to provide the Minister for the NDIS with the power to make a pricing determination, with the agency’s annual pricing review expected to inform any advice provided by us to the Minister… on pricing, if the Bill is subsequently passed. NDIS price caps are currently the NDIA’s to set; this would make price-setting a ministerial power on agency advice. We unpack what that means alongside the new Pricing Schedule in a separate piece.

Updated 16 August 2026. The committee reported on 14 August, the date it had been given, and recommended that the Bill be passed. Nothing else in this story has changed: the positions set out below are those the peak bodies took before the report.

Updated 17 August 2026. The 16 August note fixed the story but not the copy a search engine reads. The page description, the social description and the machine readable description in the structured data all still said the report was “due 14 August”, three days after it had been tabled, so a search result for this page contradicted the page itself. All three now say the committee reported on 14 August and recommended the Bill pass. No visible text and no fact changed.

Corrected and extended later on 16 August 2026. An earlier version of the note above said the report carried additional comments from Coalition senators and a dissenting report from the Australian Greens. It carries three appended views, not two: we had missed a dissenting report from Senator David Pocock, which is the substantive one, because that pass read the report's landing page rather than its chapter list. We have since read the report in full, and the answer to the question this story leaves open is that four of the five positions below were stated before the amendments the committee credits with resolving the concerns. That reading is a separate story, and the standfirst of this one, which still said the report was due, has been updated to say it landed.

The process, to date

14 May 2026Bill introduced; Senate refers it to the Community Affairs Legislation Committee, reporting date 16 June
16 + 19 June 2026Committee tables a Progress Report, then a Second Progress Report, each seeking more time
23 June 2026Interim Report tabled; Senate agrees the final report is due 14 August 2026
9 to 11 June 2026First round of public hearings: Melbourne, then Canberra twice. Transcripts are published on the committee’s hearings page
10 July 2026Submissions close
30 + 31 July, 6 August 2026Second round of public hearings: Canberra, Canberra, then Perth. Still listed as upcoming on the committee’s hearings page when we re-checked on 29 July 2026, the day before the first of them
14 August 2026Final report tabled, on time. Recommendation 1, the only one: that the Bill be passed. Coalition senators added comments and the Australian Greens filed a dissenting report

Three extensions in five weeks is itself information: the committee has repeatedly told the Senate it needed more time with this Bill. All dates above are from the committee’s own inquiry page and its public hearings page, which lists the sittings separately and is where the June transcripts sit.

The four positions, side by side

The responses do not split neatly into providers versus participants. They spread along a spectrum, and the honest report is the spectrum itself. Positions below are each body’s own published words; The Scheme Brief takes no position on the Bill and reports the spread as it stands.

Reject as drafted: PWDA and PDA

People with Disability Australia, a disabled people’s organisation and national cross-disability peak, put its position bluntly in a 29 May media release: This Bill must not pass in its current form. The safeguards are too weak, the risks are too high, in the words of Acting CEO Mx Megan Spindler-Smith. PWDA, citing what it describes as newly released government modelling, says more than 241,000 existing participants are expected to leave the scheme within four years of new eligibility rules commencing, almost 350,000 fewer people are projected on the NDIS by 2031 than previously forecast, and cuts to social and community participation supports account for $13.2 billion over four years. Those figures are PWDA’s account of that modelling, reported here as their attributed claim.

Physical Disability Australia rejects the Bill in its current form in sharper language still. Reviewing the Bill, PDA says it found tighter access, narrower definitions, repeated reassessments for lifelong conditions, and funding uncertainty for wheelchairs, home modifications, and the supports that keep us alive, concluding: This isn’t reform. It’s exclusion with better branding. And on process: The NDIS is being rewritten. We’re not being asked - we’re being told.

Substantially redraft first: Every Australian Counts

The Every Australian Counts campaign calls for the Bill to be amended before it proceeds, publishing an eleven-point amendment package rather than opposing reform outright. Its headline asks: publish the draft rules, assessment tools and eligibility frameworks before Parliament votes; no participant loses supports until foundational supports and mainstream services are fully funded, operational, accessible and enforceable; and removal of provisions that would allow governments to reduce supports below a person’s assessed needs. The campaign also wants funding caps and support-ratio limits removed where they would override individual need, and participant-directed planning principles retained in the Act.

A sector-specific alarm: ARATA

The Australian Rehabilitation and Assistive Technology Association has not taken a position on the whole Bill. Its 4 May statement responds to the reform announcement with a discipline-specific concern: the scale and direction of the changes, it says, are creating significant uncertainty for people with disability, their families, and the workforce, particularly regarding access to the Scheme, disability-related assistive technology, and home modifications, adding that assistive technology and home modifications “are not optional supports”. Its parallel submission to the Joint Standing Committee inquiry into NDIS integrity argues that Scheme integrity requires a rebalancing toward preventative safeguards, including improved planning processes, clearer standards for documentation and service agreements, more proactive regulatory oversight, and stronger protections for participants.

Assume passage, negotiate the detail: NDS and coalition partners

National Disability Services, the provider peak, is running a different play entirely. Its 16 July campaign item calls the legislation the “NDIS Future Generations Bill”, says it is expected to return to Parliament in August and is highly likely to pass, and does not contest its passage. Acting jointly with Inclusion Australia, the Disability Advocacy Network Australia and the Down Syndrome Australia Consortium, a coalition that notably crosses the provider and disabled-persons-led divide, NDS seeks targeted implementation commitments instead: exempting participants assessed as requiring 24/7 supports from a proposed 50 per cent reduction in social, community and civic participation budgets, exempting employment-related supports from the same reduction, and a clear escalation pathway where implementation creates significant safeguarding risks or unintended consequences. NDS notes the government “has stated its intent” that the reductions should not disrupt 24/7 or employment supports, welcomes that intent, and says it remains unclear how this will be achieved in practice.

What to watch next

The hearings on 30 and 31 July and 6 August are the last public evidence before the 14 August report. The committee’s own submission guidance is worth noting for what it says about the inquiry’s scope: it welcomes submissions on the Bill but states that medical reports, participant plans and court documents are not required and will likely be returned, and that it cannot advise on individual circumstances or remake NDIA or Commission decisions. The legislative question before the Senate is systemic, which is also the only way this masthead covers it: we report the sector, the instruments and the attributed positions, and the reader weighs them.