Ross Hart (Bass, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—At the request of Ms Collins, I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) there are almost 300 older Australians who have waited more than two years for their approved home care package, without any care;

(b) a further 636 older Australians have waited more than a year for care and they currently have no care at all and there are thousands more getting less care than they need;

(c) the latest waiting list for home care packages indicates that more than 100,000 older Australians are waiting for the package they have been approved for; and

(d) the latest figures show that the waiting list grew by more than 20,000 between 1 July and December 2017 and it is likely to continue growing without funding for the release of more packages;

(2) recognises the Government's response in its budget of 14,000 home care packages is woefully inadequate;

(3) condemns the Government for the aged care crisis it has made on its watch; and

(4) calls on the Government to immediately invest in fixing the home care package waiting list and properly address this growing crisis.

I rise today to support the motion moved by the member for Franklin, and I join her in condemning the government for the aged-care crisis that it has created on its watch. Older Australians are languishing in limbo, waiting for approved home care packages—packages which should be assessed according to their needs.

The figures are disturbing as to what they reveal. Almost 300 older Australians have waited for more than two years for their approved package. A further 636 older Australians have waited for more than one year for care. More than 100,000 older Australians are waiting for the packages that they have been approved for, even if their needs are greater. The last package of data revealed that almost 105,000 older Australians were waiting for a home care package, with the average wait time for a high-level package blowing out to more than a year. The situation may be worse than this, but the minister's department has delayed releasing important data on the numbers waiting for home care packages.

Each person waiting for a home care package is a person who is not able to receive the support they need or deserve. Not only are thousands left without desperately needed care; they and their families are placed under pressure trying to ensure that their loved ones have acceptable care, whilst simultaneously attempting to navigate a complicated, dysfunctional system. There are other flow-on effects as a result of this crisis. Older Australians who should have otherwise had access to a home care package are instead forced to visit emergency rooms in our public hospitals, having a real impact upon health departments and budgets at a state level. There is also the potential for overburdening residential care with residents that should and could be otherwise managed at home with a home care package under policies which are designed to ensure that people stay longer at home in familiar environments, close to loved ones and with the care that they need.

We've seen in the recent federal budget the government's purported response to the home care crisis. Indeed, whilst heralding a very good budget for health, and for aged care in particular, the Minister for Health and this minister, the Minister for Aged Care, have both misrepresented this government's commitment to solving the aged-care crisis. That commitment is illusory and inadequate. Their commitment of 14,000 home care packages is woefully inadequate in the face of the thousands waiting for approved packages and thousands more on waiting lists. Indeed, this is nothing but a cruel hoax for older Australians—slashing residential care to try and fix the home care crisis whilst making a mess of both residential care and home care packages. This Liberal government is robbing Peter to pay Paul, and it won't even come close to meeting the demand for home care, when the waiting list grew by 20,000 in the last six months of 2017 alone. The situation can and will get worse without further attention.

Australians who need home care assistance will be forced to look at residential care if they are unable to look after themselves in their home environment. But they will find, because of this government's refusal to provide additional real funding, that residential care will be difficult to find. We are faced with the real prospect of an emerging generation of elderly people who want to remain at home, safe in a familiar environment, but are unable to safely enjoy that home environment without a home care package. There are real risks of accidents, including dangerous falls, and a risk that domestic activities that should be possible with a small amount of home care assistance will be more difficult, leading to greater stress and anxiety—stress and anxiety which should be avoided by providing funding for more home care packages.

I indicated earlier that the system is chronically underfunded, complex and dysfunctional. One constituent of mine despairs at the state of the My Aged Care website, saying that it should be a research tool for older Australians, not an advertising platform for providers. In fact, this constituent pointed out to me that, despite the fact that she lives in a seaside village in north-east Tasmania and finally received an aged-care package after an extended wait, the My Aged Care website reports that she has in excess of 80 service providers available to her, people that purportedly may provide home care services to her—more service providers than are available to a potential consumer in Hobart or indeed Canberra. The reality, however, is that there are few providers available to her, despite what the My Aged Care website reports. (Time expired)

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Tourism) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak on this important piece of legislation for older Australians.

Ken Wyatt (Hasluck, Liberal Party, Minister for Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Grayndler for seconding the motion. Every year, the coalition government's aged-care funding is up. Home care packages are up and residential places are up. Under Labor's Living Longer Living Better reforms, the ratios set for the release of home care packages were inadequate and severely underestimated the real demand. It's always interesting, when you look at a population pyramid, to look at where the pressure points are within that pyramid. Certainly if Labor had done their work once the Living Longer Living Better legislation had been brought in then we wouldn't have the mess that they've left.

It is not a system of dysfunction, as those on the other side continually claim. Our reforms uncovered the extent of the problem left by the former Labor government, which the Turnbull government is working to fix. We inherited a home care system with ratios that were absolutely inadequate and a supply of packages that was vastly insufficient for real demand. Instead of investing in care for our older Australians, Labor ripped money out of aged care to prop up their budget bottom line. In 2010-11, a Labor government ripped $9 million from residential aged care and failed to reinvest every dollar—a $9 million cut, and the source is the budget papers. In 2011-12, Labor ripped over $200 million out of residential aged care, and, in 2012-13, there was another cut of $135 million. But what's not reflected is the amount that was handed back to consolidated revenue because the packages weren't taken up.

Unlike Labor, this government is making record investments in aged cared, delivering around $5 billion in funding boosts in the forward years. When I look back on the establishment of the Living Longer Living Better legislation, there was bipartisan support but insufficient planning for the level of resourcing needed to meet the needs of older Australians. In delivering better access to care, home care packages will rise from 87,000 to 151,000 with the rollout of an additional 14,000 high-level packages—real packages, real money. There will be $40 million to support aged-care providers in regional, rural and remote Australia for building and maintenance works—real money. There will be $105 million to improve access to culturally safe aged-care services in remote Indigenous communities. There will be 14,000 residential beds and short-term restorative care places made available, and that process is rolling out. Plus, there will be a $60 million capital investment to improve the facilities and provide the infrastructure required. And there will be investment in an additional viability supplement for regional and remote providers.

The second tranche is delivering better quality of care. There will be a new Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. There will be $32.6 million for intensified risk profiling and compliance management to reduce the impact on senior Australians within aged care. There will be $50 million for residential aged-care providers to transition to the new quality standards. With Better Ageing, we're providing over $100 million to enhance mental health services for older Australians. There will be $22.9 million in grant programs to encourage increased physical activity in older Australians to enable their bodies to be mobile and resilient, have good muscle tone and also have musculoskeletal support.

When people talk about the list, they forget that it is a range of packages. Previously, people applying for a place within residential care would list their names with a number of providers. That has been the history in the provision of packages and places. Often, people didn't hear back. What we provide is an increase in the number of places that senior Australians will access, but they're supported by the Commonwealth Home Support Program—1.3 million Australians. On that list of 104,000, 51 per cent are in receipt of a range of services that wrap around and meet their needs. What we're not going to do is sit and wait and listen to the criticisms that come from the other side. The $5.5 billion allocated over the forward years is real money for programs that are designed to keep Australians healthy in the first instance and to provide the packages of choice so that people can either live within their home or in a residential aged-care facility—or some have moved into retirement villages, where they live out their years enjoying both the support of the packages and the services that are needed.

Emma McBride (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The hoax perpetrated on older Australians by the Turnbull government in this year's budget is shameful. The 14,000 additional home care packages over three years announced in the budget does not come close to meeting the growing demand. What's worse is that the money taken to fund these home care packages has come from residential care funding as there is no more money in the budget for aged care—not a single dollar. We have over 100,000 older Australians waiting for home care. We have a waiting list that grew by 20,000 in six months. And what was the government's response? It was 14,000 packages to be released over three years.

I was first touched by this as a young pharmacist, when I visited a psychiatric aged-care facility. I walked in, was struck by the misery and had to walk out and walk back in again. Improvements have been made in my 20 years working with residential aged care as a pharmacist, but much more needs to be done. How does the Turnbull government think these families are going to manage while they wait—in some cases for a year and, in 300 cases, more than two years—for the support they urgently need? This leaves vulnerable people at risk. These are people like my late father, who lived with young onset dementia. He was at risk of falls, at risk of poor nutrition, at risk of missed medication—and, as a pharmacist, that particularly bothers me—at risk of missed medical appointments and at risk of loneliness and isolation. These risks are avoidable; if only the government would help families as they juggle the needs of their partner, mother, father, brother, sister or friend while trying to keep up with work or study or family or to just get by.

Then there are those older Australians who have no support at all, and there are many in our community on the Central Coast. On the Central Coast of New South Wales, we are an older population. One in five of us is aged over 65 and one in six of us, or 19,000 people, are employed in health care and social assistance. It's the biggest employer on the coast. It's where I worked for 10 years as a pharmacist in Wyong Hospital. Aged care matters on the Central Coast. I have previously told this House that on the Central Coast we have 750 people waiting for home care packages. That's people and families in urgent need and waiting right now. About two-thirds of those waiting have high needs. Many are living with dementia. Many need palliative care. Older people, people with high needs, people with dementia and their families cannot wait a year or two or more for the help that they need. They need it right now. Where is the urgency from the minister to address this crisis in communities?

Last week I spoke at a forum on the Central Coast organised by the Health Services Union, my union, called 'Our Turn To Care'. About 100 people rallied at the Central Coast Leagues Club to call for proper funding for aged-care services and better pay and conditions for the aged-care workers who care for them. We heard stories from aged-care workers that were just shocking—for example, that they had been told to wait until a person's incontinence pad was 70 per cent wet before it could be changed; that they were only allowed one pair of gloves per shift because a second pair would be too costly; and that the money spent on food per person per day in an aged-care facility is sometimes just $6.

Later in the week I attended an event at the Erina shopping centre called 'Celebrating Ageing Central Coast—valuing your wisdom, experience and knowledge' with the member for Robertson, Lucy Wicks, who is in the chamber. It was organised by the NSW Elder Abuse Helpline & Resource Unit to celebrate ageing but also to put a spotlight on the important issue of elder abuse. I have seen the most severe forms of elder abuse while working in mental health inpatient units. The World Health Organization reports that one in 10 older people experience elder abuse and most of it is perpetrated by family members. Elder abuse is real and, sadly, it happens in our communities. Sometimes it's obvious—a grandparent being pushed into residential care so their family home can be sold—and sometimes it is invisible to others until a bank account dwindles and there's no money left to buy food or pay the electricity bill. As I mentioned, as a pharmacist at Wyong Hospital, I worked in the inpatient mental health units for 10 years and saw the most severe forms of elder abuse against older people living with major mental illness and against the parents of adult children with major mental illness. There are legal protections in place but we must do more.

Older Australians deserve quality care, dignity and respect. They are our mums and our dads. They are our grandmas and our grandpas. The Turnbull government must fix the home care crisis now. It is urgent. Older Australians and their families can't wait any longer. The government must come clean with the Australian people on the hoax it has perpetrated. There is no new money for aged care in this budget. Money for home care will come from residential care and services will inevitably be cut. The Turnbull government stands condemned for the aged-care crisis of its making. It must act now. It must act with urgency. It must act with compassion. It has to help people in need now.

Lucy Wicks (Robertson, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak very briefly on this most important issue that the member for Franklin has raised, but I will not be supporting the motion, because the reality is that this government is delivering a record investment in aged care, supporting older Australians with more choice and delivering better access to quality care, particularly in my electorate of Robertson on the New South Wales Central Coast, where we have a growing ageing population and where aged care is absolutely a priority for this government. Our record on this issue speaks for itself. Since the election of the coalition government, aged-care spending has increased by an average of more than six per cent each year.

Our 2018-19 budget, which was handed down last month, outlined our plan for a stronger economy and it outlined our plan to ensure that older Australians are supported. For the more than 30,000 older Australians in my electorate of Robertson on the New South Wales Central Coast, we have outlined a strong plan to be able to deliver real support for the older Australians who have given so much to our community and to our nation and who have really helped over their lifetimes, individually and as a group, to help make the Central Coast the very best region in the very best country in the world. We outlined that we're delivering an additional 20,000 home care packages, 13,500 residential places and the largest ever single increase to mental health funding for older Australians. Under the coalition's comprehensive and fully-funded aged-care plan, the number of high-level home care packages will actually rise by 86 per cent to 74,000 over the next five years. Over the last couple of weeks I have been visiting a number of places around the Central Coast and speaking with senior Australians and aged-care service providers. I have heard very comprehensively how these increases, and what we are doing to help our senior Australians, are very much welcomed on the Central Coast. For the more than 30,000 older Australians in my electorate of Robertson on the New South Wales Central Coast, we have outlined our plan and we are delivering real support for them.

The member for Franklin spoke about the wait times for aged-care packages. But let's not forget that under Labor the waiting list was actually hidden from public view. Under Labor, we didn't even know how many older Australians were on the waiting list. In February 2017, it was actually this government that introduced measures to help make the list more transparent and totally visible for the first time. In relation to older Australians who are waiting in the queue, almost half are already receiving interim care, which is good; and a majority of older Australians on this list receive support services through our record investment in the Commonwealth Home Support Program, which includes vital services such as Meals on Wheels.

In closing, I wish to underline an important fact: this government is focused on guaranteeing the essential services for older Australians to ensure they have more choice—whether that be in aged care, in staying home longer or in having access to the support they need.

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to put on record my comments in relation to the member for Franklin's motion. I've said it here before and I'll say it again: we cannot trust the Turnbull government to deliver a pizza, let alone meaningful action for the more than 100,000 older Australians who are waiting for home care packages. You only have to look at this out-of-touch government's budget handed down last month to see that those opposite will never truly understand how to put the best interests of older Australians front and centre. Axing the energy supplement and making Australians work until they're 70 are a couple of the things on their hit list. This government has not allocated a single extra dollar for Australia's aged-care system in this year's budget. More than 14,000 age pensioners live in my electorate of Lindsay, and they deserve better than what this government is serving up. It is an absolute disgrace that the average wait time for high-level home-care packages will soar this year. It is an absolute disgrace that this government wants to take $550 a year from pensioners through their energy supplements. The Turnbull government has legislation coming through that will see older Australians having to work until they are 70 before they can get the age pension. It is an absolute disgrace that this government wants to take $1.3 billion from pensioners through concessions that help them with important things like dealing with the continuously rising costs of living—that will be going—while it gives $80 billion in corporate tax breaks to those who need it least.

This government is waging a war on older Australians. The shambles in access to aged-care home packages is symptomatic of this government's out-of-touch and problematic approach to our most vulnerable Australians. This government thinks that 3½ thousand places a year to deal with the increasing demand is enough. The government thinks that funding just 14,000 aged-care packages is enough to deal with a backlog that has already climbed to 200,000 in just six months. We are facing an aged-care crisis, and the Turnbull government can no longer ignore the problem by looking the other way. Older Australians deserve to be cared for and invested in. We need to do everything we can to ensure they are supported in the later years of their lives. Older Australians are some of the most vulnerable members of our communities and they cannot afford this government's inaction on the matter.

I call on the Minister for Aged Care to release the latest round of data on the wait list for home care packages and to be honest with us all and what we are really dealing with. We have already waited a fortnight, and older Australians have already waited that time as well. Frankly, we are sick of waiting. The government needs to be held to account and answer why there have been billions of dollars in funding cuts to the aged-care instrument and funding cuts to residential aged care. The government needs to be held to account for its blatant dishonesty by claiming to champion aged care and then turning around and defunding it. Not only did the government's budget not add up and underdeliver but it was also extremely dishonest and underhanded. The aged-care minister couldn't even guarantee older Australians that their circumstances would improve or that their voices are heard, stating:

It'll be the status quo for a short period of time and then we'll start to look at a range of other interventions that will reduce that list.

I ask him: when will that occur? The aged-care minister has simply resigned both himself and older Australians who are depending on home care packages to accept the status quo and vague promises of interventions, which the government has refused to outline thus far. The Turnbull-Abbott government, or the Turnbull government, or whoever is running the show on the other side these days, has slashed and has continued to cut billions of dollars from aged care and is responsible for the growing waiting lists for in-home care. How can this government justify funding $80 billion in tax cuts for the big end of town, including $17 billion for the big-bank fat cats, while stripping funding away from some of our most vulnerable Australians?

The aged-care budget—and we've analysed it—will hurt older Australians. The government has created the aged-care crisis, has continued to ignore the aged-care crisis and is putting our oldest Australians at risk. If the government fails to act, we will see not only the material impact on older Australians but also the mental impact on older Australians from the stress and anxiety that the government created with its failure to fix the crisis of its own making. The government has a proven track record of cutting funding and underinvesting in aged care. Only a Labor government will fight to make sure that older Australians get their fair share. Labor will give older Australians a fair go and will make sure they are supported and looked after in their later years. The Turnbull government needs to act and act now. It can no longer stick its head in the sand and ignore the aged-care crisis of their own making.

Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is nothing more concrete than the fact that each one of us adds a birthday number on the anniversary of our arrival on this planet. The recent issue of 50 Somethingquoted a point articulated by the Aged Care Workforce Strategy Taskforce: 'How we care for our ageing is a reflection of who we are as a nation.' Ageing is changing. Our attitudes to growing older are more about doing it gracefully with friends, with activities and with good-quality support, not just having a system of putting people in an institution and making sure they're comfortable. Aged care in our regions has always been a bit of a problem and we'll be addressing that. I wonder sometimes if some speakers have been to an aged-care facility, because the problems that exist now didn't happen overnight; they've been developing for years and years and years, and we are addressing it.

We're putting in an extra 14,000 new home care packages. Our funding is growing from $18 billion in 2017-18 to $23 billion in 2021-22. That's an additional $86 billion—not less, not reduced but additional. We're delivering an additional 20,000 high-level home care packages—that's in total—plus 13,500 residential places. That is the largest ever single increase to mental health funding for older Australians, which, as we all know, is becoming a much more significant problem. Over the next four years, aged-care funding is up, the number of home care packages is up and the number of residential aged-care places is up, particularly in regional areas.

My concern has been about how we get the priority listing for people to get into an aged-care place. The aged-care approval round announced recently by the Deputy Prime Minister, Michael McCormack, and our aged-care minister, Ken Wyatt, was really welcome. They're going to get those places and will get an additional 775 respite places. There's an additional $5 billion budget boost for aged care. We'll be getting applications for this special process after 2 July. That is fantastic news for the regions and will help to accelerate the process. We absolutely need to have everybody included in this process.

One of my aged-care facilities recently said that part of the problem for them is that the assessment sometimes needs to be done online, so we need a process—and some of my aged-care providers are already doing this—to assist clients to go online, go through the process and help them work out what their aged-care level and needs are. In the beginning some people might say, 'I can do that,' but in fact it is somebody else who helps them get dressed or prepares their Meals on Wheels food. They need a level of care that's a little higher. But, because we're Aussies, we like to be independent. We don't always say, 'I need this, this and this'. We like to be independent. Our scheme is to try and keep them as independent as possible but make sure we're addressing the fact that there are hidden needs—needs that have been hidden because we've been so strong.

In the past we had 'Mediscare', then 'wages scare', and now we're getting 'bed-care scare'. In Labor's 2010 budget, they ripped $9 million out of aged care and booked the savings. In the 2011-12 budget, they ripped another $211.7 million out of aged care. In 2012-13, Labor cut residential care places. We are now seeing the outcome of all those cuts. We're putting a significant amount of money into long-term reforms and a costed plan to support older Australians. It's costed and funded. It's going through the budget. Thanks to this boost, we're going to have an 86 per cent increase over five years. Some will say there are waiting lists and queues. That's not surprising when we're developing a world-class care system for an increasing demographic sector. Almost half of those in the queue are already receiving interim care. Offering them high-level packages through the release of additional high-level packages will free up their existing package for somebody else.

My office is often approached for assistance in this process, because it is a fairly difficult one to navigate. We've always had a positive outcome. I say to the people of Gilmore: you're still more than welcome to come back to my office at any time and we'll assist you to navigate this system, get the best possible outcome for your care to retain your independence and to make sure you're having the best possible life.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing and Mental Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's great to be able to speak to this motion, because I've been talking in this place for some time about how the government has mishandled aged care in this country. We are seeing a crisis in aged care on this government's watch. To have the minister come in here this morning, after five years in government, three ministers and billions of dollars ripped out of aged care, trying to blame the Labor Party, when we haven't been in government for five years, is astounding.

There were 100,000 people waiting for home care as at the end of December. I am sure that there are many more, but the government hasn't released the figures to the end of March. Those figures are now well overdue. In estimates we heard that the department thinks they may be with the minister's office. When was estimates? It was at least three weeks ago. I wonder why these figures have been delayed and what they look like? We know that 20,000 people were added to that waiting list in the last six months of last year. The question for the government today is: what is the current figure? How many older Australians are today waiting for care in their own home? We don't know the answer, because several months on from December the government has yet to release the figures. Why hasn't the government released the figures? What is it hiding? How many people is it trying to move off that list? That's exactly what I think's going on here: the minister's office and the minister are sitting there trying to knock off the list people who have been waiting for care and who should be on the list.

We heard the government's own admission that it hadn't done enough in the last budget. We had the government try and pretend that it's got 20,000 new packages and then have to admit it's only 14,000, including the other 6,000 it made available late last year in October. We know that 14,000 over four years isn't going to make a dent. This government came in here on budget night and pretended that it had done something amazing in aged care, but we saw not one extra dollar over the forwards than was already in the budget. Not one extra dollar is being spent in aged care, when we have over 100,000 older Australians waiting for home care in this country.

It is a disgrace, and the government should be ashamed that it's out there trying to pull the wool over the eyes of older Australians, pretending that it's done something when it has not. It is not okay to try and pretend to older Australians and their families, who are very stressed, looking for support for their older parents. These families are ringing my office and other offices every day, saying, 'When can I get a home care package for my mum or my dad?' They are desperate. For the government to pretend that it is doing something is just appalling. It is appalling and it is a cruel hoax on older Australians, their families and their loved ones.

In the February estimates we saw that there are around 300 people on the waiting list who have been waiting for longer than two years—two years with no care, waiting for a home care package! We have people ringing up my office nearly every week who have been on that list for over a year. The government's own website says the current wait time for a level 3 or 4 package is over 12 months. We're not sure what 'over 12 months' means—how long over—but we know people who have been waiting considerable time frames. When you're getting people in their 90s contacting you to say, 'The government's put me on a waiting list, and I have to wait at least 12 months,' that is not good enough. We all know what's going to happen to those older people, particularly those in their 90s, who are at home, waiting for care.

What happens? You have family members who have to pick up that care. They have to come home from work early or not go to work. We've had older people turning up in emergency rooms well before they should because they could not get the care at home. It's having an effect on hospital wait times in emergency departments and it's having an effect on ambulance call-outs. These old people should be receiving the care in their home that they deserve and have been assessed and approved for, but this government will not fund their packages. Over 100,000 older Australians are today still waiting for their package, despite the budget and despite what this government says. It's about time this government did something about it.

Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian Labor Party is morally bankrupt. Those opposite are morally bankrupt. The strategy that they have clearly employed is twofold when it comes to older Australians. No. 1: they lie; No. 2, they tax them. Lie and tax, lie and tax, lie and tax—that's Labor's strategy. I think the two pillars of this strategy go hand in hand, because the trick of the Labor Party is to create crises that don't exist. It's the old look-over-here strategy: generate such concern, such anxiety, in older Australians and put their focus elsewhere, on a problem that does not exist, so that the Labor Party can pick their pockets with higher taxes.

Indeed, this is precisely what we are seeing with the Shorten-led opposition, and it is a disgrace. We saw it last federal election with the 'Mediscare' campaign, which those opposite have laughed at every time it's been mentioned in this House because they know it was based on a lie. I put to them: how many older Australians bought into that lie? How many older Australians with heart problems, age problems and loneliness sat in their living rooms and believed Labor's lies? How many of them felt as though they were under threat? How many people in the seat of Longman, up in Queensland, are believing the outright lies of the Labor Party about less federal government funding for hospitals? It's an outright lie; the facts tell the opposite story. How many people are tuned in to this debate? How many older Australians are listening yet again to Labor's lies and being affected by them?

They do this unashamedly. They enter this House and they communicate to the public and they generate fear and anxiety among older Australians based on nothing—lies and tax. If we look at the facts, in 2010-11 $9 million was cut from aged care under the Labor Party. The next year, 2011-12, the Labor Party cut $200 million from aged care—

Ms Collins interjecting—

And they think it's funny, if you hear the laughter from across the House. In 2012-13, $135 million was cut, and I do not see the humour in it. If you are going to rip the guts out of aged care and then go on the attack and try to create fear campaigns based on nothing, then you shouldn't be entering this House.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I remind the member for Fairfax to direct his remarks through the chair.

Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I shall indeed. I shall direct my remarks through the chair.

Indeed, those lies and those taxes that are the focus of the Labor Party are in direct contrast with the performance of the Turnbull government, where home care packages are up, residential places are up and every year funding for aged care is up. Since the coalition government was elected, aged-care spending has increased by an average of more than six per cent each year. That is, on average, $1 billion of extra support for older Australians each year. More than 1.3 million older Australians are accessing some form of support in the Commonwealth aged-care sector. The Turnbull government is providing record aged-care funding of $19.8 billion in 2018-19. Did the Labor Party ever provide such funding in government? The heads opposite are down, Deputy Speaker, because the facts tell the truth.

The coalition government respects the dignity and is responding to the needs of older Australians. There is not a crisis. Older Australians need not be suffering anxiety from the fear that the Labor Party is trying to engender. Funding to aged care continues to grow with this government, with ongoing investment. It's for that reason that I'm very happy to reject their lies and their taxes and support the federal government. (Time expired)

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next day of sitting.