Care for elderly a focus for Treasurer
ELDERLY Australians will be able to live in their own homes longer under a billion-dollar boost to aged care that will be a centrepiece of today’s Federal Budget.
The massive cash injection is expected to pay for thousands of home care packages to help retirees with transport, meals, cleaning and gardening instead of forcing them into nursing homes.
Jan Juc pensioners Wanda and Eddie Goral do not currently receive a home care package but know others in the community who rely on it.
Mrs Goral said the investment was a good idea and has not ruled out the possibility that she may need a home care package in the future.
“It will depend on how we are,” the 77-year-old said.
“We would like to live in our house until the end of our days.
“Put it this way, I’m sure my daughters would help, as will our grandchildren — they’re really terrific kids — but I couldn’t tell you.
“All I hope is we go before that time comes, put it that way.”
Tax relief for middle-income workers and a $24.5 billion infrastructure bonanza are the other headline reforms, as speculation mounts that Treasurer Scott Morrison will get the budget back into surplus a year early.
He said the budget would be “a statement of values” about the government’s commitment to elderly Australians.
“As you get older, you should not have to sacrifice unnecessarily in choices, and you should not have to sacrifice your dignity either ... We want to protect that in this budget,” Mr Morrison said.
“The challenge and the task is to better plan and to preserve the choices of older Australians, to maintain those choices and indeed broaden them where we’re able to do that.”
The Treasurer dodged questions about whether the government would scrap plans to increase the pension age to 70. But he said Australia need- ed to embrace its ageing population instead of seeing it “as some sort of burden or curse”.
While the government has trumpeted its income tax cuts, it’s understood Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will home in on aged care when selling the budget this week.
Coalition strategists have identified the 4.8 million voters aged over 60 as critical to its re-election hopes, particularly in the wake of the Opposition’s controversial plan to strip share tax refunds from retirees.
Labor has demanded the government invest in the home care system, which has more than 100,000 older Australians on a waiting list.
Airport security upgrades will also be unveiled in today’s budget. Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said the government was “worried about the settings” in the wake of an attempt to smuggle a bomb on to a flight from Sydney last year.
The government’s infrastructure package — including $7.8 billion for new Victorian road and rail projects — was welcomed by Premier Daniel Andrews. The cash splash includes $1.75 billion for the $16.5 billion North East Link, which Mr Andrews said he was willing to build in “partnership” with the Commonwealth.
But Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy wants to build the East West Link before the North East Link, with the Coalition able to bank on $3 billion from its federal counterparts if it wins the state election.
“We need to fix congestion in the northeastern suburbs but first we need to fix the Eastern Freeway which ... cannot support another 100,000 cars daily,” Mr Guy said.