Russell Broadbent (Monash, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

listen closely—home-care packages are up, residential care places are up; every year, aged-care funding is up. When I came here, we spent $3 billion on aged care—$3 billion. Under the Howard government, it went from $3 billion to $9 billion to $11 billion. I remember, at the close of the Howard era, I went to Mr Howard and he said, 'Don't ask me for more money for aged care, Russell. You've had enough.' Of course, there was never going to be enough, because we had an exponential rise in the number of older people. And the models that we used, as I told many of the aged-care facilities in my electorate, when people went in at an earlier age and actually stayed for some five, eight, nine, 10 years, completely changed.

Because of home-care packages, we are putting people into aged-care centres when they are much older and when they are much frailer. Even though when you put them in—when they go in of their own free will, I should say, their health and lifestyle and wellbeing improve dramatically, and then, sadly, goes. Death and taxes. We all know we're going to die. That's why aged care should not be somewhere you go to die; it's somewhere you go for a really good part of your latter years. It should be a good experience.

I heard the member for Werriwa speak most passionately about the care her mother received. And it's the care my mum received, my dad received, and my father-in-law and my mother-in-law received from aged-care sector providers. They have all passed away. But, in my electorate, is there a crisis in care? No. If anything, there's a crisis in the fact that no government, in the whole time that I've been here, has been able to keep up enough funding to make sure that everybody's getting a fair go. You've got to have a really close look at the models.

My not-for-profits are amazing, the way they approach aged care—and I have to say my for-profits in that care do very well too. In my time as federal member for Corinella, then for McMillan and then for Monash, I would have had three inquiries regarding difficulties that people were having in aged care, and we were able to resolve every one of them. We have amazing providers in Gippsland. Now, my electorate might be a one-off and unusual; I don't know. But I am so proud of my aged-care providers and those who work for them.

Have we got difficulties at the moment? We sure have. It's called COVID. It's called a pandemic. My providers, like many others, struggle getting the right PPE, the right approach and the right masks. How do we go about this? How do we engage with our community? Many had been cut off from their community, with Victoria being in lockdown so many times. Have there been difficulties? Absolutely there have been difficulties. How have they been handled? To the best of the provider's ability. We have worked with them closely through all of that to make sure that those people, who are part of our most vulnerable community—and there are so many others—are the ones who are specifically cared for in our community. I just don't know how they were able to work so closely with the broader community to enable them to deliver, and they're still delivering every day.

There will always be more money needed in aged care. We will always take this as a very important part of what governments do. We will be judged, one day, on our ability to provide services to older Australians. They deserve that respect and they deserve that encouragement.

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