“It makes us feel like second-class citizens, which is kind of what these cuts are about.” Andrew Brethern, an organiser of Melbourne’s Protect Our NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) rally, was talking about the savage police violence against the largely disabled crowd.
The May 9 rally was one of many coordinated actions across the country, three days before the federal Labor government unveiled its 2026–2027 budget. Brethern warned that the aggression unleashed that day was a taste of what the economic managers planned for those they consider expendable.
Deep and painful
Brethern was right. The cuts announced on May 12 were vicious. The NDIS took the largest slashing, losing $37.8 billion, or 12% in real terms. Over the next four years, more than 240,000 recipients will be thrown off needed programs and another 350,000 applicants denied supports. Especially horrific is the Disability and NDIS Minister’s new power to unilaterally cut any funding stream by up to 99%.
For example, Social and Community Participation, a lifeline for those needing higher level support, is losing 50% of its budget. This funding provides skilled workers, equipment such as wheelchairs, or transport necessary to get to appointments, work, the supermarket or social activities.
Of course NDIS has issues. Launched in 2013 by Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard, it was designed by big consultancies and industry providers to shed public responsibility for these services. Gillard’s government then sold or shut down the public disability services it funded to open the door to private competition. So, yes, NDIS needs reform. However gutting it with no replacement isn’t the answer.
Today’s Labor-led government shows its real budgetary priorities in the whopping $53 billion boost to the Department of Defence. An additional $604 million on surveillance, to quell mounting popular resistance, is disguised as fighting “hate speech” and “extremism.”
Meanwhile, big-stakes business and investor interests remain intact, despite increasing working-class anger over soaring costs of housing, food, energy and fuel.
As usual, women will take the hardest hit. More than 70% of primary caregivers are female, half of whom have disabilities themselves. And while 50% of the disabled population are women and girls, only 38% are NDIS recipients. This is because of the expensive and time-consuming burden of proving eligibility, which will get worse. Added to this is the pressure on carers to cut back on paid employment to meet increased caring loads. Sophie Cusworth, from Women with Disabilities Australia, warns that less community participation means more isolation, leaving these women vulnerable to domestic violence.
Public outcry forced a Senate review. But the substance of these cuts won’t change.
Disability justice fightback
The nationwide pre-budget protests demonstrated not only anger and fear, but the will to fight. The call for justice was unambiguous.
This struggle needs a united working-class effort. Who knows better the fragile line between abledness and disability? Who experiences the burden of needing support and caring most? Working people have similarly seen Medicare, the once-universal health insurance scheme, privatised away.
U.S. socialist feminist and disability activist Kendra Scalia explains disability justice as a “tool of liberation,” based on “leadership of those most impacted, intersectionality, anti-capitalist politics, cross-movement solidarity, wholeness, sustainability, cross-
disability solidarity, interdependence, collective access, and collective liberation.” Let’s fight for this!
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