The government has announced a major overhaul of the beleaguered aged-care sector that provides additional funding, means-testing and greater invest in in-home care to address the slowly developing crisis in the industry.
The key elements of the package, based on the Productivity Commission’s August 2011 report and consultations with the sector by Mark Butler, the Minister for Ageing, are:
- A big increase in support for home care, with the number of funded home-care package increasing from 60,000 a year to 100,000, designed to reduce pressure on the nursing home sector. Home care packages will be means-tested (not including the family home) but there will by payments caps. There will also be more support for carers of people with dementia.
- A rise in government accommodation support from $32.58 to $52.84 per day for new aged-care places, to address the lack of incentives to invest in new aged-care facilities. There will also be a means test and payment caps in place.
- Greater flexibility in payment for accommodation, including a “cooling off” period once a place is secured, to put an end to fire sales of family homes
- An additional $1.2 billion funding for the aged-care workforce while the sector transitions to more competitive wages for staff, who are currently significantly underpaid compared to other healthcare sectors
- As per the PC’s recommendation, a new single information gateway website, with the ultimate goal of a site that will provide tailored, localised information, including ratings and performance information about facilities.
- Dementia to be added to the current list of National Health Priority Areas.
The announcement was strongly built around assurances from the government — despite some bizarre media commentary overnight — that family homes would be safe and indeed safer under the new arrangements, which are scheduled to start in July 2014, than under current arrangements.
Labor has known virtually since it arrived in office that the aged-care system it inherited wasn’t sustainable. Workforce issues and the lack of incentives to build new facilities were creating skill shortages and real bottlenecks for the provision of places. The growing ranks of Australians with dementia has also been placing additional pressure on a system already in serious trouble.
Butler said today there’d be a review after five years to see how issues such as the “Workforce Compact” and the forecast expansion of places was going. The government has also adopted the PC’s approach of looking at all aged care as a series of points on a spectrum of needs, rather than separate sectors, and seeking to delay people’s transition into accommodation for as long as possible by increasing home care and support for carers.
While the bulk of the heavy lifting will be done through additional funding, means-testing will be the political sensitivity for the government. But for an opposition increasingly focusing on the reality it will confront if it wins next year, the temptation to exploit the government’s stance might be tempered by the realisation that it has little choice about trying to make the aged care sector sustainable.
I’d hoped that the salaries of nursing staff would be increased. I understand that it is pathetic. The nurse/patient ratio is also too high. We could take a leaf out of other countries, for instance, The Netherlands. I recall several decades ago, that a friend visited his Mum who was in a nursing home there. All the beds were water beds, so there was no incidence of bed sores and discomfort on pressure points etc, which is particularly awful for the elderly who are also very frail. My little Mum was smaller than my very slim 9 yr old grand daughter for many months before she died. She got a bed sore on the back of one heel (and the nursing care could not be faulted)which was just awful – very painful, and she never complained. So what happens now? Decades on and staff ratio is lower etc?
There’s a saying, something like, ‘you can tell a lot about a country by the way it cares for its very young, its very old and its dead’? I think the first two are the most important. We seem to treat the elderly as though it’s their fault that they’re old. I think the estimates for the number of dementia sufferers in the not too distant future is about 2 million? (I stand corrected on this if I’m wrong.)
I’m closer to 70 than 60, and would like to spend my elderly years in my own place, pleasing myself about sewing, gardening and using my computer, going for walks and entertaining family and friends etc. I don’t own a home, so would be dependent, and I’d hate that? But? Who knows what the future holds? don’t think I’d like being in an institution – fingers crossed!
As commented in another place, it seems to be Labor Govts that take the initiative for the care of our citizens. The Coalition’s overall policy is the ‘survival of the fittest’ and to hell with the rest. If you have no assets then you get what you deserve! Hockey’s recent blast only reaffirms this. Hefty govt funds to pay for well off people’s contributions to health insurance etc.but the others? Tough!
Thanks for the above article Bernard but I believe a more expansive
coverage of the detail of this policy would be of help. It is going to be
an important election issue and could be the beginnings of a poll game
changer. It is also good to read something other than the feverish tea
reading speculation on the budget. Unless off course you can do a
Laurie Oakes
Liz 45
Thanks for your erudite comments on this and other issues. They are
always a good read and bring many a chuckle to my furrowed brow.
@MIKE – Thanks Mike. Like you I’d have liked some more details. This is so important (not just because of my age, although??) the population is ageing. Did you hear Abbott’s response? Predictable. To the effect, ‘more means test means more people have to pay more’ or words to that effect. No, I didn’t think it was an opinion either, but typical Abbott! He’s such an ignorant person isn’t he?
I have to keep reminding myself that he IS a member of Parlt; that he has staff working for him; that he has so many resources at his fingertips, but he’s still so ignorant? It’s embarrassing! Sometimes I just cringe. I hope that nobody from another country has heard his infantile or stupid responses, with much tongue and teeth clicking!!!! And then I see him walk? And it all becomes clear????Straight from the jungle??Embarrassing! Please reassure me that he’ll never be PM? I’d leave the country if I could afford it?
The ‘gateway’ for information makes so much sense. Trawling through the myriad of local government and private sector websites is certainly not easy.
I just wonder how the industry will fare with the ‘increased’ cap (to $10,000 per person each year?) over time.
Personal carers, those who provide home-based care for the elderly and disabled are some of the lowest paid workers in our community. They perform a job with a high level of responsibility and significant physical and emotional demands – to assist people to continue to live safely and happily at home. I hope that the ‘boost’ is enough to attract and retain the best carers.
So good to see some action on this issue at last. I think it could well be a game changer as Mike Flanagan said above.
I have heard so many horror stories of the aged getting well and truly ripped off by unscrupulous owners of nursing homes where tens of thousands of dollars are required to be paid up front just for starters before the real screws are put on. Try to go somewhere else, if you can find one, and its just as bad. I’m not yet at the age where I need worry about it for myself but fervently hope better arrangements are in place when I get there.