Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

HER ( — ) ( ): I move:

That the Senate take note of the statement.

I thank the Leader of the Government in the Senate for providing that speech this morning. Despite what Senator Birmingham said, the picture we paint is an accurate picture of what's happening in aged care at the moment. We have an aged-care system that is broken. We have an aged-care system that is in crisis. We have an aged-care system where it cannot be guaranteed at the moment that elderly people living in residential aged care are receiving the quality of care that they deserve. There are too many stories of neglect. There are too many stories of people who have lost loved ones—mums and dads and grandparents and, in some cases, younger people living in residential aged care—in terrible circumstances that will devastate those families and those individuals for years to come, if not forever.

This isn't the fault of the staff who work in the aged-care sector. There are not enough of them. They don't get paid enough. You can't retain them because they can get better pay outside the sector. The providers support this view. It's not us sitting here politicking; this is the snapshot of aged care at the moment. I know the minister knows that, because he will be getting the same emails and the same correspondence that we are getting—awful stories of what is currently happening in aged care.

I know the government wants to say, 'Well, it's omicron,' or, 'Well, it's COVID.' While COVID has stressed the system, it's not the cause of the broken system we have. That has been years in the making. We've had 22 reports and a royal commission with an interim report titled Neglect. We've had a Treasurer, now Prime Minister, who cut funding from aged care when we were in a world of 'a surplus at any cost', despite the fact that it was going to hurt elderly Australians. When we were living in that world and that political reality, that's what the Prime Minister did. Those cuts and those failures of years ago are coming back to roost now, and, yes, we do hold this minister responsible. Perhaps he's not responsible for all the failures of the system—that goes to his predecessors as well—but at some point somebody has to take responsibility.

If I can deal with the cricket again—I know this has become a talking point—the cricket is symbolic of a complacent government that has not worked during its nine years to fix a system. I don't care that Minister Colbeck went to the cricket. I wish I could have gone to the cricket that day. I like the cricket. But the fact is we were told by Minister Colbeck that he did not want to see resources diverted from dealing with the crisis and therefore he could not attend the committee hearing. That is the problem—that we weren't told the truth. That smacks of complacency, arrogance and disrespect for the Senate.

From my point of view, the real issue is about what's happening for people living in aged care. We have the Defence Force currently working in there. Yes, there is an impact from COVID, but we have nearly 200,000 Australians, at their most vulnerable, living in a system where we cannot guarantee that they are going to be cared for properly. That is the failure of this minister and it is a failure of this government. As I said, it might not be fair to lay 100 per cent of the fault at Minister Colbeck's feet. Maybe 50 per cent of it should be with the Prime Minister. Maybe more should be with the Prime Minister, seeing as how he made all the cuts to aged care years ago. But, under our system, the minister takes responsibility.

The system is in crisis. Hundreds of people are dying. Staff are leaving the sector in droves. The government doesn't have the answers and, over the years, hasn't made the investment that would have provided elderly Australians with the protection they deserve. It is a national shame that we accept the system as it is. It has to be better, and the minister has to be held to account.