Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am in total disbelief at the hypocrisy of Senator Cormann’s motion on aged care, which is before us, and his comments. Senator Cormann must have the shortest of short-term memories if he wants us or the Australian community to believe that the issues present today in the aged-care sector are wholly and solely the responsibility of this government. He started by saying that the federal government has direct responsibility for the provision of aged care. How astounding! This must be a fact that Senator Cormann has only recently discovered. It certainly appears as though his party were unaware of this during their last term of government, because they actually did so little for aged care.

He seems unable to cast his mind back less than two years to recall nearly 12 years of complete inaction and complacency by the former Howard government. That government, of which Senator Cormann was briefly a part, stood by and did nothing positive for aged care year after year as the reality of our ageing population became more apparent. They ignored outdated infrastructure and capital investment needs. They ignored the mass exodus of nurses from the industry. They ignored increased demands to access community care places. They ignored the unique needs of rural and regional service providers.

During the last five years of the Howard government, residential aged-care funding had an average annual increase of 7.1 per cent. Under the Rudd government this has been 8.5 per cent. Let us get the facts on the record. The average annual increase in total aged-care funding over that same period of the former government was 8.4 per cent. Under the Rudd government that has been 9.1 per cent. These figures underlie the basic difference in the importance placed on aged-care funding between this government and those opposite in the coalition.

Despite this apparent difference, Senator Cormann would have us believe that the Rudd government has done nothing on this most important of issues. As Senator Cormann appears unable to see, hear or remember the multitude of steps taken by the Rudd government to address the aged-care issues, I will remind him and those in the chamber. This government has committed $44 billion over the next four years to aged care, which is an increase of $2.5 billion over that period and more than that by any previous government in our country’s history. Far from failing to address capital funding for aged care, the Rudd government has committed $300 million in zero real interest loans. Half of this money has already been allocated and is expected to produce 1,455 additional places.

Far from exhibiting inaction, as Senator Cormann states, the Rudd Labor government has provided unprecedented funding levels to extend aged-care services further than they have ever been extended before. As of the middle of 2009 there have been more than 178,000 residential aged-care places, half in high care and half in low care. On top of this more than 47,000 community care places have been funded by the Commonwealth.

Funding for aged care increased nearly 10 per cent between 2008-09 and 2009-10 to $9.9 billion. Since the Rudd government came into being in November 2007, overall funding to aged care and community care has increased by nearly 20 per cent. This is the kind of increase that has demonstrated our genuine commitment to meeting the needs of older Australians and it is a far cry from the entrenched neglect of the former Howard Liberal government.

Since the change of government, an increase of 6,100 residential aged-care places and 2,800 community care places has been realised. There is an additional $14.8 million for the viability supplements paid to residential aged-care providers in regional, rural and remote areas, bringing the total funding to $72.3 million over the next four years. Funding for home and community care, which is quickly becoming a key element of aged care and ageing in place, will increase by $180 million, reaching a total of $1.2 billion this financial year. Five hundred million dollars has been added to subacute care through the Council of Australian Governments and $293 million has been provided for the Transition Care Program over four years to create an additional 2,000 places. Add this to the $120 million every year for the dementia initiatives that will reach more than 200,000 Australians, $348,000 for hearing services this financial year and $21.6 million per annum to support the National Palliative Care Program and you will start to get an idea of how inaccurate and blatantly shameful Senator Cormann’s statements are.

The other critical area of aged care, beyond capital investment and funding of services, is creating a suitably skilled and stable workforce. It has become apparent that the aged-care sector experiences far more recruitment and retention issues as to their staff than other sectors of health. We have put in place a multipronged strategy to address this. Through the federal and state governments $1.1 billion is being invested in our health workforce. The Rudd government has created the bringing nurses back program, with $6.9 million specifically targeted at bringing aged-care nurses back into their profession. This has directly resulted in 100 nurses returning to the aged-care sector. In addition, 21,300 aged-care workers are having their skills upgraded through a $127 million training commitment.

If Senator Cormann’s head is spinning trying to keep up with all these figures, I can stop; however, I will have not exhausted the list of steps this government has taken to support the aged-care sector and older Australians. In this year’s budget an additional $728 million was committed to aged care over the next four years. The increase to the rate of aged-care pensions for singles and couples not only yielded a much-needed boost to meet the cost-of-living pressures for pensioners but also will add an extra $713.2 million to aged-care providers over the next four years.

That same budget also committed $14.1 million over four years to continue palliative care initiatives started under the Australian healthcare agreements. It also retained the conditional adjustment payment at 8.75 per cent. This payment is the lifeblood of many regional aged-care providers and was due to expire. However, through consistent evidence provided to the Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration in its inquiry into residential and aged care in Australia, the importance of this payment was noted and the payment was retained.

The inquiry, which I was fortunate enough to chair, was a comprehensive look at the current and future needs and circumstances of the aged-care sector. It was a large-scale inquiry that held multiple hearings, received more than a hundred submissions and took much of the first half of this year to complete. Evidence taken at hearings and through submissions was consistent in its frustration at the worsening state of aged care in Australia in the face of heightened demand. Far from pointing the finger of blame at the Rudd government for supposed ‘inaction’, most stakeholders acknowledged that this was an issue that had been sorely neglected and that manifested during the Howard-Costello Liberal government years. Each and every submission acknowledged that the sector indeed required quick and considerable action. Most of the submissions were consistent in identifying fragmented funding, staffing levels and increased demand for services as the major challenges facing the industry. The government did not shy away from the strong recommendations on the future directions of aged care by the committee in its unanimous report. Indeed, the Department of Health and Ageing has already started working towards realising the recommendations of the report and it moved quickly after the report’s release to continue the conditional adjustment payments.

The continuation of these payments has been particularly important to my home state of Tasmania, which has a rural profile, much like that of outback Australia, with a small and highly decentralised population. More than half our residential aged-care facilities have under 60 beds each, which is considered to be at the margin for viability. On top of this, Tasmania has the second oldest population in Australia and by 2020 it will have the oldest. I have talked in detail with aged-care stakeholders from Tasmania—and, in fact, from around the country—and they have shared with me the need to build a sustainable sector without losing their critical, small, community based facilities that are so deeply connected with their communities. Tasmania is very strong on social inclusion, and allowing people to age in the community they belong to is vital to meeting our social inclusion agenda. Tasmania, with its highly fragmented population, boasts hundreds of small, tightly knit communities, many of which offer small aged-care centres. Pressure on the aged-care sector has resulted in two visible policy drivers: consolidation and a push for efficiency. While it may be viable for many metropolitan residential aged-care facilities, Tasmania is unable to achieve the economies of scale that come from mergers and larger facilities. It is also contrary to the idea of ageing in place to move aged-care places into bigger population centres.

I was pleased to be able to attend recently a meeting between the Minister for Ageing, Justine Elliot, and stakeholders from Aged and Community Services Tasmania to discuss Tasmania’s unique aged-care situation. It was a testament to the importance that this government gives to aged care that the meeting was a positive and productive one. The CEO of Aged and Community Services himself stated that ‘the minister was very interested in what we had to say’ and agreed that ‘Tasmania has had a good hearing’ on the issue of aged care. He summed up the meeting by stating that the minister was very positive toward some of the options and strategies presented to them during the meeting, calling it ‘a glimmer of hope that we can build a sustainable sector’. That is positive feedback. That is recognition that the Rudd Labor government is actually listening, unlike those opposite who had 12 very long years to address these issues. Senator Cormann was quoting various reports. It would have been more factual if he had given the dates of those reports, then it would have been more than obvious that his own government, the previous government, had failed to act.

There is no faint praise from a sector that has been underfunded and ignored for so long. It is indeed an indication of how productive the relationship between the government and the industry stakeholders is becoming. The industry does understand and acknowledge that we are listening to it about the issues confronting it. I acknowledge there are many issues facing the industry, but you cannot lay the blame on a government that has been sitting on the benches on this side of the chamber for less than two years when the Liberal Howard government had almost 12 years and neglected the industry. The industry itself acknowledges that. That is not a political statement; that is a fact of life.

I also take particular exception to Senator Cormann’s comments that this government has wasted significant sums of money on Building the Education Revolution. What his statement implies is that aged care takes precedence over education infrastructure. This is a ludicrous notion that tries to compare apples with oranges. Both are equally important in society’s eyes. Both have been given much-needed and long-overdue attention by the Rudd government. While achieving record funding in aged care and a multifaceted approach to increasing the effectiveness of aged-care services, we have also embarked on an unparalleled school infrastructure modernisation program. Thousands of schools have benefited from the $16.2 billion investment in upgrading classrooms, libraries, halls and gymnasiums. After nearly 12 years of steady decline in funding for education and an almost complete halt in any form of infrastructure investment under the former government, Australian schools are now being given a sign of faith. They are being given hope. This government has clearly shown that providing good infrastructure in schools not only benefits a community but benefits an entire generation. If we do not invest in our education systems, in learning and in bricks and mortar, how then can we honestly say that we respect the needs of our children? Does Senator Cormann honestly ask us to believe that ignoring investment in our children is justified as a means for channelling additional funding to older citizens? And if he does believe this, why did the former government, his government, do neither? Why did they neglect the education of Australian children and neglect older Australians for 12 long years?

Far from funding one whilst neglecting the other, we have stood firmly by our social agenda and provided more practical support for each layer of our community than the opposition can rightly claim to have done in their last term in office. They glorify the days when they saved and saved until we were rich with savings. But the opposition did not seem to notice that all these savings had been to the detriment of our young, our old, our infrastructure, our health, and our future needs. There is no glory in saving for a rainy day when everything that our society holds as important is pulled back, tightened and starved to the point of collapse. That is what happened to our aged care sector during those 12 very long years and that is the reality that the Rudd government has had to work with since then. And in addressing all these issues that I have outlined from our budget we have done this while under the strains of the global financial crisis, the worst in 75 years.

I do agree though with Senator Cormann on one thing: we do need to take decisive action to address the significant challenges faced by the aged care sector. However Senator Cormann fails to acknowledge that the Rudd government is doing exactly that. The Rudd government recognises the importance of providing a high-quality minimum standard of aged care for all. It recognises that a rapidly ageing population will provide us with unique and critical challenges that require responses in equal measure. The Rudd government is working carefully and thoughtfully on addressing all aspects of the issues that we will face in years to come—not just nursing homes, but community care, numbers of nursing staff, infrastructure, training, health and safety, medical needs and much more. No other government has recognised more fully that people have a right to age with peace, quality care, dignity and respect. Consequently, no other government in this nation’s history has spent more on aged care. And we do not deny that more needs to be done.