Announcement Date
12 May 2026
Link to Announcement
Problem being addressed
Multiple reviews including the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability, the Independent Review into the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the Productivity Commission Report Delivering quality care more efficiently, and the NDIS Provider and Worker Registration Taskforce have revealed serious quality, safeguarding and integrity risks within the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
While all NDIS providers, regardless of their registration status must always meet their obligations under the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 (NDIS Act) and Code of Conduct, registration of providers ensures the Government has better oversight to help keep participants safe from harm. In the current regulatory framework, provider registration is only mandatory for the delivery of a few categories of support. While a number of NDIS providers have chosen to register with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission (NDIS Commission), the vast majority of providers have opted to provide services without undergoing registration. This has resulted in the NDIS Commission having limited visibility of the services delivered across many categories of support.
Proposal
The Impact Analysis Equivalent (IAE) considers three policy options.
- Option 1: Graduated Risk-Proportionate Regulatory Model
- Option 2: (preferred): Mandatory Registration of NDIS providers delivering the highest-risk supports in an advanced registration category
- Option 3: Maintain the status quo whereby not all NDIS providers, as currently defined in the NDIS Act, are required to be registered.
Option 2 is the preferred option. This option balances a comprehensive, measured regulatory response and associated quality and safeguarding benefits with appropriate investment by the government to address the complex challenges present in the provider market and corresponding service delivery.
Assessed Impact Analysis outcome
Impact Analysis Equivalent
Assessment comments
The Office of Impact Analysis (OIA) does not assess the quality of reviews and documents used in lieu of an Impact Analysis. IAE are assessed by OIA for relevance to the recommended option(s) and for the coverage of the seven Impact Analysis questions.
For this IAE has drawn on the:
- Independent Review into the NDIS Final Report
- NDIS Provider and Worker Registration Taskforce Advice
- Productivity Commission Delivering quality care more efficiently inquiry report
- Mandatory Registration of all NDIS Providers Supplementary Analysis Report prepared by the Department.
The OIA assessed that the options analysed in the IAE materials are sufficiently relevant to the proposal.
Regulatory burden
The Department estimates the proposal will increase average regulatory costs by $77.4 million per year.