Radio interview with Minister Butler, ABC Melbourne Drive – 21 August 2025

ALI MOORE, HOST: Well, Mark Butler is the Federal Minister responsible for the NDIS. Mark Butler, welcome to Drive.
 
MARK BUTLER, MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGEING, MINISTER FOR DISABILITY AND THE NDIS: Hi, Ali. How are you?
 
MOORE: Good. I want to have a look at what Thriving Kids is, but first of all, can we just deal with that issue about how much the states know or knew? Because two years ago, when this was at National Cabinet, there was an agreement for the states to take responsibility for providing what was then called foundational supports. It was meant to be a 50-50 funding arrangement, but none of the states signed up. This is, in essence, a replacement scheme for that, isn't it? And yet the states didn't seem to know it was coming.
 
BUTLER: It's certainly part of the foundational supports that were recommended to National Cabinet by the NDIS review, the review of the scheme that was conducted in 2022 and ‘23.
 
Another part of the foundational support’s recommendation was for adults with severe and chronic mental illness, and that's a piece of work we'll have to come to as well. But the feedback that we had got from states over the last 12 or 18 months was, firstly, they didn't think the Commonwealth was leaning in enough about what this system would look like for children under the age of nine with mild to moderate needs. And secondly, they were concerned that the Commonwealth had not committed funding beyond the first five years. And so, yesterday's speech was about meeting those two concerns. We are going to lean in more heavily. Obviously, it's got to be a partnership with states and with the community more broadly.
 
But I think that the community had said to us and certainly said to me, they didn't see the sense of eight different schemes being built up in different states and different territories. They wanted a level of national consistency even though we obviously recognise that in your state, Ali, Victoria is going to play a really critical role. Yesterday, I also committed to funding beyond the five years, so responding to those concerns that states had been raising with us.
 
MOORE: But given the states are so significant, have you actually brought them on the process of designing Thriving Kids? Have they been part of that design process? Because the message that we got from Jacinta Allan, and I think the Queensland Minister has said the same thing, is that they actually didn't know about it.
 
BUTLER: We have been talking about it, so it's not really that they didn't know. And I don't want to get too deep into a process story. I want to focus on the main game here, which is building a system of supports for parents and children with mild to moderate needs in this area. That's what we agreed to do 18 months ago. The states put some views to us about the Commonwealth's position about that. I laid out our new position on that yesterday and said very clearly that the job now is for us to build and design this system over the coming months. We want to see it start to roll out from July 1 next year. It'll ramp up over the course of 12 months and be fully operational in 2027, we hope.
 
But yes, there's got to be now that co-design process between the Commonwealth and the states but also involving the community and importantly involving parents. I said yesterday that I wanted Frank Oberklaid, well known to Victorians, really, I think Australia's preeminent paediatrician and childhood development expert, to work with me and states and the community to design that, and now we've got to get on with that job. It's a job that all governments agreed in 2023 we had to do, and frankly, now is the time to start the work.
 
MOORE: So what will the criteria be for deciding whether a child should be in the NDIS or on Thriving Kids?
 
BUTLER: It's essentially a clinical decision. But what was a clear recommendation from that review a couple of years ago and is reinforced every time we get a report about how the NDIS is operating, is that, frankly, there are children on the scheme who are not intended to be on it. This was a scheme built for people with permanent and profound disability. And what we see instead is tens and tens of thousands of children with relatively mild to moderate developmental needs or mild to moderate symptoms of autism. This is a broad-based mainstream issue that impacts a lot of children, and it should be dealt with through broad-based mainstream services, many of which existed before the NDIS. They're the sorts of systems that parents are familiar with, interacting with, child and maternal health systems, primary care, community health, in early childhood settings, and ultimately at schools as well. It's not like we need a blank sheet of paper here. We have those systems. We've just got to focus and resource them more.
 
MOORE: Sure. But Minister, you'd be well aware that there are- and for example, I've got a text from Carissa just saying: please ask Mark Butler why he's using language that suggests that autism is not a lifelong disability requiring support and is lumping it in with developmental delays. There's a lot of parents who are concerned that, for their children, autism is a very real and a very permanent disability.
 
BUTLER: It is a permanent condition. And I've tried to be very clear that the two touchstones of the NDIS were permanence, but also that it was designed for profound or significant disability. And the advice now for some time has been that there are many, many children on it who, yes, they might have a permanent condition in the case of autism but not at a level of severity that warrants their enrolment on the NDIS, that they should be supported through other systems. That's the very clear advice that we have got. I don't want to suggest that relatively mild to moderate levels of autism are not permanent. They are, but they are conditions that should be supported in the mainstream system, not in the NDIS. That's been the design feature of the NDIS since it was created.
 
MOORE: But if it is severe autism, according to a clinical diagnosis, and you referred to that earlier, then they would remain in the NDIS?
 
BUTLER: Absolutely. Absolutely. There's no question that someone with significant profound levels of autism, and that's ultimately a clinical decision, not a political one, the NDIS was designed precisely for those people, and they should remain on it.
 
MOORE: You're listening to the Federal Minister, Mark Butler. We're talking about changes to the NDIS. Just again, and I guess it is procedural, but I know it's the things that are really focusing the minds of parents, Minister. If, for example, you're in the NDIS at the moment, at the end of your current plan, is it possible that you might be managed out of the NDIS if you don't have the clinical diagnosis, which means that you need to be in it? And the question that follows that is, if you are, if you are moved from the NDIS into this new program, if that proves to be insufficient, or if you turn 18, or if you do continue to need lifelong support, can you go back into the NDIS?
 
BUTLER: What I said yesterday, I tried to give reassurance to parents that if your child is on the NDIS right now, then nothing I said yesterday changes their position. And if your child is enrolled onto the NDIS over the coming almost two years until 2027, when new systems will be in place, we're confident then again, for them, nothing will change. They can stay on the NDIS subject to the usual arrangements. But you're right to say, or at least imply in your question, Ali, that children going onto NDIS through the early intervention scheme have always been subject to reassessment. They're on as early intervention, and so the advice has been for a long time that they should be subject to reassessment every one to two years, very young children we're talking about. If the early intervention has meant that, particularly in the case of developmental delay, for example, that they've got back on track and are able to be supported through mainstream systems, then they have for many years been moved off the scheme back into mainstream supports. That won't change, that's been an operational feature of the NDIS since was first set up. But the point I really wanted to make is that my announcements yesterday do not change the position of families on the NDIS today, or indeed families who will be enrolled on the NDIS over the coming period of time while we transition to this new system.
 
MOORE: But I guess that's not of comfort for parents who are looking forward or looking ahead. What would happen to a child who wasn't on the NDIS was being helped through Thriving Kids, what happens when they turn 18 if they still need support? Do we take Thriving Kids literally? Is it only for children?
 
BUTLER: There are mainstream supports for adults with conditions like autism, ADHD, which are not at the level of severity or as profound as would qualify them for the NDIS. Many of them are in workplaces now and in the community receiving mainstream supports as adults, and that's not going to change.
 
MOORE: Minister, the whole point of this exercise is that, as you've made very clear, the NDIS is not sustainable. Growth was 22 per cent when you took office, it's now 11 per cent. You're bringing it down to 8 per cent, but you don't consider 8 per cent to be sustainable either. What is a sustainable long-term growth rate?
 
BUTLER: I talked yesterday about some of the points of guidance for that. For example, aged care is growing at about 5 per cent, projected to do that over the coming decade, in spite of the fact that we're dealing with a huge increase in demand for aged care through the ageing of the baby boomer generation. Medicare is growing at about 5 per cent, projected to do that over the coming decade as well. Getting the NDIS back down to something closer to that level that reflects what is happening in the population. The increase in the price of delivery of NDIS services is what a government must responsibly do. And the thing I said yesterday, Ali, is that my main focus here is on securing the future of the NDIS. It's now 12 years old, it's still growing very, very fast. And I want to make sure that it is sustainable, not just from a budget point of view, but to guarantee its social licence, its broad support out there in the community. What I said yesterday is that although Australians broadly think this has been a terrific scheme that's transformed the lives of people with a disability, they also, in very large numbers, think it's costing too much, has much inefficiency, and too many dodgy providers. Seven out of 10 agreed with that proposition in research I talked about yesterday. Six in 10 said it's broken. We've got to make sure we shore up that broad community support for a very significant social program that secures its future for the long term.
 
MOORE: Mark Butler, I know I have to let you go, but you put in $2 billion yesterday. It's a partnership with the states. How much do you want from Victoria and how much do you want from other states?
 
BUTLER: The Prime Minister and Premier's made a commitment of $5 billion each. That's $5 billion from the Commonwealth and $5 billion collectively from the states, so Victoria's generally about a quarter of that. As I said, that covers the kids but also covers adults with severe and chronic mental illness. We've put $2 billion on the table, that really should be matched by states. But this is connected to ongoing negotiations we're also having on hospital funding, which is always a pretty hotly contested negotiation between states and the Commonwealth, and broader NDIS reform as well. As I've said publicly before, we're keen to secure that broader agreement on these funding issues by the end of this year.
 
MOORE: But that's an extra $1 billion plus that you need from this state committed to this scheme?
 
BUTLER: That's a commitment made by the Victorian Premier back at the National Cabinet in 2023, effectively a contribution to the $5 billion over five years that states committed to foundational supports, only part of which will go towards kids. If we're making a $2 billion commitment to kids, that should be matched by $2 billion from the states collectively. In broad terms, Victoria is usually a quarter of the Federation, so that would be half a billion.
 
MOORE: Mark Butler, I really appreciate your time. I know a lot of people are very interested in the future of the NDIS, so thank you so much.
 
BUTLER: Thanks, Ali.