Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) Share this | Hansard source

' NEIL () (): We saw two very different approaches exhibited in question time today to the critical question of aged care. We had the Leader of the Opposition on behalf of the Labor Party asking detailed questions, advocating for the almost 200,000 people who rely on this sector for their lives and livelihoods. Then we had the Prime Minister on the other side of the chamber doing something that I find truly extraordinary—that is, using his position as the leader of this country to minimise the crisis in aged care and minimise the fact that 622 people in aged care have died from COVID just this year.

How can we expect the government to do anything about this crisis when the Prime Minister, instead of acknowledging what is happening today in aged care, is attempting to essentially diminish it to say that other people died in aged care, so the people who died of COVID don't matter? I actually can't believe that he's using his platform in this way. Deputy Speaker, you're a member of parliament who represents constituents. I know that you, like me, must be getting many emails from people in your electorate who are suffering because of the negligence and incompetence of this government and, in particular, Richard Colbeck, the relevant minister. We know that today people in aged care are not getting showered, not getting food and water, and not getting their wounds tended to.

I spoke to the daughter of an aged-care resident whose mother has been in lockdown in her aged-care home for three weeks now. Her mother is deaf. She is sitting in her room on her own. The only person she sees every day is a nurse in full PPE. She's confused, and her daughter is continuously trying to explain to her what's going on. This is what's happening today in our aged-care system, and the Prime Minister diminishes the crisis.

We should never forget that the staff in aged care are also deeply affected by what is happening today. Aged care was already staffed at crisis point before the pandemic hit. We have nurses and carers in this country doing everything they can to protect the people who rely on them in aged care. They're getting no support from the government. The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Foundation were in Canberra today. We heard from Sue, Wendy and Linda. We are asking these people to do the impossible; we are asking them to choose between helping someone who's fallen out of their bed and assisting someone who might be in pain. Deputy Speaker, imagine you and me having to do that job every day. It is inhumane. The Australian parliament should not be asking Australian workers to make those choices.

We've had 662 people die in aged care this year. There are 12,000 current COVID infections. Almost half of all aged-care homes have a COVID outbreak. This has been going on for weeks and weeks. Where is the government? Richard Colbeck goes to the cricket during the worst of this outbreak, not for one day, not for two days, but for three days running. He goes to the cricket while people in his care suffer in misery. He should be focused on this crisis. The Prime Minister does some ridiculous photo op, washing someone's hair, when people in aged care are not being showered. We hear, endlessly, that they're sending each other abusive text messages. Come on! This is a crisis. It needs the full focus of government; instead, they're focusing on themselves.

If Scott Morrison would come and talk to the aged-care nurses, as many Labor members of parliament did today, they would give him a very clear message: this aged-care crisis is not just about COVID; this is about nine years of disgraceful neglect of a sector that cares for some of the most vulnerable people in Australia. We have a royal commission, which the government has just cast aside because it's inconvenient. Find me a person in this country who will say that there's been any improvement since the aged-care royal commission reported a year ago. They do not exist. What was the point of spending two years going through that exercise? Aged care is not a sideshow; it is not some thing that government does just because it feels like it. These people need care. If we are lucky, you will age and I will age. We might end up in aged care too. This is an urgent priority for the federal government, and if Australians want to see aged people in this country looked after appropriately, then at the next election they are going to have to choose a new government.

See this speech in context