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

I thank the senator for his question. Since the 2018-19 budget, this government has invested $4.6 billion in 73,105 new packages. Last night's budget allocation of 23,000 new packages, which is not over four years but over the next 12 months, will make a significant change to those who are waiting for a home-care package. What we're doing is exactly what we said we would do when the royal commission handed down its interim report in November last year. We will continue to invest in new packages, as we've done on three occasions now: 10,000 in November in our response to the interim report, 6,105 in July and then 23,000 last night. This financial year there will be an additional 30,000 home-care packages injected into the system.

We have to grow the workforce. These 30,000 packages will create about 6,000 jobs. To assist with that we've also allocated funding of over $10 million to the workforce industry council and, as we announced last week in conjunction with Minister Cash, over $10 million to support training of nurses to go into aged-care support. And there are a number of other packages through other portfolios—for example, the JobTrainer program—which will provide incentives to employ other people in the residential aged-care sector.

The waiting list now has been reduced by over 20 per cent since I came to this portfolio, and the 30,000 new packages that are being allocated will make a significant contribution to reducing that further.