Participant Safeguarding

Overview

The Participant Safeguarding Initiative will develop an enhanced, proactive risk and safeguarding approach. The approach will improve the identification, assessment and response to risks of harm faced by NDIS participants such as violence, abuse, neglect, exploitation and financial misconduct. It aims to support people to build safeguards that are tailored to their individual circumstances, proportionate to their level of risk and empower them to take part in their community.

The Initiative will respond to the Disability Royal Commission and NDIS Review recommendations, as well as implement the NDIA’s Participant Safeguarding Policy.

In designing improvements to the approach to risk and safeguarding, it is important to listen to the voices of people with a disability who may be impacted, especially those with lived experience of the NDIS. Guided by the Participant Safeguarding Working Group, the NDIA has started work to establish important mechanisms for co-design. This includes a series of four workshops that will be run by skilled and trusted organisations with broad networks across the sector. These workshops will bring together a diverse group of participants, families, carers and providers to shape how future safeguarding supports will work.

The Participant Safeguarding Co-design Working Group will also continue to focus on what needs to be co-designed together this year to support enhancements to risk and safeguarding approaches linked to new planning pathway reforms. The new planning pathway will start with a small group of participants to test and make sure we get these changes right.

The transition of participants to the new planning pathway will take place over time and will continue until mid-2031.

Participate

If you are interested in getting involved in co-designing improvements to the NDIS, you can sign up to Participant First.

Participants, family members and carers will be paid for participating in accordance with our Participant Engagement Payment Policy.