Jason Falinski (Mackellar, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Aged Care and Other Legislation Amendment (Royal Commission Response No. 2) Bill 2021. Just listening to the member for Moreton, it occurred to me that some things need to be put in context. The first of those is that the so-called 'cuts' he referred to were not cuts at all. They were the efforts by this government to stop the growth in expenditure in aged care. Why did we do that? We did that because there are now three listed aged-care companies—SDR, Japara and Regis—who in all their prospectuses stated that their sustainable competitive advantage, compared with their competitors, was that they were better at filling out forms and gaming the system of funding that the federal government had instituted to maximise the amount of money that they got from the Australian taxpayer. So when I listened to the member for Moreton speak so eloquently, as he always does, about the needs of those people who are not wealthy, those people who do not have access to unsustainable riches and class-action lawyers and industry super and big unions, I was left to wonder why all of a sudden he is in favour of very wealthy listed companies in Melbourne getting access to untold riches from the taxpayer and this parliament not being in a position to ask whether they deserve it and whether they are actually providing the care.

Is that the sort of deep moral and intellectual bankruptcy we are to expect from the opposition on every issue this parliament deals with—that they would favour the interests of large listed corporations over that of people seeking care in aged care and nursing homes? Is that where we've got to in this parliament? Is that where we've got to in this country? (Quorum formed) Surprise, surprise! The Labor Party wants to shut down debate when we start talking about ideas—when we start talking about the endemic corruption of industry super, big unions and class-action lawyers. They are afraid of ideas. The member for Fenner talks and talks about ideas, but he doesn't want to hear the ones he needs to listen to. And I'm really surprised that the member for Moreton don't want us to ensure that taxpayer funds go to caring for people.

Before I came to this place, I had a business that provided goods and services to the aged-care sector. That business started roughly in 2004. My observations between 2004 and 2016 were that aged care in Australia actually became outstanding. I would go to trade shows in the healthcare sector in places like Germany, China and Taiwan—it was nothing compared to the locations that James Bond went to!—and I heard people from every part of the world talking about aged care and the challenges that their nations faced. It is little known in this place that Germany has a proactive policy of relocating people who require care as they grow older. They have a policy that enables people to be cared for in the Czech Republic and in Thailand, because they simply do not have the resources or the people to enable them to undertake that care in Germany. China has a very large number of people about to get very old. Traditionally what happened in Chinese society was that those people would be looked after in the homes of their children. But of course, under the communist regime, there has been 40 years of a one-child policy, which means that this traditional care model for people in China as they become older has broken down. So the Chinese government is looking for potential solutions for what they see as a crisis on their doorstep, a demographic crisis. When they've looked around the rest of the world, they have found that, in their view, Australia has one of the best systems in the world for caring for people as they get older.

I think back to 2004 when I walked into my first aged-care home, which was a UnitingCare aged-care home in Croydon, and, as the doors opened, the smell of ammonia that escaped was overpowering. I remember, at a Royal Freemasons home in Parramatta, walking past a lady who was quite distressed because she had been calling for care for quite some period of time. But, as the private sector came into the provision of aged care, quality and service went through the roof. I think of Arcare—

An honourable member: An outstanding company.

an outstanding company, a company that really makes me wonder, as a sprightly 51-year-old, whether it would be okay for me to move into one of their facilities at Warriewood. I think of Signature Care, which is providing four- and five-star quality care in rural and regional settings that many of the not-for-profit providers, whether it be UnitingCare or otherwise, simply are not dedicating the resources to providing. These organisations are providing incredibly good quality care in terms of the services that they provide. I think personally, from my observation, that the group that has done more to stop older Australians, our tribal elders, from getting the care they deserve is in fact this parliament. We have heaped regulation after regulation after regulation onto aged care so that innovative, entrepreneurial people who take caring seriously, take compassion for older people as their calling in life, have been prevented from providing different care, more care, services that people want, by this parliament, who have decided that the smartest 151 people in the world actually sit in this chamber and we are so smart that we can tell you what care a person in Broome requires versus a person in the south of Hobart, that we know that model of care from one end of this country to the other. But the truth is we don't. We don't. The people who the member for Moreton talked about, the people who are engaged on a daily basis in the provision of this care, know better than any of us ever will what an individual needs, requires and should have to ensure the last years of their life are some of the most satisfying that they can have—or, at least, are satisfying.

When this parliament—and I was part of that vote—referred the aged-care sector to a royal commission to investigate the problems that some aged-care providers were having, I have to say this thought went through my mind: can you think of a group less suited to undertake this investigation than lawyers—who are known for their care and compassion!—opining on the entirety of the aged-care system in this country, a system that is globally seen as one of the best in the world, one that other nations want to replicate? But so it came to pass.

Those opposite say, 'The government isn't interested or aren't accepting all the recommendations of the royal commission.' Let me tell you why. The two commissioners themselves disagreed. You had the Chief Medical Officer of Australia sitting in front of them saying, 'These are all the plans we had during COVID,' and then they had the counsel assisting saying, 'Oh, you didn't explain; there was no plan,' which was just not true. Simply put, it was not true. So now we have this report that has come from a royal commission staffed by a bunch of lawyers.

The member for Moreton asked how many people have spent time in aged-care homes. Well, I'll put my hand up. I have spent a lot of time in aged care. I have seen the best and the worst providers of aged care throughout this land, and I know that the people who have been able to provide better care have been the private sector coming into this market and reimagining what it should look like. The people who have prevented them from providing even better care than that are this parliament, because we've told them what they can and cannot do from Canberra rather than say we do not know.

The member for Moreton said the government has rejected provisions like 24-hour nursing. Let me tell you why we did that. We did that because there are small towns dotted throughout this country who, if you brought in that provision, would lose their nursing home. In other words, the people who want to be close to their loved ones—their wives, their husbands—in the last few years they have on this planet would not be able to access an aged-care home if this parliament decided, 'No, you cannot have a perfectly good, caring environment for your husband or your wife because you can't find a nurse to work 24-hours,' even though you don't need a nurse, even though you're highly unlikely to ever require one. We should endorse this bill and we should vote for it, but, most of all, we should support the best aged-care sector in the world. (Time expired)

See this speech in context