Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this matter of public importance: the crisis in aged care caused by Minister Colbeck's failure to listen to warning after warning and to have a COVID-19 plan for aged care, instead responding to the pandemic with self-congratulation and hubris, turning his back on scrutiny and dismissing deaths by neglect as a function of aged care.

Firstly, let me acknowledge the incredible tragedy that's facing families across the country—the significant number of deaths in aged-care facilities, with more than 450 older Australians having died, in either residential aged care or other aged-care settings, as a result of COVID-19. I remind those opposite that we are talking about real people, not numbers in a report. These were Australians with families, friends, memories and stories of lives lived, who contributed to our society—people like Maria Rukavina, the little girl who hid in a haystack from enemy troops and survived World War II and who passed away on the other side of the world. She was a resident of St Basil's Homes for the Aged and she died of COVID-19. People like Maria and her family deserve our respect and care.

First Nations people look at our old people as our elders. They are our elders: they are the carriers of our stories, our families' stories, our culture and our kin, passed down from generation to generation. I want to tell the Senate about one elder, Ms Numamurdirdi, a traditional owner from Numbulwar, who, since March 2018, lived in residential aged care in Darwin 800 kilometres from her home. She was one of 52 witnesses who gave evidence to the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety when it was in Darwin in July last year. Ms Numamurdirdi was supported to give evidence by her doctor, Dr Meredith Hansen-Knarhoi, a general practitioner with Danila Dilba Health Service, an Aboriginal community controlled organisation providing primary health care and community services in Darwin and the surrounding areas. She told the commission it was difficult for Ms Numamurdirdi to maintain contact with her family in Numbulwar, on the far eastern side of the Northern Territory. It took some months to arrange a mobile phone for her, and, despite exploring options, it was not possible at all over that period of time for Ms Numamurdirdi to return to Numbulwar. In a video statement to the royal commission in July, Ms Numamurdirdi described how she felt living away from her family and country. These are her words:

My heart is crying because I far away from my family… Because if I pass away here, I've got my spirit, my culture, my ceremony way back… at home and my family, they don't want that way, because we've got everything there in the home. And if we pass away, culture there, our spirit. That is my family, because I'm the eldest out of my family and that's my mother land Numbulwar.

Sadly, Ms Numamurdirdi passed away not too long ago. She was not able to return to her country of Numbulwar. When elders and older people are away from country it doesn't just affect the individual; it has consequences for families and communities, who miss out on being the recipients of cultural knowledge. Why do I share this story with the Senate? Because it's about aged care. It's about the care of our elders right across Australia—not just in southern Australia but right across this country. The responsibility for all our aged care across Australia comes right back here to this parliament. Indeed, it is Australia as a whole that suffers when that knowledge of our elders is gone.

Ms Olga Havnen, the Chief Executive Officer of Danila Dilba Health Service, told the commission in Darwin:

The point I really want to emphasize is that Aboriginal people have by far the most complex health conditions, complex level of needs and who actually receive the least level of service, and these things are not new. We have talked about it for decades…

One of the things we were incredibly concerned about and still are, certainly in northern Australia and the Northern Territory, is the impact of COVID-19 and the possible impact of COVID-19 on our First Nations people. Just like our elders, the First Nations people have been considered one of the most vulnerable groups in our community. I raise this issue with the Senate because, again, aged care is the responsibility of the Commonwealth government. We have a minister here who has not talked about a report from that royal commission which these members of the Northern Territory constituency gave evidence to. This minister, Senator Colbeck, could not even remember if he took that report titled Neglect into the cabinet to talk about it with the Morrison government and the cabinet ministers. That report came down in October 2019. These constituents in the Northern Territory gave passionate evidence about the failings of the aged-care system. This parliament was given notice back in October 2019.

But that's go back even a few more years before that, to the database of workers. That report about aged care and the workforce sat on the desks of our Prime Minister and his fellow ministers. They were warned about the failings in the aged-care system, and today is about facing the reckoning and the responsibility, or lack thereof, of this minister. The royal commission heard about the stark challenges faced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in terms of poverty, food insecurity, difficulties in accessing services, lack of culturally safe and secure services and the distances from services. The Neglect report found that the aged-care system fails to meet the need of older, vulnerable citizens. Read that report!

It impacts, even now, as every single day goes by. It found that the aged-care sector does not deliver uniformly safe and quality care. It's unkind and uncaring towards older people and, in too many instances, it neglects them. For those in the sector, this is not new; this is something they've been talking about for decades, and yet the Morrison government has chosen to ignore the royal commission that the Prime Minister set up. It has ignored the warnings from experts and unions and it has ignored the warnings from the tragedies already experienced at Dorothy Henderson Lodge and Newmarch House. This is a system that puts profit above people.

The truth is that after seven years of neglect, Australia's aged-care system was broken long before COVID-19. The Morrison government is in charge of aged care: the Morrison government regulates aged care and it funds aged care. And the Morrison government has the legislation which determines the quality of the aged care that older Australians get in this country. When Mr Morrison was the Treasurer he cut $1.7 billion from aged-care providers. The Aged Care portfolio has churned through seven ministers over seven years—Minister Andrews, Minister Fifield, Minister Morrison, Minister Ley, Minister Wyatt, Minister Hunt and Minister Colbeck. If things are not working—if systems are not working—the Morrison government is ultimately responsible for this. The buck stops with the Prime Minister.

The Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians, Senator Colbeck, has admitted that the federal government has no idea about how many aged-care employees are working across multiple sites, despite the serious risks of this issue. This is critical to preventing the spread of infection. The aged-care workforce is casualised, insufficiently remunerated and has no entitlement to paid sick leave. It means that workers work in multiple aged-care centres. The minister has also admitted that the Morrison government's regulator ceased unannounced visits to aged-care homes at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. This minister needs to go. He needs to take responsibility and go.