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

My question is to the Prime Minister. On 2 February, when more than 500 people had already died of COVID in aged care this year and residents were being left without food and water, the minister for aged care services said the system was functioning 'exceptionally well'. Today in the other place he's again refused to say the system is in crisis. Why has the Prime Minister not sacked this minister?

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll ask the minister for aged care to add to my answer. As I remarked in response to a question earlier today from the Leader of the Opposition, this pandemic is taking a heavy toll on the entire world and on Australia. In particular, our most vulnerable and our frailest are in the most vulnerable of all positions. I think we all understand that. While I know international comparisons provide no comfort to those who have lost loved ones, we do know that the outbreaks in Canada, for example, are around 13 times greater than what we see in this country. We do know that Australia's fatality rate is one of the lowest in the world, certainly amongst the OECD countries. We do know that the investments that we have made—the changing of close contact rules and the investment in the boosted wage payments of aged care workers, including those working in non-care settings—are all assisting the sector to deal with a big challenge. But those who pretend that the pandemic can have no impact are misleading Australians and are diminishing the scale of what is a very difficult challenge. I will ask the minister for aged care to add further to my answer.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I recognise that this has been a very challenging time for many people in aged care in Australia and, of course, around the world. In particular, over the course of the summer we've been working very closely with our aged-care facilities, and we have dispatched over 48 million units of PPE in 2022 alone. That includes a total now of 10.9 million rapid antigen tests to aged-care facilities, which commenced in August of last year, and it has included over 6.7 million this year.

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

A point of order, Mr Speaker. The Prime Minister and the minister have now had two minutes to go to the point of this question, which is about the incompetence of the minister for aged-care services. Could they please address that key part of the question?

Andrew Wallace (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hotham would know that the question was directed at, in effect, the state of the aged-care sector, and the minister for health is being directly relevant.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In terms of the specific response to support the aged-care sector, which I would hope is the real concern of every person in this House, there have been 14.8 million units of masks, 17.5 million units of gloves, 5.9 million units of gowns and 3.9 million units of goggles. All of these are real actions that have been taken to support that sector. In addition to that, the changed furlough requirements were fundamental to ensuring continuity of workforce, in both the definition of a close contact and the capacity in critical sectors such as aged care for asymptomatic close contacts to work. That's been backed up by 80,000 shifts which have been put in place by the government and, in addition, the support for workforce retention and now the ADF.