Up to 30 per cent of Tasmanians who receive assistance will be ineligible for assistance under the NDIS, the state’s peak mental health body says.
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The Mental Health Council of Tasmania holds fears that people with psychosocial illnesses might find themselves without adequate supports as programs are replaced by the scheme.
Council chief executive Connie Digolis said although the NDIS concept offered equality across the disabilities spectrum with a level of choice and independence, it was originally designed without coverage of mental illness.
She said member organisations had raised with the council that there was a lack of a standardised approach to assessing people with a mental illness.
“The NDIS should be assessing needs at a particular point of time and there are always fluctuations when dealing with mental illness,” Ms Digolis said.
The main issue has been the lack of clear benchmarks had not been set for capturing people with a psychosocial disability.
This has been acknowledged by the Independent Advisory Council of the National Disability Insurance Agency who said it would investigate the issue further.
Ms Digolis said a number of previously federal funded programs had been rolled into the NDIS with the assumption that all of the recipients would be included under the scheme.
But she said that member organisations claim 30 per cent of people who receive program assistance currently would be ineligible under the NDIS.
“Those people will be left without funds and social support,” she said.
“The NDIS isn’t supposed to be the be all and end all.”
State and federal governments have committed through a bilateral agreement continuity of service for all disability program recipients.
“But what we are not entirely clear about is who is going to provide that continuity,” Ms Digolis said.
She said she was pleased that there was an acknowledgement of a service gap for people with psychosocial disability within the federal budget.
The government has committed $80 million for community-based psychosocial programs over four years to be shared between states through matched funding.
Ms Digolis has questioned whether this was an adequate figure, however.
