A key priority in 2025–2026
The National Disability Insurance Scheme Quality and Safeguards Commission (Commission) has indicated that in 2025–2026 it will continue to focus on ensuring human rights are central to disability supports and services by working to reduce and eliminate the use of restrictive practices.
The Commission’s continued focus in this area means that NDIS providers will need to ensure:
They remain informed about the Commission’s policy guidance and expectations when developing behaviour support plans and reducing and eliminating regulated restrictive practices.
They comply with their conditions of registration, including reporting the use of regulated restrictive practices to the Commission at regular intervals, as determined by the National Disability Insurance Scheme (Restrictive Practices and Behaviour Support) Rules 2018.
Where the use of a restrictive practice is also a reportable incident, they notify the Commission of the incident in accordance with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (Incident Management and Reportable Incidents) Rules 2018.
Reportable incidents
Registered NDIS providers must notify the Commission of certain incidents that occur in connection with the provision of supports or services to a person with disability, within prescribed timeframes. The table below sets out the types of incidents that must be notified to the Commission and the applicable notification timeframes.
Incident | Timeframe | |
| Within 24 hours after the provider becomes aware of the incident. | |
Unauthorised use of a restrictive practice. | Within 5 business days after the provider becomes aware of the incident. |
Recent cases: reportable incidents
Failing to comply with mandatory reporting obligations within the specified timeframes above may be a breach of a condition of registration and provide grounds for regulatory action. The Commissioner has commenced civil penalty proceedings for non-compliance with mandatory reporting obligations in two recent cases:
On 14 November 2025, the Federal Court of Australia declared that Lifestyle Solutions had:
Failed to notify the Commission of 148 reportable incidents that were required to be reported within 24 hours and 49 reportable incidents that were required to be reported within 5 business days.
On each occasion breached a condition of its registration and contravened s 73J of the NDIS Act.
Contravened s 73J of the NDIS Act on a further 1,312 occasions for each additional day that it failed to notify the Commission of each of the 148 reportable incidents, and on a further 302 occasions for each additional day that it failed to notify the Commission of each of the 49 reportable incidents.
Accordingly, the Court ordered Lifestyle Solutions to pay a pecuniary penalty of $500,000 for the contraventions of s 73J of the NDIS Act.
You can read more about this part of the case here.
In April 2024, the Commissioner commenced proceedings against Oak Tasmania alleging, among other things, that between 1 July 2019 and 1 December 2023 Oak Tasmania failed to notify the Commissioner of more than 600 reportable incidents within the prescribed timeframes.
The Commissioner sought declarations that Oak Tasmania breached a condition of its registration and contravened s 73J of the NDIS Act when it failed to notify the Commission of 104 reportable incidents that were required to be reported within 24 hours, and 370 reportable incidents that were required to be reported within 5 business days. The Commissioner also sought orders requiring Oak Tasmania to pay a pecuniary penalty of $1,100,000, which is inclusive of other alleged contraventions of the NDIS Act.
You can read more about the case here.
What’s next
Registered NDIS providers can expect the Commission to continue to monitor the use of restrictive practices and the quality and compliance of behaviour support plan development and implementation over the next 12-month period.
Providers can also expect the Commission to monitor compliance with mandatory reporting obligations and to take regulatory action where non-compliance is identified.
What you should do now
Providers can get ahead of these issues by doing the following:
Ensure all key personnel are aware of the Commission’s regulatory priorities for 2025-2026.
Review the Commission’s policy guidance on restrictive practices and the development of quality behaviour support plans.
Review existing processes and procedures on restrictive practices, the development of quality behaviour support plans and the reduction and elimination of regulated restrictive practices.
Review incident management systems to ensure they comply with the requirements under the NDIS Act and Rules.
Review and, if necessary, establish clear processes and procedures for responding to and notifying the Commission of reportable incidents, and ensure all relevant personnel receive necessary training on their responsibilities and obligations.
Ensure all staff are aware of relevant NDIS Practice Standards and the requirements under the NDIS Code of Conduct.
If you are concerned about any historic non-compliance with any of your reporting obligations, it may be prudent to self-report those matters to the Commission without delay.
Please contact us if you think there may be an issue.
Read our NDIS in focus series: