Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to contribute to this debate on a matter of public importance. It needs to be put on the record, unambiguously, that the Australian government does not in any way support or condone or seek to downplay the significance of the kind of neglect and maladministration which Senator McLucas referred to in her speech. Clearly, what has occurred at Belvedere Park Nursing Home is unacceptable and an example of practices which should form no part in the aged-care industry. Although we can agree on that much, Senator McLucas has attempted in this debate to employ, by implication, the argument that, first of all, there is a more widespread problem than there is at places like Belvedere Park and previously at Kenilworth—another facility operated by the same operators; both of them have now been closed down by the federal government—in the broader aged-care industry in Australia. That is a matter which Senator McLucas, with great respect, has not established, and she can only attempt to do so by using an extremely broadbrush approach to tar many other, reputable operators with the actions and omissions of Belvedere Park.

She also suggested that this government has failed by not being aware of the issues going on at Belvedere Park and has failed to act on them. Today in this debate I want to comprehensively indicate that that is simply not the case. Since the connection between Belvedere Park and Kenilworth became evident to the Department of Health and Ageing because of an overlap in persons involved in both organisations, comprehensive steps have been taken by the federal government to ensure that an extremely close eye is being kept on Belvedere Park. I want to outline some of those steps.

It is worth acknowledging, first of all, that the government needs to operate in the context of the administration of the law with respect to aged-care facilities. The laws have been greatly strengthened in the last few years by virtue of reforms undertaken by this government to ensure that higher standards are in place in Australian aged-care facilities—standards which could not have been applied before because there were no such laws underpinning those standards. But, despite that, the government has faced the battle of enforcing standards when there are rights built into laws, appropriately, for persons affected by government decisions to appeal to courts.

I want to come back to the issue that, by implication, Senator McLucas is raising—that the government and its agencies, particularly the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency, must somehow accept responsibility for attempting to enforce standards in respect of these areas and being knocked back by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal on a number of occasions.