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

I'm not trying to be. Senator Marielle Smith, if that suits the chamber. It's a term I've heard in the chamber. I'm not trying to be disrespectful—let me put that on the record. I thank Senator Smith for the question. As I indicated in my answer to Senator Keneally earlier, the government has clearly said that it will respond, with respect to home care packages, prior to Christmas. The Prime Minister said that the day after the interim report from the royal commission was released. It's been repeated by other colleagues and it's been repeated by me. It was repeated by me in the chamber earlier. The government take this process extremely seriously. We said, when the commission interim report was released, that we would consider what it said very carefully and we would take the appropriate policy response, and the Prime Minister announced the following morning that we would invest additional resources into home care packages prior to Christmas. That's what we said we would do. That's what we will do.

Opposition senators interjecting—