As the parent of an adult daughter with an intellectual disability, Phil brings both personal insight and lived experience to a role that requires navigating the often complex systems of the NDIS.
Wallara supports more than 600 adults with disability across 20 locations. Its programs focus on three key areas: work, accommodation, and learning and lifestyle. Through partnerships with organisations such as Monash University, the Suburban Rail Loop Authority, and Frankston RSL, as well as its own Sages Cottage Farm, Wallara offers real employment opportunities from land care and logistics to hospitality and retail. The newly developed media program helps participants learn creative skills and build confidence through storytelling.
Importantly, Wallara also helps clients and families interpret and implement their NDIS plans. Whether it’s funding for job coaching, supported accommodation or lifestyle programs, Wallara’s team supports each person to understand how to put their NDIS goals into action. For many families, this guidance provides both clarity and relief in a system that can otherwise feel overwhelming.
Wallara’s model goes beyond service delivery, providing structured pathways to independence while raising awareness and educating the wider public. Participants are helped to build skills, explore new experiences and, when ready, transition into supported independent living arrangements. Some may move in with friends and have a carer on site, while others may benefit from short-stay accommodation to prepare for more independent living or simply to build confidence and experience. Either way, the emphasis is on choice and dignity.
Wallara has eight permanent houses in operation, each with four or five residents and a carer. This freedom to choose their own housemates is incredibly important, but having the support of Wallara to find the buildings and manage the whole process of stepping up to independent living is vital. Phil urges parents and carers of adult children with disabilities to consider preparing for what a move to more independent living might look like, rather than reacting in moments of crisis when stress and complexity are already high.
Phil is a strong advocate for flexible, person-centred approaches to inclusion, and is cautious of polarised debates that suggest a single model fits all. “Inclusion is an experience, not a postcode,” he said. “For some people, mainstream pathways work well. For others, specialist settings offer structure and opportunity.”
That perspective, shaped by both Phil’s leadership and family life, has helped define Wallara’s direction. At Sages Cottage Farm, for example, Wallara participants care for animals, grow food, cook, and welcome visitors. It’s a place of learning, work, and community, where inclusion happens through connection, not just policy.
Phil’s leadership style reflects a careful balance: grounded in lived experience, informed by research, and open to complexity. At Wallara, that approach translates into something that is practical as well as powerful, supporting people with disability to navigate the NDIS, to grow and to find their own sense of community. “We don’t know what people’s limits are,” he said, “so it’s up to us to help them grow.”
