Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I say at the outset that Labor will support the Aged Care Amendment (Red Tape Reduction in Places Management) Bill 2015. This legislation comes after consultation with the Aged Care Sector Committee. We commend the government for this legislation and we support it. We have seen members opposite wax lyrical about the alleged $4.5 billion in savings, but this is red tape reduction. For the sake of those who may be listening, the four tranches of legislation that the government has put forward save only $63.6 million of taxpayers money. We commend them for doing so, but it is not $4.5 billion.

We are in favour of getting rid of spelling and punctuation errors. We are in favour of reducing red tape, as this legislation does—and I will go through the terms and details of this legislation. But much of the reforms that have been made in relation to the aged-care sector come very much out of Labor's Living Longer Living Better reforms—a $3.7 billion tranche of legislation that Labor brought in in the last year of its tenure, after extensive consultation with the unions, LASA, COTA, National Seniors, ACSA and a whole range of aged-care providers and stakeholders. The government has continued to consult with the sector, but there are continuing challenges.

This particular bill amends the Aged Care Act 1997 to streamline processes in two main respects. There are two schedules: the first schedule relates to the transfer of places between aged-care providers, and the second schedule deals with provisionally allocated places in aged-care facilities.

In relation to the aged care sector generally as well the background to this bill, it has to be understood that the coalition has accepted the deliverance of the biggest aged care reforms that have ever been made in this country—Living Longer Living Better. The strategy is consistent with red-tape reduction, and we brought that in when we were in government. Living Longer Living Better provides a framework to build an aged care system for the future. It was a strategy over a 10-year period to build a better, a fairer, more sustainable and nationally consistent aged care system. The reforms are all about delivering choice, easier access and better care for older Australians, their families and carers, while making sure that the aged care industry is equipped to deal with the dramatic demographic changes that we will see with the ageing population. There will be a burden experienced by the community and the taxpayers but there will also be an opportunity in terms of trade and investment and the export of our skills, talents and abilities into the growing, the burgeoning, ageing populations of Asia.

So Labor's reforms were about appropriately funding the system and making it more sustainable as the demands for aged care services increase significantly over the next few decades. In the next few decades, the proportion of Australians over 65 years of age will increase from about 14 per cent to about 25 per cent—about one in four Australians will be over the age of 65 years. On this side of the chamber, we remain committed to ongoing reform. We remain committed to Labor's Living Longer Living Better reforms, which the government is carrying out. We are also committed, as I said before, to ongoing aged care reform and red-tape reduction.

What does this legislation have to say, specifically? It implements, as I said, the Red Tape Reduction Action Plan that the government has developed in consultation with many of the stakeholders that I referred to. The Red Tape Reduction Action Plan sets out a range of actions to reduce red tape for aged care providers and consumers. One particular area highlighted in the plan was the review of places management. There are changes in relation to: policy setting and governance, streamlining of administrative requirements, and simplification of consumers' interaction with the aged care system. Specifically, this legislation says as follows. Schedule 1, in relation to the transfer of places, says that, when an approved provider of residential aged care decides it is no longer capable of delivering care to residents, it may seek out another approved provider to continue that care and it may transfer the ownership—if I can put it like that—of the aged care places.

Prior to the amendments that we have before the chamber today, there was an indefinite opportunity for approved aged care providers to continue to hold those aged care places in place without the developments of facilities for a long period of time. That resulted in some challenges, because people held beds for a start and were not going about making sure those beds were operational. Indeed, they were not going about making sure that they were ready within the time frame that the public expected or that the government anticipated. When they were transferring beds, what they actually had to do was get the approval of the secretary of the department, who would consider and either reject or approve all of the applications. This was in circumstances where the department and the minister had actually approved these two aged care providers already. It seemed to the government, and I concur with its assessment, that amendments needed to be made to streamline the transfer process where you have two providers already approved. The amendments remove the requirement for approved providers to make applications and simply wait for the secretary of the department's decision. The amendments deem the transfer to be approved already after a notice of transfer has been given by the approved provider. We agree that that is a good sensible suggestion.

We want to make sure that the quality of aged care and the capacity of the providers remain. So the secretary of the department would retain a power of veto, to ensure that the transfer is of someone who is suitable and appropriate, in order to make sure that the delivery of those aged care services can take place. The right of veto ensures that someone is not transferred to a shonky provider but to a provider who has actually been approved. That qualification protection remains for consumers and the Australian public, and we agree with it.

The second schedule in relation to this fairly simple bill relates to provisionally allocated places. I alluded to this before. One of the biggest problems that people, particularly providers, have complained about is the situation in relation to the time frame to get the beds and the places operational. People would get provisionally allocated places and, prior to these amendments, approval of the secretary of the department had to take place and you needed an extension after two years. Aged care providers told us, the government and the public that it takes on average longer than two years to get those residential aged care facilities and beds in place—in fact, that it takes on average about four years. So what the government is doing, and I think it is sensible, is making that two years into four years.

The point I made before was about the indefinite period of time in which provisional aged care places could remain in the pocket of the approved provider without being rolled out. What happened was that communities were not actually getting the delivery of residential aged care services; although the providers got the provisional places, they were not actually delivering them. That could have gone on and on and on. The government, through this legislation, will actually bring that to an end. There will be two one-year extensions that can be sought. After those two one-year periods, it is only in exceptional circumstances that that provisional allocation of beds can continue on. The providers have to go to the department and provide evidence that they can still deliver. They must also show that they need approval because the exceptional circumstances qualification has been satisfied.

I agree with the government; I do not think this has happened. As shadow minister for ageing, as I have gone around the country, what has happened is that too often beds are not delivered—residential aged-care facilities are not delivered, promised, allocated. That can potentially happen. I see that the member for Hasluck is here. I have been in his electorate and I know that the need for residential aged care places in his electorate is real—and I make no political comment or criticism of the government in relation to it. Hasluck just happens to be a marginal seat, by the way, but that is beside the point. I know that there is a need in that electorate for more residential aged care facilities and places—and that is quite clear in WA as well.

The government's amendments here are sensible, and we support them. While we are on the government's performance in terms of red tape reduction and administrative changes, the government has said it is carrying out Labor's Living Longer Living Better reforms. I am critical of the government's implementation of those reforms. While I am at the dispatch box and we are talking about administrative burdens and red tape reduction, one of the biggest administrative burdens that I hear about is the My Aged Care website. I think the government really needs to look into that and the hotline. I know the time frames have improved but, still, not enough providers are actually getting the referrals, and people are finding it difficult to navigate their way through the website. It still takes too long on the hotline. And I found residential aged care providers who, but for the fact they had waiting lists, would be broke by now and, but for the fact that we have actually provided the opportunity to get refundable accommodation deposits for high care, would have been really struggling financially.

The government really needs to have a look at that, if they are on about red tape reduction. The previous bill and this one are about red tape reduction. One of the biggest red tape reductions, administrative burdens and challenges that the government needs to face is the improvement of the My Aged Care website and hotline. More staff and resources have been allocated, but they need to do it. The system has been plagued by long delays, inaccurate and often incorrect information and there clearly is an inadequate referral system in this country through the My Aged Care website.

I say to the government: we will give you our support for this. Keep carrying out Labor's Living Longer Living Better reforms—we support you to do that—but implement them better than you have been. Make sure you do a better job in implementing them. You have not resourced the system appropriately. You have not consulted the key users of the system—GPs and aged-care providers—as much as you need to do. We know that is the case because the government has admitted it. When the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners wrote to the government recently, they labelled the new system 'unsafe, clunky and time consuming'. That led to an admission by the government that the My Aged Care website and hotline were not operating the way they need to—and, still, it needs to be improved. We will support the government on this legislation. We commend them for the red tape reduction in relation to this, but there is a lot more work to be done if they want to get it right.

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