Commentary on “Australia’s National Disability Insurance Scheme: a collaboration opportunity for academia and industry”

The purpose of this paper is to provide a UK perspective on the article by Mason et al. on Australia’s National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).

A commentary on the main article, drawing on the author’s knowledge and experience of the implementation of personalisation in the UK and information gleaned during a recent visit to Australia.

There is a major risk that the implementation of NDIS will repeat some of the failings of personalisation in the UK. Specifically, the failures of public bodies to invest in supporting people to take effective control over the resources available to them, and to instigate action to manage the emerging market in ways that promote innovative community options, risk the forces of the free market economy undermining disabled people’s ability to make maximum use of any new choice and control open to them.

This is a personal perspective, backed by experience, on a current policy development that is of international interest.