Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion. I rise to associate myself with the comments made by the member for Makin and I thank him for his motion. Elder abuse has many facets. In our society, often in the past our elders and those who were ageing were seen as the people to whom you went for advice, support and guidance. Over the last few decades that has changed. We see elements of abuse that are not acceptable. The whole financial construct of the abuse—the humbugging, seeking to take care of your parents and then taking their wealth to build your own—is problematic.

Elder abuse, as defined by Seniors Rights Victoria, is:

Elder abuse is any act which causes harm to an older person and is carried out by someone they know and trust such as family or friends.

That is normally the gamut of how you would consider it. It is even in terms of some of the unscrupulous behaviour of people who take advantage and work on the fear that they create in the elderly about the safety of their environment and who extract from them commitments to financial arrangements, security systems et cetera. In days gone by, these elders were more able to be strong in their resolution as to their aspirations and dreams; but when you become frail you are at the mercy of others. The problem in our society is that when you become old there is a mindset of ageism and that mindset sees people categorised as 'not of value' and being set aside. I think that is a sad indictment, particularly when those who are vulnerable are subjected to financial, social, physical, sexual and psychological abuse and neglect from those who purport to love and care for them.

World Elder Abuse Awareness Day—the day that is bringing us together—is about working together to bring greater recognition of the mistreatment of older people wherever they live and to highlight the need for appropriate action. The United Nations notes that:

The global population of people aged 60 years and older will more than double, from 542 million in 1995 to about 1.2 billion in 2025. Around 4 to 6% of elderly people have experienced some form of maltreatment at home.

In my own electorate of Hasluck 18.6 per cent of residents are over the age of 60, which equates to just under 28,000 people according to the 2011 census.

There are some subtle elements of abuse as well. One of these is loneliness. You hear of somebody who passes away in a unit and nobody notices that they have not been around and when they are discovered dead in their bed people then ask: 'Where is the family? Where are the relatives who were part of that person's life? Where is the community?' That is a subtle abuse through neglect and through loneliness. Often when we doorknock, as most of us in this chamber do, we meet people who live in poverty and whose physical surrounds show and exemplify neglect. It is sad that at their time of life when they have contributed to the building of a nation that we take for granted and enjoy that they are not the benefactors of what you would expect to be a good retirement or a good time in life. As we reach our senior years, we expect to be able to spend that time in the twilight of our life enjoying family, friends and those around us. We do not need the type of abuse that we are seeing becoming increasingly prevalent.

I must admit in a previous role one of my responsibilities was to look at the extent of elder abuse within that jurisdiction, to look at how we address it and to look at what measures there were to protect people who were experiencing elder abuse. Sadly, as the member for Makin indicated, there is no legislation that protects them and there is no concerted effort. It is only through these motions and through these debates that we will continue to raise within the community's conscience the need to address the abuse of elders.

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