Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to talk about a visit to the Manor Court Werribee aged-care facility that I undertook recently after a kind invitation from the CEO, board members and staff. This facility was developed from the ground up. Funds were raised with support from Rotary many years ago, and the facility has a long history in the community. It was evident on the visit what high-quality staff this facility has. My saying that is based on the conversations I had with the elderly people that I had an opportunity to interact with

From person to person, when I asked them about the facility—many of them are locals and have family connections, so conversations are not difficult to start up—every single one of them, female or male, said, 'The staff are lovely, Joanne, and the food is great.' I took the 'food is great' as a pretty good indicator of how happy they were. I then had the pleasure of meeting the chef, who has been working at the facility for a long time and who takes enormous pride in the service that they provide. I had an opportunity to meet with people and then to sit down with board members and staff and have a chat about aged-care provision. This is a not-for-profit facility, and in order to deliver the great service that they do they overcome many challenges.

They raised with me the current aged-care funding instrument, which they describe as far too complex, and suggested that it has certainly run its course. They moved from the previous resident classification scale, which had eight categories, to the aged-care funding instrument, which has 64. They wanted me to bring their concerns back to this parliament. They are desperate to see a review conducted, as Labor suggested—to see action taken here to give them certainty in their planning and their provisioning.

I would add too that this is a facility that takes its responsibilities very seriously, being one of our local facilities that is heavily engaged in the training of staff, ensuring that around our area we are getting quality staff into our aged-care facilities. I would like to commend their work and assure them that I will stay in touch— (Time expired)

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