David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Minister, you talk about it being heartbreaking hearing about people experiencing distress, waiting for home-care packages that they've been approved for. Yesterday in my speech on the second reading I read out half a dozen stories from over 100 that my office has received from Canberrans who are desperate for more supports so that their parents or they themselves can age at home with dignity. Imagine if the government was actually in a position to do something about it. Imagine if you could change the lives of 20,000 older Australians before 1 November, which we heard on Friday there's capacity to do. I urge the government to support my amendment to release 20,000 home-care packages now, given that there is a great need for them and there's capacity to do so.

I understand that for you this may be a cost. You want to balance the books. But I put to you that it is Australians, families, communities, and the states and territories that are bearing the cost. One of the stories I read out yesterday was from a local Canberra GP who has had to go to part-time work to care for her elderly parents. We have one of the lowest ratios of GPs to population in the country here in the ACT. Another story we hear about is how Canberra Hospital is full of older people. So every Canberran is copping an extra $100 healthcare levy because our hospital is bursting at the seams. Yet we have a Labor federal government that is happy to balance the books on old people.

We could do something about it now, and I certainly hope you will when we vote on these amendments. I urge you to back them. But what I'm hearing is that you actually just want to balance the books on old people who desperately want support and who we have deemed worthy of support. They have qualified for a home-care package, and yet we're going to make them wait until November. So I urge the government to support these amendments, and I commend them to the Senate.