Yvette D'Ath (Petrie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the Social Security Legislation Amendment (Improved Support for Carers) Bill 2009. This bill provides part of the government’s response to the report of the Carer Payment (child) Review Taskforce and gives effect to a number of measures aimed at improving assistance to carers from 1 July 2009. The qualification criteria and assessment process for carer payment for care provided to children with disability or a medical condition will be changed to provide a fairer and more equitable process based on the level of care required, rather than the rigid medical criteria used currently. A person who qualifies for a carer payment under the new provisions inserted by this bill will automatically qualify for carer allowance.

The provisions in the Social Security Act 1991 that provide for qualification for carer payment and carer allowance while a care receiver is in hospital, or continued qualification if a care receiver enters hospital, will be amended to allow a person to qualify or remain qualified for carer payment while a care receiver who is a child is in hospital for an unlimited number of days per calendar year.

The Carer Payment (child) Review Taskforce was established in March 2007 to examine eligibility criteria for the carer payment (child) and to consider the effectiveness of the payment in providing a safety net for children with a profound disability or severe medical condition. In identifying the challenges and critical role for carers, the task force recognised the vitally important role of carers and acknowledged that the willingness and ability of carers to provide care is an integral component of the broader care system. Their contribution is central to sustaining the current system of community based, person centred care.

The major challenges faced by carers identified in the consultation process were the impact of the caring role on carers and their families and the level of care required beyond that of a usual parenting role; the eligibility criteria and assessment processes for access to carer payment (child) and the fact that these processes did not measure care load; the complexity of the application process and the role of health professionals in verifying claims for payment; the inadequacies in the service delivery system in helping carers to access information and assistance; the lack of recognition of different care arrangements, such as shared, short-term and episodic care and multiple caring responsibilities; the financial costs of disability and the costs of caring; workforce participation; the relationship between carer payments and other social security payments; and the lack of a smooth transition between child and adult carer payments.

Throughout the review process, issues with the way the carer payment (child) is structured and administered were identified as major sources of concern. Not surprisingly, as the public face of payment service delivery, Centrelink received some critical comments. In dealing with the eligibility for carer payment, the task force was asked to compare the circumstances of carers in receipt of carer payment (child) to those who in recent cases have not qualified. In doing this, the task force assumed that the recent cases referred to were those where alternative assistance was provided. Through the review process, the task force identified that the perceived inequity of the current eligibility requirements, particularly the need to meet arbitrary and, in the view of many, irrelevant specific circumstances, was a major issue. Many carers were precluded from receiving the payment even though their caring responsibilities may have been as great as those of carers who qualified for the payment. We have certainly heard examples of that from our speakers today. The prescription of a small number of very specific circumstances in which the payment may be granted is inflexible and does not accommodate advances in medicines and in medically applied technology.

That is why this legislation is so important. The proposed changes provide a fairer and more equitable process, based on the level of care required rather than on the rigid medical criteria used currently. For the first time, there will also be access to the carer payment in respect of a child whose requires care on a short-term or episodic basis. I hear of these examples time and time again when I talk to parents at special schools in my electorate. They face difficulties in trying to provide an education and quality of life for their children, quite often having to pull their child out of the schooling system to care for them full time or while their child is hospitalised for a lengthy period of time. Carers need support through those episodes. It would, of course, be remiss of me to not use this opportunity to also acknowledge the great work of all carers, not just those who care for children. We have carers who care for both the young and the old. I have personal experience in my family; my mother needed full-time care for a period of time and then specialised care before her passing. I appreciate the hard work that carers do and the difficulty for those carers who are not of retirement age and who still need to balance work and financial obligations—such as a mortgage—with being a full-time carer.

The work of carers generally goes unrecognised by the broader community. We do not acknowledge the absolute commitment that comes from making the difficult decision to become a carer, even though most carers would tell you that it was not a difficult choice, that it probably was not a choice at all; it was just something that they needed to do and wanted to do. It was the right thing to do. But such decisions are not made any easier. It is not just the commitment; it is also the sacrifices. Those sacrifices are not just in relation to the carer’s social life but also in relation to things such as work opportunities and, when they are no longer a carer, the ability to retrain and get back into the workforce. It is very important that we provide support to carers to ensure that during the time of being a carer they do not feel isolated in that role.

That is why these people, the carers in our society, should be given support not just from the government but from the community. As we heard from many speakers today, it is about quality of life and, unfortunately, in many circumstances the life that the carers are caring for may be cut unfairly short. That is why the time they do have as carers is so important and why we should do absolutely everything to provide them with the support needed in the role. I was pleased to recently meet with my local carers at one of their regular meeting groups through Carers Queensland, to hear their stories and to empathise with their needs. It was heartening to meet two lovely elderly ladies who had previously been carers but were no longer carers as their husbands had passed away, who continued to come to these meetings to provide support for other carers and younger carers. It is wonderful to see them voluntarily coming along and providing that support.

This is why the initiatives the Rudd Labor government have already taken and continue to take are so important. The changes in this bill are the latest in a series of recent support initiatives that have extended to carers—such as the 2008 one-off payment legislation, which delivered $1,000 to carer payment recipients and certain other pensioners with a caring role. The carer allowance recipients were generally paid $600 for each person cared for. Then the economic security strategy legislation of late 2008 provided $1,400 to carer payment recipients and, generally, $1,000 to carer allowance recipients for each person cared for. The new measures in this legislation are part of an $822 million package from the 2008 budget to support and recognise carers. As well as the 2008 one-off payments, and the amendments to the carer legislation included in this bill—worth about $273 million over five years—the government set aside $100 million for support accommodation facilities for people with disability whose ageing parents can no longer care for them at home and $20 million for carers who have experienced a catastrophic event involving a young child.

I know that all carers, especially those with children, are permanently aware of the future. It is forever on their minds as to what quality of life their children are going to have into the future. It is one of the biggest concerns that parents have. One of my local families has a son called Christopher who has cerebral palsy. He is now a young man and is very much involved with Cascade Place, with their art and their music—which is fantastic. This is a respite centre which focuses on people with disabilities—but on their skills and their abilities. They are artists and musicians first; they are not known for their disability. I congratulate them for the amazing work they do.

Having spoken to Christopher’s parents on a number of occasions, I know that they have struggled to care for Christopher. They are trying to manage their own business; the two of them are running their own business as well as raising a teenage son with cerebral palsy. The one thing that they talk to me about—other than, like all parents who are carers, the need to have respite care and every now and then have time to themselves—is what the future holds for Christopher. One of the issues that they have been tackling is the limited number of small, personal and friendly home environments where Christopher can have a good quality of life, live with other young men like him and go out on social outings—a place where Christopher can live in a household, not an institution. That is the sort of life that they want for him. They had the pleasure of meeting me at a place known as Narin at Aspley in my electorate that has that very focus. It has four wonderful people living there. They looked at that place and said, ‘That is what we want for Christopher.’ But there are not enough of these sorts of places around. This initiative is fantastic, but we need to continue to do more and to focus on the issue of places and homes that provide a good quality of life as carers get older.

In addition to the announcements and initiatives of the Rudd Labor government that I have just highlighted, it is appropriate that I also acknowledge the fantastic commitment made by the Rudd Labor government in the budget announced last night by the Treasurer, the Hon. Wayne Swan, which provides further relief for carers. Around 500,000 carers across Australia will receive, as part of the government’s sustainable pension reform, a new permanent carers supplement to help meet the significant financial challenges that they face.

In addition to that carer supplement, carers in receipt of the carer payment will also get an increase equal to the increase being given to single and couple pensioners. I know that carers in my electorate will welcome this increase and the carer supplement. I understand that people who receive the carer payment and the carer allowance will receive at least two payments every year in addition to increases to their pension. More than 95 per cent of carer payment recipients also receive the carer allowance, so this is a welcome initiative by this government to support carers. These are measures that are recognised in my electorate. Those recipients are certainly deserving.

As the previous speakers have said, I will continue to recognise the needs of carers in my electorate and argue strongly that we not only need to provide financial support to these people but also need to ensure that we are providing the social support and that we are looking at how we can provide a good quality of life for all these people into the future. For all those reasons, I commend this bill to the House.

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