Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party, Minister for Indigenous Health) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Brisbane for his ongoing interest in aged care. Since Oakden, what we've done is turn our minds to safety and quality for every senior Australian in this nation in residential care, in Aboriginal communities and in in-home care. What we have also done is to take all four sets of standards and we now have one set that is applied across all areas. Unannounced audits and unannounced visits were an outcome of the Oakden inquiry. That work is absolutely important because it has shown that there are serious risks. The unannounced audits now demonstrate very clearly why it was necessary to do it. In the first year, we had two serious incident reports. In the following year there were 22, and, recently, there have been 61 serious incident reports, which I discussed with the Prime Minister. In discussing those, we reached the conclusion that there were many elements in aged care that need to be considered and viewed by an independent authority, hence the announcement of the royal commission.

Service providers will no longer receive advanced notice for re-accreditation, and that is important because we want them to make sure that they provide the quality of program and services that are absolutely important. They will have nowhere to hide. This will ramp up even more through the tough cop, the new Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. The legislation we passed through the House and that will hopefully travel through the Senate with the support of senators, will mean that the new commission comes into place on 1 January. It is important that all of us turn our minds to the safety and quality of life that senior Australians deserve in aged care.

We have announced an additional $106 million for better support, facilities, care and standards, and $50 million for the new cop on the beat. But, more importantly, $50 million has been announced for aged care providers to transition to the new standards that we have all agreed to. It is important that we consider quality and safety as part of that process.

Mr Perrett interjecting—

Other matters, as the member for Moreton interjects and makes comment about, will be considered by the royal commission. There is an opportunity—that's why the royal commission will cover a range of issues in that context. We will continue to provide the level of funding in aged care that we currently do and, as it increases by a billion each year in the forward years, that will give certainty to senior Australians.

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