Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

On 6 June last year, the first assistant secretary provided me the waitlist as at 31 May. I will quote to you what was said at the time:

… very recent, not yet published, data … it's fresh data. We may not have the usual granularity around it.

They provided me with that data with those caveats, with full transparency, six days after the actual data was collated. So I am still at a loss to understand why your government has been so keen not to provide this data, given it has provided it every time before. The department has indicated it is happy to provide caveated data, yet you're not. We know now that the waitlist is in excess of 20,000 people more than it was on 31 March 2025. We know that the waitlist is now in excess of 80,000 people more than it was 24 months ago. We know now that the average wait time for a package has blown out: 24 months ago it was one to three months, and it's now between nine and 12 months. Minister, I'm keen to understand why your government is withholding this vital information, particularly given the absolute crisis that is facing the aged-care sector and that has befallen the sector over the last 24 months.

But, clearly, the public record can now state that the government has provided data—even though they failed to provide it to their minister who is managing the bill in this place, which seems a little incredible—that 108,924 older Australians have been assessed by this government as needing a level of care, and that care has not been provided to them and has not been provided to them for a much, much longer period of time than has previously been the case. So, Minister, I'm keen to understand, if you would like to put it on record, why your government thinks it is reasonable not to provide this publicly important information and why you have withheld this information for nearly six months now.