Royal commission to shine light on secrecy of abuse in aged care
The details of more than 3700 assaults in aged-care facilities last year are obscured by a culture of secrecy enabled by an Aged Care Act that protects operators. Now aged care advocates are pushing for an overhaul of the Act.
SA News
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Aged care advocates expect the royal commission will recommend ending the sector’s culture of secrecy over complaints, neglect and assaults.
South Australian whistleblowers have backed the call for transparency in the sector but have expressed serious doubts that the industry can be trusted to regulate its own ingrained secrecy.
One leading representative claimed the need to increase transparency was so obvious that nursing home operators should act now.
Council on the Ageing (COTA) chief executive Ian Yates, who appeared at the commission, said he was confident the recommendations would include “far greater transparency”.
There were more than 3700 assaults in aged care facilities in 2017-18, but little is known about where they occurred and what if anything changed in response.
A reason for the mystery is the Aged Care Act contains a secrecy provision that protects operators.
Clive Spriggs, whose father Bob died in the shamed Oakden aged care facility, said secrecy had no place in the sector.
“Family have a right to know how their loved ones are being treated and what is happening to them,” he said. “The whole industry needs an overhaul and stronger guidelines.”
Stewart Johnston, whose mother Helen was a patient at Oakden, said a reform of secrecy provisions would help the industry repair its public image.
“The aged care sector has suffered from being kept in the dark, that is how Oakden occurred,” he said.
“There was no transparency and no accountability. If there was one thing we should have learnt through this journey it is that we need complete transparency and that leads to better accountability and safety.”
More than 80 per cent of Australians are concerned the Government does not allow them to know details of nursing home mistreatment, according to a survey released this week by the Right to Know coalition of media organisations as part of a major new campaign.
Mr Yates, who is on the Government’s Aged Care Quality and Safety (ACQS) Advisory Council, said the industry should not need to be told to be more open.
“Why don’t they just get out there and do it?” he said.
“And if they won’t the Government doesn’t have to wait; it can get on the front foot.”
Aged Rights Advocacy Service chief executive Carolanne Barkla, said the service was expecting the royal commission to recommend increased transparency of data on assaults, such as the number and types, as well as the use of restraints. The Combined Pensioners and Superannuants Association is pushing for a rewrite of the Aged Care Act’s Division 86, which provides blanket protection for providers’ information.
Opposition aged care spokeswoman Ged Kearney said the sector was in “dire need of accountability and transparency reforms”.
Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck said the Government had brought in new measures to “improve transparency, including making public any breaches of the new Aged Care Quality Standards online”.
Originally published as Royal commission to shine light on secrecy of abuse in aged care