Rainbow and National Disability Insurance Agency

This matter concerned an application by Mr Rainbow for review of a decision by the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA). The dispute centred on a request for additional funding for medium-term accommodation received during the period of an earlier NDIS plan, which preceded the plan that was the subject of the review. The NDIA sought to have the proceeding dismissed.

The legal issue before the Tribunal was whether it had jurisdiction to determine the applicant's request for funding for accommodation services provided between 2 and 6 July 2021. This period fell within the scope of an earlier NDIS plan, referred to as the "First SOPS". The Tribunal was required to consider whether the necessary preconditions for its jurisdiction under the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act (NDIS Act) had been met in relation to the First SOPS.

The Tribunal reasoned that for its jurisdiction to arise under section 103 of the NDIS Act concerning the approval of the First SOPS, Mr Rainbow would have needed to request an internal review of that decision under subsection 100(2), an internal review decision would have needed to be made under subsection 100(6), and an application for review of that internal review decision would have needed to be lodged with the Tribunal. The evidence before the Tribunal indicated that none of these steps had occurred. Consequently, the Tribunal concluded that the request for funding for accommodation services provided during the period of the First SOPS did not fall within the scope of its jurisdiction for the present application.

Accordingly, the Tribunal dismissed the application for review. It found that, taking into account a reconsideration decision made by the NDIA on 8 March 2022, the residual issue concerning the medium-term accommodation funding was not an issue over which the Tribunal had jurisdiction to determine, rendering the application misconceived, lacking in substance, and without reasonable prospect of success.