Kristina Keneally (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to ask the Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians when the Senate can expect an answer to a question he took on notice in question time on Tuesday 26 November 2019.

Leave granted.

In question time on Tuesday 26 November 2019, the Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians took on notice a question asked of him by Senator Ciccone. The question was: 'How many Australians have died whilst waiting for their home care package in the last financial year?' On Monday 2 December 2019, I wrote to the minister and noted that he had not come back to the chamber with an answer to the question. I invited him to provide an answer to this question at the conclusion of question time yesterday, which he did not do. I ask the minister if he has an answer to the question: how many Australians have died whilst waiting for their home care package in the last financial year? I indicate that the opposition will grant him leave to answer.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I indicated when Senator Ciccone asked me the question: it is a legitimate question and it's a serious question. What I would like to do is provide accurate information to the chamber. I commit to doing that as soon as I possibly can. I have received some advice from my department which I've asked for some additional information on. My office has gone back to the department to clarify that. I will supply an answer to the chamber as soon as I possibly can.

Kristina Keneally (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to take note of the minister's response.

Sue Lines (WA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Leave is granted for up to 10 minutes, Senator Keneally. I understand arrangements have been made.

Kristina Keneally (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the Minister's response.

We want an answer. We in the Labor Party want an answer to this question. Senator Ciccone asked Minister Colbeck a very straightforward question last Tuesday:

Minister, how many Australians have died whilst waiting for their home package in the last financial year?

Whether by shame or incompetence, the minister has failed to provide this chamber with an answer. I wrote to the minister yesterday asking him to provide a response to the chamber after question time. We heard nothing from the minister yesterday and his silence, his lack of an answer here today, has necessitated this action. I note that since last Tuesday a number of government ministers have come to this place and provided answers to questions they took on notice or updated responses that they had given to the chamber. This is standard practice for ministers. It's one of their most basic responsibilities. Yet, Minister Colbeck has even failed to do this today.

At Senate estimates on 23 October, Senator Watt and Senator O'Neill asked officials about the number of people who had died in the 2018-19 financial year while waiting for their home care packages. Just to be clear: in October, Labor senators asked, 'How many people died in the 2018-19 financial year'—a year that had come and gone—'while waiting for their home care packages?' We know the figure for the previous financial year: 16,000 Australians died before they got the home care package that they were assessed as needing. Senators Watt and O'Neill were told that the department didn't have the updated figures yet for this last financial year. When pressed for a date that they would be available, the department responded: 'It is certainly close. I think it would be within a month'. Well, a month has come and gone. They have missed that deadline. We're now in the final sitting days of parliament for this year, and we are still without an answer from the minister and his department.

This is just like the contempt that the Prime Minister is showing for ministerial standards in relation to the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction. Here we have the minister for ageing showing contempt for this parliament and, more disgracefully, showing contempt for older Australians who need a home care package. Here we are, in the parliament, and the minister is refusing to answer a basic question in his portfolio. That may not grab the attention of the public in the same way it is grabbed by a minister in the other place who is being investigated by the New South Wales Police Force through a criminal task force—

James McGrath (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You'd know all about that, wouldn't you?

Kristina Keneally (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is not what this is. This is a minister, though, who is showing the same contempt for ministerial standards: that is, he is not answering a basic question asked of him in this parliament about a basic figure within his portfolio. It is a basic figure he should know, but it is not basic in terms of the import that it has for older Australians who are waiting for their home care packages, when 16,000 died waiting the previous financial year. All we want to know is how many died in the last financial year waiting for their home care packages. How far will ministerial standards slip under this third-term Liberal-National government? The minister has acknowledged that this is a legitimate question. He said last week:

This is a legitimate question. It's one of the reasons why the government takes the issue of aged care and the growth of aged care home care packages so seriously.

Well, if he takes it so seriously, how can he not know the answer? How can he be talking about increasing home care packages when he doesn't even know how many people are missing out on home care packages—how many people are dying waiting for their home care package?

It would appear that the basic responsibilities of a minister—answering questions from his parliamentary colleagues and being accountable to the Australian people—are a bridge too far for Senator Colbeck. He has shown contempt for the parliament. But more importantly and more significantly, through his administration of the ageing portfolio, which looks after older vulnerable Australians who need our help, seniors who have given their lives to building their families and their communities—in their time of need, when they need a home care package, what do they get from this government? Neglect, lack of information and an insufficient supply of home care packages. That is the utter contempt that Minister Colbeck is showing to older Australians and to this parliament.

Raff Ciccone (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Like many on this side of the chamber and in our community, I take the care of our older Australians very seriously. That's why late last month I asked the Minister for Aged Care about the number of Australians who have, sadly, passed away whilst waiting for an home care package. I and many others in this chamber, like many in our community, were horrified by the interim report handed down by the royal commission on aged care and, in particular, the number of older Australians who were left without the care and support they need so that they can live comfortably in their own homes.

The fact of the matter is that home care packages are drastically underfunded by this conservative government. Thousands and thousands of older Australians, sadly, are dying before they get the chance to receive the care that they deserve. Members of the community are right to demand transparency from their government on this issue as much as anyone else. They have a right to know how many older Australians have died waiting for a package this year, last year and the year before that. But, when I asked the minister a very simple question, the simple answer that we got from the minister at the time was that he simply did not have the latest figures. That is why we are seeking to have those figures tabled here in the chamber, and we gave the minister an opportunity again this afternoon to place on the record what that simple figure is. He has a whole department behind him—thousands of people who could easily provide him with that figure. From the comments that were provided by the minister earlier, I suspect that that figure is slowly making its way through. But, for whatever reason, the minister refuses to provide this chamber with a simple answer to a very simple question.

My community in Victoria deserves to know what the truth is. Every older Australian who is waiting for a home care package, and their family members and carers, deserves the truth. The minister must come to the Senate by the end of the week—ideally today or tomorrow—and provide an answer to my question. The fact that he didn't know the answer when I asked him in late November is outrageous enough. It demonstrated to all of us in this place that he is either uninformed about matters relating to his own portfolio or lacks interest. To delay his answer even further to hide the truth from the Senate and, through us, the Australian people is shameful. One is left to wonder why it is that other ministers, as Senator Keneally articulated earlier, have been able to table answers to questions asked in this chamber a lot sooner than Senator Colbeck has so far been able to do in relation to my question. What is the minister hiding? I think people in the gallery and those who are listening have a right to know why it is that the minister has taken so long to provide an answer to a very simple question.

It is a fundamental responsibility of this place to hold any government of the day to account. The Australian community expect us as senators to ask these very questions. These questions need to be asked. For any minister of the Crown to simply ignore this place—to disrespect the Senate and, through it, the Australian community—is very much unacceptable. I and my colleagues call on the minister to provide an answer to my question as soon as possible.

Question agreed to.