Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing and Seniors) Share this | Hansard source

I want to say, at the outset, that Labor will be supporting this bill. As outlined by the minister in the explanatory memorandum, this bill enables a new procedure to do a shadow classification of recipients of residential aged care and some kinds of flexible care in Australia. This has been necessary, of course, because we know that the current funding model is broken—the Aged Care Funding Instrument. Indeed, we have known that for some time, and we have been calling on the government to do more about that. In fact, we have had the University of Wollongong commission a report about the funding model. This has been going on for some time. Indeed, the government has had this report since August 2017, so it has taken a very long time to get to this point.

I want to put on record that the Department of Health has estimated that there will be around 250 independent assessors that will do the shadow classification, and that they are required to hold a qualification of a registered nurse, an occupational therapist or a physiotherapist. I've also been reassured by the government that these assessors will not replace the current ACATs and, indeed, the current ACATs could actually do this work.

I'm also advised by the government that there will be no change to the funding currently allocated to the Aged Care Funding Instrument to providers without any further legislation coming to this place. Indeed, this legislation will only enable the shadow classification ready for any reform that may be recommended by the royal commission into aged care for this new classification system to be introduced, so we want to make sure that the government does the right thing here by current aged-care recipients. We understand that the government wants the 220,000 current recipients of residential aged care and some flexible care to be reclassified in the first year of operation with the shadow classification and that the government wants to start doing that from April.

But we do have some concerns about this bill, and I want to take time to put them on the record. We are concerned that the 250 full-time assessors will not be regulated by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. We understand that the regulation of the assessors will be the responsibility of the Department of Health. We would like to see that fixed. We also understand that the government is seeking to move a substantive amendment to this legislation in relation to improved privacy so that people's personal information is not published. Obviously we want to support the bill, but, as I said at the outset, we are concerned that the government has been very slow to do the reform that is necessary in aged care.

We know that aged care in Australia is in crisis. We also know that the current government and the current Prime Minister, when he was Treasurer, cut funding from the Aged Care Funding Instrument. Indeed, $1.7 billion was cut. And we know that this has had an impact on the care being provided. We know from providers, we know from families and we know from workers in the aged-care facilities around Australia that the current Prime Minister's cut when he was Treasurer to residential aged-care funding has had a substantial impact, particularly on those residents with very high needs. Everybody has seen that the cuts that were made by the current Prime Minister when he was Treasurer have had a significant impact on the delivery and quality of care in facilities right around the country. It got to the point where it was so bad that this government had to call a royal commission, essentially into itself and its management of aged-care reform in Australia. It has been very, very slow. To that end, I move:

That all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

'whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes the Government's slow approach to reforming aged care'.

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