16/08/2026
I’ve been sitting with a lot of feelings about the NDIS Bill and what happens next.
After the submissions, protests, petitions, meetings, conversations with politicians, the Senate inquiry and even a bloody National Press Club, I don’t think anyone can reasonably say the disability community hasn’t made itself clear.
And now we wait.
That’s the bit I’m struggling with.
Because people didn’t just give policy opinions through this process. People shared their lives. Their support needs. Their fears. Their families. Some people shared trauma.
And we’ve only just come through the Disability Royal Commission, where disabled people and survivors were asked to do much of the same thing. There is a cost to asking people to keep reopening those wounds in the hope that somebody will listen.
I keep coming back to P!nk’s What About Us?
Not because the whole song fits this moment, but because that question keeps sitting with me.
What about the people who trusted these processes?
What about the people who made themselves vulnerable because they believed it might actually change something?
And what happens to that trust if, after everything people have given, they feel like nobody was really listening?
I don’t have a neat ending for this.
I’m hopeful. I’m scared. I’m angry. I’m incredibly proud of our community.
And I’m tired.
All of those things can be true at once.
I wrote this piece because I wanted to be open about where I’m sitting in all of that uncertainty.
Behind every submission is a person.
That trust needs to mean something.
What about us?
- William Ward-Boas
NDIS Participant and Founder of William Ward-Boas Consulting
Read below
What About Us?
The cost of asking disabled people to tell our stories again
I have been sitting with a lot of uncertainty about the NDIS Bill and what happens next.
After all the submissions, advocacy, protests, petitions, meetings, conversations with politicians and the Senate inquiry, even a bloody National Press Club. We have made our position as a disability community pretty clear. People have put an enormous amount of work into explaining what is at stake.
Now we wait.
I don't know what Parliament will ultimately do with the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Bill 2026. I don't know what will change, what amendments will be accepted or what will happen behind closed doors.
More than anything, I don't know how much of what disabled people have said will actually make a difference.
I think that uncertainty is affecting me more than I expected.
We have made ourselves clear
The disability community has not been quiet about this Bill.
People have written submissions, gone through legislation, spoken with politicians, organised, advocated and appeared before the Senate inquiry.
Some of what came through that inquiry was incredibly raw.
We weren't talking about policy in the abstract. We were talking about people's support workers, housing, independence, safety, review rights, the labour being shifted onto parents/systems already at their capacity limits and ability to participate in their communities.
For some people, these decisions can affect whether they can get out of bed, eat, shower, communicate, leave their home or live safely. At the most serious end, inadequate support can be a matter of life and death.
That is what makes this different from an ordinary political debate.
I made my own submission because I have serious concerns about this Bill. I wrote about review rights, ministerial powers, functional assessments, Foundational Supports and what happens when disability and support needs are forced into neat administrative boxes.
But underneath the policy language was fear.
I wrote about supports I rely on and about parts of my disability that aren't necessarily visible when people see me working, speaking publicly or participating in policy discussions.
I chose to make myself vulnerable because the stakes are personal. They affect me, my family, my mob and a community I love.
So did many other people.
Haven't we already told you?
I keep coming back to P!nk's What About Us.
I'm not trying to make every part of the song fit this political moment. It doesn't.
It is the feeling behind it that gets me.
What about us?
What about everyone who believed participating in these processes mattered?
What about the people who gave evidence knowing how much it would take out of them?
What about people who disclosed trauma?
What about people who trusted our democratic institutions with some of the most painful parts of their lives because they hoped it might stop the same things happening to somebody else?
What about all the talk of co-design and "nothing about us without us"?
And what happens to people's trust if, after all of that, the decisions have already been made?
That's the part I can't shake.
We have been here before
This also isn't happening in isolation.
We have only recently come through the Disability Royal Commission.
Disabled people, families, advocates and survivors spent years giving evidence about violence, abuse, neglect, exploitation and institutionalisation. Many people I knew made submissions.
People were asked to revisit experiences they had spent years trying to survive.
We asked people to trust a major democratic process with their trauma because there was an expectation that telling the truth could lead to change.
There is a responsibility that comes with asking people to do that.
Participation costs something. Consultation costs something. Giving evidence costs something. Reliving trauma definitely costs something.
For some people, the cost is enormous.
We cannot keep asking marginalised people to reopen their wounds just to prove that the wounds exist.
This worries me for our democracy too
I worry about what repeated experiences like this do to people's willingness to participate.
What happens the next time government announces an inquiry?
What happens the next time we hear, "We want to hear from people with lived experience"?
How many people will think: Why would I put myself through that again?
That's a genuine risk.
Not because disabled people don't care. We care deeply. That's why so many of us keep showing up.
But democracy cannot rely on the endless emotional resilience of the people most affected by its decisions.
If government asks people for their lived experience, there also needs to be accountability for what happens to that evidence.
What did you hear?
What changed because of it?
What didn't change?
Why?
Holding a consultation isn't the same thing as listening.
The real test comes afterwards.
I don't always feel strong doing this
There is another part of this I want to be open about.
I'm vulnerable in this too.
I'm an advocate, but I'm also an NDIS participant. I don't stop being disabled when I walk into a policy meeting.
I can understand legislation and still be frightened by what it could mean for so many.
I can speak publicly and still come home exhausted. I literally came home from the DSC NDIS Conference crying in the car from masking fatigue.
I can advocate for systemic change while wondering what that same system might decide about my own life.
There can be an expectation in advocacy that we are always strong. We're the people at the microphone. We're writing the submissions, attending the meetings and telling everyone we will keep fighting.
But we are human too.
And right now, I don't have a neat or triumphant ending to offer.
I don't know what is going to happen with this Bill.
I'm hopeful. I'm scared. I'm angry. I'm incredibly proud of our community.
And I'm tired.
All of those things can be true at once.
So, what about us?
The NDIS exists because disabled people and our allies fought for something better than what came before it.
It isn't perfect. Reform is needed. I've never pretended otherwise.
But reform cannot forget why the Scheme exists.
People with disability didn't create the failures in disability services, health, housing or community supports. We shouldn't be expected to carry the consequences of governments failing to fix those systems.
As Parliament decides what happens next, I want the people making those decisions to remember what sits behind all this paperwork.
Behind every submission is a person.
Behind every person giving evidence is a life that will be affected by these decisions.
Behind some of that evidence is trauma that somebody trusted our democracy enough to share.
That trust needs to mean something.
Because if people keep participating, keep telling their stories, keep giving evidence and keep making themselves vulnerable, only to feel that none of it carries any weight, eventually we stop asking whether government consulted us.
We start asking whether anyone was actually listening in the first place.
That is where I am sitting in this uncertainty.
And maybe that's why one question keeps coming back to me.
What about us?
