Emma McBride (Dobell, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention) Share this | Hansard source

Aged care matters. It matters in communities like mine on the Central Coast of New South Wales, where one in five people are aged over 65, and it matters in every suburb, town and city across the country, where old Australians and those who love them deserve better. That's why it's crucial this legislation, the Aged Care Amendment (Implementing Care Reform) Bill 2022, is supported and urgently implemented.

I want to start by saying to the many people in my community who live in residential aged care, are receiving home care or know someone in aged care: you deserve better. As a government we're acting on the recommendations handed down by the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety. In doing so I acknowledge those who shared their experiences with the royal commission and the people of my community who encouraged me to share their stories in this place—stories which are familiar to so many of us, which are often heartbreaking, disturbing and deeply personal. I also acknowledge the members of the Health Services Union, who stood up for older Australians and those who care for them.

Nicole, from Chittaway Bay, in the electorate I represent, contacted my office earlier this year to talk about her experience with aged care. She told me that we need urgent change to fix our broken aged-care system. Nicole said that aged care is overstretched and older people are paying the price. She told me: 'My mother is currently in a nursing home, and every time I visit her I can see quite clearly that there is a shortage of staff available to help her. I often search around for someone to assist me if help is needed. It worries me, and I often worry she is being neglected.' Elizabeth, from Bateau Bay, also contacted me, in July this year, about her husband, who is living with dementia and is in residential aged care. Elizabeth told me she has to spend hours a day caring for him herself because there aren't enough staff to give him the care he needs. She said she's desperate for aged-care reform. And that's what the Albanese government is doing. This legislation is a big step forward in fixing our broken aged-care system. It will respond to recommendations from the royal commission's final report and will help us as a nation to put security, dignity and humanity back into aged care.

This bill introduces a responsibility for approved aged-care providers to have a registered nurse on site and on duty at every aged-care home across Australia 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This will give older Australians the care they need and their families the comfort and assurance they need. It will also prevent thousands of avoidable and distressing trips to the hospital emergency department.

I've spoken often in this House about my father and his experience living with younger onset Alzheimer's. The particular situation was this: my father was at a cottage having some respite so that my mum, his full-time carer, could have the break she needed. Dad had a history of kidney stones, and he had an episode whilst he was in respite care. He wasn't able to communicate his distress or the pain he was in. The staff there were capable and dedicated, but it was beyond their experience and what they were able to do. I had to rush and collect my dad from respite and take him to the emergency department at Gosford Hospital, where we spent hours in a busy emergency department. It's not a place that any older person, particularly someone living with dementia, should be in. It was very unsettling for my dad, it was very difficult for my mum and it is something that happens to so many older people and their families every single day. That's why it's so important that we have the right care at the right time—so that people can get the support that they need and so they don't end up in distress and with complications, where their situation progresses, they become worse and they end up in emergency departments or having long stays in geriatric or rehabilitation wards in hospitals.

This bill also introduces a cap on charges for the administration and management of people receiving home-care packages, and it removes exit fees altogether. There are currently more than 210,000 Australians receiving home-care packages, and they deserve quality care. They need to know that the care will be of a standard that they can rely on. Their families need that reassurance and that comfort. In capping these charges, the Albanese government will make sure providers are spending more of their funding on care, making sure that that investment from all of us goes into supporting staff and providing quality care.

The last measure of this bill is the government's commitment to improving integrity and accountability in aged care and providing greater transparency. We know that aged-care staff, the many capable and dedicated people who are working within our aged-care system, are as much the victims of aged care as the people that they're trying to support. So that integrity and accountability is absolutely integral in underpinning the reform to aged care, which is so desperately needed and which our government is determined to achieve.

This bill requires the secretary of the department to make information on residential aged-care services and provider expenditure publicly available, including information on labour, care, food and nutrition, cleaning, administration, maintenance and profit or loss. This information will be published online and will help older Australians make more informed choices about residential aged-care services and providers. These measures respond to increasing public concern about the aged-care system, and they'll improve transparency for those living in residential aged care, for those who love them and for the providers. This is an important step in making sure that older Australians get the care they deserve and that, as a community, we are determined to provide.

These measures build on legislation passed by the House in the previous sitting fortnight. For me, personally and as a local MP, I'm so pleased to say that that legislation, the Aged Care and Other Legislation Amendment (Royal Commission Response) Bill 2022, has now passed the Senate. This was the first bill—and I think this is not just symbolic but practical—passed by the 47th Parliament, and it addresses a series of urgent funding, quality and safety issues as recommended by the royal commission. It will provide additional protections for older Australians living in residential aged care and a series of measures to increase transparency and accountability, something which all Australians have called for. The royal commission's interim report into aged care was titled Neglect, and, after close to a decade of inaction under the previous government, Australia's aged-care system has fallen into crisis. We need to act, and we need to act with urgency because people's lives depend on it.

Another one of my constituents, Frank, from Mardi, wrote to me last year saying—and this reflects the former speaker: 'Every baby boomer we know dreads the thought of having to go into a nursing home. Just look back at the issues uncovered by the royal commission and, more recently, the shocking handling of infection control with COVID-19. We have all had experience with parents and relatives experiencing substandard care in nursing homes, so, absolutely, everybody plans to stay home for as long as possible.'

We need to make sure that older people, and those who love them, aren't fearful about the prospect of being forced into aged care; that they know with confidence that, if they enter aged care, they will get quality care; and that they will get the care that we all want for our parents, for our grandparents, for every older Australian.

I'd also like to reflect that later this month we'll be marking Dementia Action Week. In doing so, I recognise the work of Dementia Australia and, locally, the Central Coast Dementia Alliance. As many of you in this House know, dementia impacts close to half a million Australians, and almost 1.6 million Australians are involved in their care. People living with dementia are some of the most vulnerable Australians. They have been tragically let down by our broken aged-care system. Older Australians who have worked hard their whole lives—raised families, supported communities, run businesses, contributed, had meaningful lives—deserve to be treated with dignity. They deserve respect.

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