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

I rise to call out the Albanese Labor government for its deeply flawed rollout of its aged-care reforms. This week, I joined with colleagues from across the parliament to demand urgent action to protect older Australians from the consequences of these failures. This is a damning indictment on a government that is causing real harm. Labor promised no older Australians would be worse off under its reforms. That promise has been broken in so many ways.

Costs for essential home-care services have exploded, driven by additional red tape and rigid rules that are choking providers and denying older Australians the care that they need. The government is essentially letting a robot decide the care needs of older Australians, without any human override. Home-care funding is being rationed through the introduction of interim packages, where they are only delivering 60 per cent of the care that is needed. And the waitlists continue to grow, with more than 234,000 older Australians now waiting for support, including more than 131,000 who are waiting an average of 10 months for a home-care package that they have been assessed as needing.

This is Labor's aged-care crisis, and it is only getting worse. This failed rollout of its aged-care reforms is hurting older Australians and putting more pressure on our broader health system. Minister Rae has been completely missing in action, and it is clear he and the government have no plan to fix these issues. Instead, he is deflecting responsibility to the regulator. The Albanese Labor government must take responsibility for its own crisis, starting by immediately introducing human override to its harmful assessment algorithm.