Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the statement.

Maybe you should stay and listen to what the Senate has to say, Minister Colbeck. As of yesterday there were 353 Australians in residential aged care who had died from COVID-19, and today it's more than 360. It is a disgrace that this minister leaves the chamber when the parliament is taking note of his statement. I hope all Australian see how he just turned his back on his accountability and responsibility in this parliament and did not have the honour and principle to stay and listen.

There were 353 dead as of yesterday, 360 dead as of today and more than 1,100 active cases. These numbers tell a tragic story. They are not just numbers. Behind each of these is a story of heartache, grief and trauma experienced by the families, children, grandchildren, siblings and friends of each and every one of these older Australians who has died. Now, it is true: we are in the grips of a global pandemic. And there are some who would suggest, like the government, these deaths are unavoidable. But we would be betraying our duty if we blindly accepted that argument. We would be blindly betraying our duty to the more than 360 Australians who have died and their loved ones, we would be betraying our duty to the 200,000 Australians in aged care and we would be betraying our duty to those who put themselves at risk every day to care for them. You see, this was avoidable. It was foreseeable and it was anticipated. Senator Colbeck said today that this has been the government's highest priority. That is demonstrably untrue. You see, Senator Colbeck was warned. He knew aged care was in crisis before COVID hit. Just as they had been warned before the bushfires last summer, this Morrison government has had warning after warning after warning on aged care.

There was the interim report of the royal commission, entitled Neglect; the warnings from experts and from unions representing workers in aged-care homes; the tragic events at Dorothy Henderson Lodge and Newmarch House earlier this year; the warnings from his own backbenchers; and the lessons from his own government's report in March and in June. So, just as in the bushfires, the failure to act on these warnings—that minister's failure, this government's failure—has left devastating consequences for Australians. Instead of acting on these warnings, Senator Colbeck comes into this place and denies the premise of almost every question. He comes into this place and he claims to have done his job by holding a webinar and doing some mail-outs. Worse still, he comes into this place and talks about the Morrison government's performance as a high watermark—a high-water mark! What that demonstrates is how profoundly amoral, how profoundly dishonourable the heart of this government is, and what it reveals is this government's continued preference for self-congratulation over action under Scott Morrison. It's the arrogance and hubris that the counsel assisting the royal commission spoke of. It is dishonourable and it is unprincipled. This minister abdicates responsibility, and the cost of his failure is borne by hundreds of grieving Australian families who are still trying to come to terms with immeasurable tragedy.

But there is one notable action this government has taken in relation to aged care and that is to defund it. As Treasurer, Mr Morrison cut almost $2 billion from the aged-care budget, and the results of that action, the consequences, are being seen today. In fact, it was one of their own, Mr Broadbent, who said it was a disaster waiting to happen. He went on to say his warnings, too, were 'ignored completely'. Tragically, all the other warnings that the Morrison government has received were also ignored completely. The royal commission heard this:

… in the crucial months between the Newmarch House outbreak in April and mid-June a degree of self-congratulation and even hubris was displayed by the Commonwealth Government.

The government was too business with boasting, too busy making announcements—just as Mr Morrison still is this week—to actually care that their job was not done.

It's obvious that they sat on the reports, because those reports made clear the consequences of government action, or failure to act, and made clear the consequences of the government's actions to cut nearly $2 billion from aged care. Every day this week, before and after his disastrous committee performance, Australians have seen the horrifying death toll climb, and that is a consequence of budget cuts. It is a consequence of ignored warnings, and it is a consequence of incompetence by this government and, specifically, this minister.

All of us have heard harrowing stories of severe neglect. Brendan from Victoria, whom we spoke about yesterday, said his 94-year-old mother, removed from her room after testing positive for COVID-19, was found not to have been showered for four days due to staffing shortages. Elizabeth, also from Victoria, said hospital doctors found her mother also had a secondary chest infection and a UTI, in addition to COVID, and she had been left in soiled nappies for hours—on many occasions, for the whole day.

These are the people we are supposed to be representing in this place today. These are the people who need a voice. This minister seeks today to dismiss this debate as political. Well, I have a human question of my fellow senators, a question for all of you: would any of you want your loved ones to be in Senator Colbeck's care? When we look at Senator Colbeck's performance in the Senate, when we look at his performance in the Senate select committee, when we look at his performance as a minister, that is the question. Would you trust your parents, your grandparents, your aunts or uncles, your brothers or sisters, your wives or husbands to Senator Colbeck's care? If not, why would you expect other Australians to trust their loved ones to his care? Why would you accept a Prime Minister forcing Australians to put their elderly loved ones into Senator Colbeck's care? It is that's simple. If you wouldn't want him to be in charge of the care of your loved one, why do you expect others to want that?

We know this Prime Minister. Although he is too stubborn to sack Senator Colbeck, he knows he can't fix this mess. We know that because just this week the Prime Minister cut Senator Colbeck out of the emergency response decision-making. Consider that for a minute. Mr Morrison has so little confidence in this minister that he's taken him out of the decision-making process. So I say to this government: if even Mr Morrison knows that Senator Richard Colbeck isn't up to the job, why should any of us expect Australians to believe that he is? The fact is that Senator Richard Colbeck has lost the confidence of the parliament, he has lost the confidence of the public, and he has to go.