Kay Patterson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Whenever Labor get up and talk about aged care, their concerns and their tears are crocodile tears; their comments are nothing short of hollow and hypocritical. All you have to do is look back at Labor’s record on aged care, and it was nothing short of disgraceful. Senator McLucas talks about taxpayers not thinking that our system is worth the money they are paying. Let me tell you: they were very critical of Labor’s record. When they had the Gregory report back in 1994, it found that 13 per cent of nursing homes did not meet relevant fire authority standards. That is what Senator McLucas is complaining about now. Thirteen per cent of nursing homes then did not meet relevant fire authority standards; 11 per cent of nursing homes did not meet the relevant health authority standards; 70 per cent of nursing homes did not meet the relevant outcome standards; and 51 per cent of nursing home residents were living in rooms with three or more beds. That was the state of nursing home care when we came into government. I visited nursing home after nursing home and I saw situations that were totally unacceptable and intolerable.

The then minister, Mrs Bishop, when she took over aged care, closed 200 nursing homes. When I was shadow minister for aged care I used to lie awake at night worrying about how you would actually close nursing homes, accommodate those people while you closed them, find somewhere for them to go and relocate them. But she did it, with 200 of them. How many did Labor close before that? A big, fat zero—none. They were just full of empty rhetoric. There was no action and no substance. The Prime Minister mentioned that just today about their new leader—all style and no substance. They were all style and no substance then and they are all style and no substance today. They come in here criticising what we have done and the enormous changes that we have put into aged care and they fail to look at their record, as I said, of 13 per cent of their nursing homes failing to meet relevant fire authority standards and the other standards I listed.

What have we done? Under a number of ministers, we have put into place a certification process to ensure that aged care homes reach specific building standards. We have introduced a complaints resolution scheme and a free call number so that, if any resident, family member or staff member has a concern or complaint, it can be raised anonymously. We introduced the position of the Commissioner for Complaints, who has a role in mediating and negotiating outcomes as a result of complaints. We have required aged care facilities to meet these high standards and we have actually publicised those that do not. We have made people aware of when nursing homes fail to comply.

In addition, what we have seen is the creation of a role for a new aged care commissioner, an Office for Aged Care Quality and Compliance, a rigorous new complaints investigation procedure, compulsory reporting of abuse and legal protections for whistleblowers. What we have seen is Minister Santo Santoro taking very quick action when we saw the totally unacceptable abuse of some older people in nursing homes, particularly the sexual abuse of older people in nursing homes. He actually instituted additional funding to monitor this. But we never hear Labor talk about that.

When I was shadow minister and we saw the introduction of a bond for hostels and then the building and upgrading of hostels, I gave credit to Labor where credit was due. I always criticised them where criticism was due, but I always gave them credit. We never once hear the shadow minister come in here and say anything about the enormous changes we have put in place—the innovative programs, the new transition care programs for older people going from nursing homes to hostels and the programs to establish additional places outside of aged care facilities when people want to live in their own homes so they have choice about ageing in place. They do not talk about the new measures for strengthening accommodation bonds paid by older people to make sure that those are protected. None of those positive things are mentioned. They do not talk about dementia being made a national priority. Labor can only criticise. Labor is all about style and nothing about substance.