$500m doesn’t go far enough, aged care advocates say
The Federal Government has announced close to $500m in funding to support people in home care but aged care advocates say the funding boost doesn’t go far enough and thousands will die waiting for help.
NSW
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Aged care advocates say the federal government’s $500 million response to the crisis gripping the sector doesn’t go far enough and that thousands of people will still die each year while waiting for help.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced 10,000 new home care packages yesterday, plus funding to curb the use of medication as a chemical restraint, as well as more money for dementia training and removing younger people from aged care.
All these areas were identified as requiring immediate action by last month’s aged care royal commission interim report.
The measures have a total cost of $537 million, with $496 million of that committed to the home care packages — most of which will provide high levels of help.
Councils on the Ageing CEO Ian Yates said while the extra packages were welcome “the missing piece of the puzzle” was a strategy to get the median waiting time down from 180 days to the government’s own target of 60 days.
“What’s the plan? It’s essentially ad hoc,” Mr Yates said.
Nationals Seniors Australia spokesman Ian Henschke said the government hadn’t even met the “most dire need”.
“Ten thousand packages is 6000 less than the number of people who died last year while they were waiting,” Mr Henschke said.
Aged Care Crisis spokeswoman Lynda Saltarelli said it “welcomed these small first steps that attempt to address the immediate crisis points identified by the royal commission. (but) these fall a long way short of the fundamental structural changes needed to address the deep flaws in the system”.
Mr Morrison said on Monday that the Royal Commission had been a “very uncomfortable exercise” for all Australians.
“As we listen to the stories and were shocked and disturbed at the treatment of our older Australians in their moments of greatest vulnerability,” he said.
Mr Morrison said the government’s response went directly to the issues highlighted in the interim report.
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“I know quite precisely the sorts of things that you are thinking about at the moment when it comes to the treatment of your loved ones in aged care.
The PM also said there was “more to be done and more will be done”.
“I want to assure all Australians that we will deal with these issues as you would if you were standing in my shoes today,” Mr Morrison said.
“My family is no different to yours in that respect and so I have a very deep understanding of the difficult decisions that you’re having to make, the conversations you’re having to have with the partners, husbands, wives of those loved ones going into care, other siblings.”
Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck pointed out the government had increased the number of home care packages from 60,000 to 150,000 including the 10,000 that will become available from next month.
He also noted the royal commission had not recommended “just flooding the market with additional packages”.
But Catholic Health Australia CEO Pat Garcia said with 110,000 people still on the wait list, “much more” needed to be done.
The Daily Telegraph put the criticisms to Mr Colbeck’s office yesterday but there was no response before deadline.
The government said $26 million will go to better medication management to reduce the use of drugs to control the behaviour of residents in aged care facilities.
The royal commission interim report described chemical restraint as “inhumane, abusive and unjustified”.
About $5 million will be spent on hitting targets for getting younger people with disabilities being out of aged-care homes.
The government’s goal is to ensure no-one under the age of 45 is living in aged care by 2022, rising to 65 by 2025.
Dementia training will be boosted by $10 million.