Despite having been designed and rolled out with the best of intentions, it is patently obvious that the National Disability Insurance Scheme has evolved in ways nobody predicted.
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This was despite clear warnings almost a decade ago the introduction of a "one-stop shop" for people with disabilities made the demise of many existing disability support services and groups almost inevitable.
That has since come to pass on a large scale with state and territory governments - not surprisingly - cutting funding to agencies which were perceived as duplicating NDIS services.
It is also not surprising that the creation of a new super bureaucracy funded by a bottomless well of taxpayer dollars was seen by many shady types as an opportunity to cash in.
While reluctant to put an exact figure on the cost of "shonks" within the system at his National Press Club address on Thursday, NDIS Minister Bill Shorten said the figure of five percent of the budget had been quoted.
If that is correct then about $2 billion will be creamed off the top of the scheme's $40 billion spend in 2024-25. With the cost of the NDIS expected to blow out to $54.4 billion by 2025-26 the "shonks's" take will grow to $2.72 billion unless firm action is taken.
The flight of states and territories from direct involvement in the disability support space has had unfortunate unintended consequences, the most significant of which is in the demographics of the NDIS's users.
"Almost half [of the people on the NDIS] are children, nobody saw that coming," NDIS Minister Bill Shorten told the National Press Club on Thursday.
There has been an explosion in diagnoses of children - especially boys - with autism because being on the spectrum is treated as a disability, not a learning disorder that can be dealt with in other ways.
Mr Shorten, who went to great lengths to assure the parents of children on the spectrum they would not be worse off as a result of the reforms, said with the benefit of hindsight there were things he would have done differently a decade ago.
"Autistic Australians are not just part of the disability community, they are a part of the community," he said.
With questions being asked about whether or not the NDIS was the best way to address autism-linked developmental delays the government is working closely with the states and territories to develop other "foundational supports" that would meet the needs of many in this cohort.
There is broad agreement that although the NDIS was intended to meet the needs of the most profoundly disabled the net had been cast too wide.
With more than 630,000 people on the scheme it is already costing more than Medicare - which covers the entire population - and is growing at 13 per cent a year.
This is not sustainable. Mr Shorten has the Herculean task of reducing that to eight per cent a year while, at the same time, ensuring everybody who needs support will receive it in one way or another.
He has said the lived experience of the last 10 years had been incorporated in the 26 recommendations made as part of the 329 page review report prepared by Bruce Bonyhady and Lisa Paul.
"It was always inevitable we would have this Mark Two moment," he told the National Press Club.
While the intention is to concentrate on those with profound disabilities the government is committed to reinstating many of the external supports that withered on the vine in the early days of the NDIS.
The deal struck with the states and territories at Wednesday's national cabinet meeting is central to this process.
