About the Conference

This Conference is part of For-Purpose Leaders’ Care Series

The National Care Sectors Conference: NDIS, Aged Care & Childcare returns in 2026 as Australia’s premier gathering for leaders, practitioners, policymakers, and lived-experience voices across aged care, disability, early childhood, mental health, and community services.

Building on the momentum of 2025, this year’s program pushes the conversation forward, addressing the toughest challenges facing the sector while showcasing bold ideas for transformation. With six dynamic panels, interactive sessions, and opportunities for collaboration, the conference promises to inform, inspire, and ignite action.

Why This Conference Matters: The insights gathered from this conference will contribute to shaping the future reforms, ensuring that the voices of sector leaders, providers, and individuals with lived experience are heard at the highest levels of policy-making.

Why this conference matters

Australia’s care and support system stands at a crossroads. Workforce shortages, fragmented funding, and rising demand are colliding with new pressures — from the lessons of COVID-19 to the realities of climate change and rapid digital transformation. At the same time, families, communities, and First Nations voices are calling for deeper recognition and genuine partnership in shaping the future of care.

The National Care Sectors Conference: NDIS, Aged Care & Childcare is where these challenges and opportunities meet. It’s the sector’s flagship platform for critical dialogue, shared learning, and collective action. By convening leaders, practitioners, policymakers, and lived-experience voices in one room, the conference seeks not just to debate, but to shape the reform agenda for the decade ahead.

What to Expect

• Six dynamic panel discussions tackling the most pressing issues facing the care economy — from building a sustainable workforce and embedding safeguarding cultures to preparing for climate shocks, pandemics, and the ethical use of AI.

• Cross-sector dialogue: aged care, disability, mental health, early childhood, and community services brought together to break down silos and imagine integrated solutions.

• Lived-experience perspectives woven throughout, grounding policy and practice debates in the realities of those who give and receive care.

• Forward-looking ideas that push beyond compliance and crisis management to bold reimagining of funding, governance, workforce, and technology.

• Opportunities for connection: networking breaks, facilitated conversations, and practical takeaways to support collaboration long after the event.

This is more than a conference—it is a national conversation and collective movement towards a more inclusive, sustainable, and future-ready care and support economy.