Disabled refugees and carers have told the Disability Royal Commission that services such as the National Disability Insurance Scheme are alienating people rather than helping those most in need.
The hearing on Thursday focused on barriers for culturally and linguistically diverse disabled people.
Race Discrimination Commissioner Chin Tan spoke of the need of disability services to accommodate multicultural communities.
He said participants in community consultations described the disability sector as "very European".
"Ensuring cultural safety, respect and inclusion for culturally and linguistically diverse people is paramount," Mr Tan said.
Witness Mr Rahman (a pseudonym) detailed his harrowing experience as a disabled asylum seeker in 2013, when he was detained on Christmas Island.
The 36-year-old was born in Bangladesh with a severe spinal condition and a chest deformity that restricts his breathing. His doctor's orders to remain in Australia for medical treatment were ignored by authorities and he was shipped back to Christmas Island.
"It was humiliating to be handcuffed and treated like a criminal," Mr Rahman told the commission through an interpreter.
"I felt like I had engaged in a criminal activity just for being a disabled person."
He detailed his detention in Nauru until 2019, when he was transferred to Australia through the Medevac program.
"I lived in a small plastic tent with 25-30 other people," Mr Rahman said.
"There were very limited toilet and shower facilities. It was very hard to access clean drinking water.
"I had to line up for food for hours, but because of my disability I could not always stand in line and would often go without food."
He believes he was "better off in the jungle of many other countries" and was attacked by locals who broke his leg.
"My only fault is that I arrived ... by boat," Mr Rahman said.
''My feeling is that the detention centre was run as if people were in a zoo," he said, adding he was only given Panadol to numb the pain and was not provided with specialist services for his back.
He later spent two years in detention in Melbourne, including in the infamous Park Hotel.
Once released into the community on a bridging visa, Mr Rahman found access to disability services lacking, especially when the pandemic plunged the city into prolonged lockdowns.
Unable to work because of his disability, he was forced into homelessness and resorted to eating from rubbish bins for two months when Centrelink payments and free accommodation stopped after six months.
Mr Rahman urged the government to better financially support disabled refugees through Centrelink. He receives about $550 a fortnight
An Iraqi refugee given the pseudonym ZA said caring for her daughter, who was born in 2008 with heart problems and blockages in her nose, was a full-time job.
Based in Shepparton in Victoria, the family supports the daughter, who is unable to talk, hear, eat, drink, toilet or shower.
ZA said her interactions with NDIS staff were traumatic, unprofessional and bogged down in bureaucracy, without clear lines of communication.
"He (an NDIS manager) said that even if your daughter has access to services and supports for 100 years, she will not learn,'' ZA said.
"I spent days feeling anxious and worried. I feel like all the therapists do is write reports."
The NDIS refused to pay for repairs to the daughter's bed and wardrobe, and would not install a fence around the house to keep her from wandering off.
ZA said funding for the NDIS needed to filter down to disabled people.
"The only help my daughter gets is having a support worker for three to fours a day, but that's not really covering her needs," she said.
This month, NDIS Minister Bill Shorten announced a review into the scheme, saying it will cost an extra $8.8 billion over the next four years, which he said was the result of "poor management" by the previous government.
