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

I do not often speak on the adjournment, but I am moved to speak on the adjournment tonight. I had the opportunity to go to the Ballarat electorate in conjunction with Samantha McIntosh, who wanted to point out to me some issues that were occurring in that electorate. One of the main reasons for going was to look at disability services, but I went to look at aged care in Bacchus Marsh.

Before I talk about that, I want to talk about an absolutely outrageous campaign that has been waged against Samantha McIntosh in the electorate of Ballarat. There have been advertisements on the television which are totally inappropriate, appalling and misleading. They misrepresent a young woman who, with her family, has built up a business which has brought jobs and other benefits to Ballarat. This young family has bought houses, renovated them and moved; bought houses, renovated them and moved—and, as anyone who knows anything about renovating houses will know, it is not easy. They have finally bought an amazing old building in Ballarat that was owned by, I think, the hospital. They have renovated it, with the kids helping with painting, to its splendid Victorian original state, and they now use it for bed and breakfast accommodation to raise money for charities, and they have tourist events where people have high teas and are told about the history of the building and the history of Ballarat.

What do Labor do? They deride her by suggesting that she is living in some mansion. This is a home in which the children live while the business goes on around them. It is not an easy thing to do when there is a function in the kitchen and the kids are trying to study and do things. This family lives on the premises. They have worked their hearts out to build a successful business. What do Labor do? They portray them on the television as wealthy people. These are businesspeople who have worked their fingers to the bone to build up a small business.

What do Labor do? They put a shot of a building on the TV, on the pretext that it is this building, with a Mercedes-Benz outside so as to imply that the family drive a Mercedes-Benz. Nothing is further from the truth. I am advised the shot was not even of their building. And, anyway, people do go there in Jaguars and Mercedes-Benz to visit Ballarat and stay at their wonderful B&B. Labor pulled the ads but after the damage was done. I hope it backfires on them. Samantha McIntosh is a tremendous young woman who has gone through some challenging health issues with her young family. She and her husband have built a business up out of nothing. It is the old motto of former Senator Richardson: whatever it takes—denigrate, mislead, misrepresent, it does not matter, and never say ‘sorry,’ never apologise.

We went to Bacchus Marsh with Samantha. One of the things that was highlighted to me was that Bacchus Marsh needed more aged care, particularly more low-care and high-care places. We visited Grant Lodge, a facility administered by the Djerriwarrh Health Services. It passed what I call ‘my mum’ test: if my mother were still alive, would I like to have her live there? The care by the staff was outstanding—the facility is old and needs a lot of work done, if not rebuilding—and the love given to the residents there was exemplary. But I do not want to talk about the staff of Djerriwarrh services or Grant Lodge; I want to talk about the Victorian Labor government.

The facility passed 44 out of the 44 care standards set by the Commonwealth, which indicates that the staff there are providing appropriate and very good care. But I thought to myself: why is the building so old and why have they not applied for more aged-care places in previous rounds? Then I discovered that Grant Lodge is one of the aged-care facilities which are run by the public sector, the Victorian government. There are about 195 or so public sector residential aged-care facilities run by about 85 agencies across Victoria. About 80 per cent of them are located in rural and regional areas. Something which has interested me, from when I first became interested in aged care in Victoria, is that aged care in Victoria is quite different from aged care in almost every other state, other than most probably South Australia, where a significant proportion of aged-care places are provided by the state government. The Australian government provides recurrent residential aged-care funding, based on residents’ care needs, from time to time providing funds for specific capital purposes. However, capital works funding for Victorian public sector aged-care facilities is primarily the responsibility of the state government, administered through the Department of Human Services. Victoria, as I have said, has the largest involvement in residential aged care of any of the Australian jurisdictions. About 6,500 older Victorians are accommodated in Victorian public sector facilities. In the majority of cases, the agencies which provide public sector residential aged care are health services. They are required to comply with the same certification and accreditation requirements which apply to other providers of residential aged care.

An edifying document on the Bracks and Brumby record on the provision of aged care in public sector facilities can be found in the Victorian Auditor-General’s August 2006 report: Condition of public sector residential aged care facilities. It highlights the failures of the Bracks and Brumby administration in this area—a lack of overall planning and a lack of oversight of the Commonwealth’s 2005 grant of $3,500 per resident place to improve building standards. In fact, the report suggests that 65 per cent, or $13 million, of the total grants may have been unspent, and they need to be spent in this area.

There was evidence that communities which raised funds to support their public sector aged-care facilities may be penalised by a reduction in funds available to them for capital improvement. The report also pointed out that facilities with a higher number of low-care beds and higher SES areas were benefiting disproportionately from the benefits of accommodation bonds and extra charges. In addition, it was found that there was a wide variation in the per cent of residents paying bonds at the maximum level, which was limited to ineffective local practices and policies. I recommend that people have a look at that report. It is a damning indictment of Labor’s appalling record. The Auditor-General’s report concluded that the Victorian Department of Human Services:

… does not adequately plan for managing the condition of public sector residential aged care facilities.

The report was about the condition of public sector residential aged-care facilities. They were not looking at planning for the future. I have no doubt that, if a review had been undertaken of the Victorian government’s plans to redevelop and increase the provision of aged care in Victoria, the same conclusion would have been drawn.

The people of Victoria deserve better; the people of Bacchus Marsh deserve better. The burgeoning population of Bacchus Marsh and the surrounding areas need to know that the Victorian government is planning for their future. Just keeping the status quo in Grant Lodge is insufficient. There are no low-care beds. People cannot age in place; there are only high-care beds. The people of Bacchus Marsh should be demanding that the Victorian government rebuild and extend the facility so the people of Bacchus Marsh can take advantage of the $1.6 billion federal government funding which has gone to the recently announced aged-care reform package Securing the Future of Aged Care for Australians. If the Victorian government got its act together, older people in Bacchus Marsh could benefit from some of the 32,000 new places planned for the next three years.

I hope I do not go back there when I am no longer in the Senate and find that they still have not applied for places, because they have not planned for them. I am glad that Samantha McIntosh took me to Bacchus Marsh. She is a candidate who is already showing how she will stand up for the people of the Ballarat electorate. That is what they need—someone who will stand up, who will fight for the issues affecting people from Bacchus Marsh in the east of the electorate right across to the west. I call on the Victorian government to lift its game and give the older residents of Bacchus Marsh, and the rest of Victoria where aged-care facilities are run, access to care they need and deserve.