A seriously ill man who had been repeatedly refused NDIS funding has finally scored a victory after Daily Mail Australia intervened in his more than four-year campaign for help.
On Tuesday morning, the day after his 37th birthday, John G received an email confirming he had finally been approved to receive NDIS money to alleviate his suffering.
At his home in north-west Sydney, John, who suffers from a severe neurological disorder, admitted: “It’s the best birthday present I could ever get.”
‘The moment they told me, a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. I can finally feel some relief.
‘One of (NDIS Minister) Bill Shorten’s office assistants contacted me personally and said he was going to speed things up after the (Daily Mail Australia) story.
“She was a gem.”
John, a former engineer who can now only walk with crutches and constantly shakes, has been waiting for NDIS assistance since 2019 after falling ill the previous year with a functional neurological disorder (FND).
John’s harrowing life story and his rejection by the NDIS shocked and angered millions of Australians, who demanded to know why he had not been included in the scheme like the other 660,000 Australians.
John G received the news on Tuesday morning with an email from the NDIS stating that after four and a half years he had finally been approved for disability funding.
John said things started to move forward when an assistant in Bill Shorten’s office “contacted me personally and said she was going to speed things up.”
The family has started helping to clean John’s house, but he hopes that now the NDIS has been approved, his house can be properly cleaned and he can start a new life.
FND was not among the 49 diseases or disorders listed on the NDIS, even though his condition is permanent and he can barely walk.
His plight became public knowledge when generous gardener Nathan Stafford cut his overgrown grass for free, because John is unable to clean, shop or properly care for himself.
Daily Mail Australia approached Shorten’s office about John’s case earlier this month in a bid to help him get his life back on track.
But her office insisted: “A person must meet all eligibility criteria, including NDIS eligibility.” criteria for permanenceto comply with access to the NDIS.
‘The NDIS must be satisfied that all relevant and appropriate treatments have been explored, leaving a permanent disability.’
But John revealed he has since been told there was “a technicality with the paperwork” that had delayed his application from before the Covid pandemic began.
“Now I can breathe fresh air,” she said. “Now I can get my life back on track with help.”
“I can get help cleaning this pigsty,” he said.
John lives among piles of garbage scattered around his house because he is physically unable to pick it up and clean it.
Relatives helped start cleaning his house and bagging the trash before his birthday, but he still lives in poverty.
“It’s very embarrassing,” she admitted. “It’s not just about my house, it’s about me. I used to dance and have fun, play pranks on people. I was a very energetic person.”
“When people asked me how I was, I would say, ‘I’m on top of the world; if I were better, I’d be in heaven.’ I used to exude optimism.
“I don’t look good now, I look completely different. I hope to regain some of that optimism.”
John “used to dance and have fun, play pranks on people. He was a very energetic person” before he got sick (left), but since contracting Down’s disease he can barely walk and his standard of living has declined.
Since Daily Mail Australia told John’s story – of how the proud civil engineer on Sydney’s biggest project became a self-confessed “shaky wreck” – friends and family from across Australia and the world have been in touch.
As a youngster, he practiced taekwondo and played rugby at high school, before studying engineering and being hired to build the Sydney Metro.
He dressed smartly, socialised, had a fiancée and was in charge of a team of fit and able-bodied men like himself who built the vast subway tunnels under Sydney.
But the sudden onset of non-epileptic seizures began in 2018, followed by “a lot of falls” and episodes of paralysis, which not only weakened John physically but also isolated him socially.
“My life fell apart,” she said. “And when Dad died (last year), it was like pouring salt on an open wound.”
“I miss going out a lot and I’ve basically spent the last 18 months on this couch. This room has become my bedroom.”
He revealed that he hopes to be able to get out with help one day soon and revealed that his big dream is to travel on the new Metro that he helped build.
John hopes that with help he will be able to travel on the new Sydney metro, whose construction he is proud to have contributed to.
John (above, as a teenager with his family at his grandmother’s birthday party) says receiving the NDIS means he will regain some of his optimism about life and end his social isolation.
“I’ve only been out for coffee once in the last 18 months,” he revealed.
“Isn’t that what the NDIS is all about? Giving people with disabilities the chance to have a better life?”
John said he still needed to learn exactly how NDIS funding would work before making plans on how to use it.
But he said he would be keeping a close eye on how his funding was spent. Like many Australians, he was angry when he learned that “$4 billion had been wasted.”
“It bothers me when I hear that it has been used to buy a new car or to go on holiday. That’s not right,” he says.