QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE

Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Minister for Finance, Minister for the Public Service, Minister for Women, Minister for Government Services and Manager of Government Business in the Senate) (14:21): This budget tries to deal with those reforms in two ways. In the first way, it tries to manage the growth of the scheme immediately, and some of that is to do with plan inflation and the reassessments of plans.

Then there's a second piece of work around how we manage some of the other changes that are going to be required in the NDIS. I know that, under the leadership of Senator McAllister and the Minister for Health and Ageing, that will be done in consultation with the disability community. The PRESIDENT: Senator Steele-John?

Senator Steele-John: On relevance, my question was very clear: 'Will you guarantee that no-one will be worse off?' I would draw the minister's attention to answering that basic question. The PRESIDENT: Thank you, Senator Steele-John. The minister is being relevant to the question you asked.

Senator GALLAGHER: In terms of people's needs for day-to-day support and disability support, we are about protecting that and making sure that the budget can fund that in an ongoing sense. At the moment, the scheme is growing and has been growing much faster than anyone expected, and we need to deal with that. I think the failure to do so would put at risk the NDIS as a program.

(Time expired) The PRESIDENT: Senator Steele-John, second supplementary?