Australian Greens spokesperson on ageing, Senator Rachel Siewert has called on the Government to make stronger investments in community care as part of wider reforms to our aged care system.
“I am encouraged by the Minister’s commitment to reform in the face of a clearly inadequate aged care system and I urge the government not to delay in making these important investments,” Senator Siewert said today.
“The latest Aged Care Approvals Round shows that in some states, a vast number of available bed licences for residential aged care services are not being taken up because providers can not afford to operate them.
"The low rate of uptake for residential care places is especially alarming in my home state of WA, where only 433 licences have been taken up by service providers, despite the fact that 1500 were made available. Allocations in QLD (68%) and Tasmania (13%) were also very low.
“At the same time there have been an overwhelming number of applications for community care licences, despite current payments for community care places not keeping pace with rising costs.
“The Government offered funding for around 1700 community care places, there were 25000 applications for those places in this year’s allocations. This equals 14 applications per available place.
“Organisations are clearly very willing to provide community care services, but current funding model is unable to meet that demand”
“The Australian Greens have been calling for structural reforms that would enable greater investment in community care, leading to wider benefits across the aged care sector.
“Improving community care packages would provide an interim measure until the implementation of a more ambitious, integrated system of care entitlements.
“By enabling people to stay in their homes and communities for longer, they have better health outcomes, are happier and enjoy a higher quality of life.
“This can keep people out of more intensive, expensive high-care accommodation and help them to remain as active members of the community,” Senator Siewert concluded.