Funding promise welcomed

LEADING advocacy organisation National Seniors Australia has welcomed the Federal Government’s $967 million commitment to boosting aged care, including 13,500 new residential places across Australia.

Chief advocate Ian Henschke said the commitment was a step in the right direction to help fix massive shortcomings in the aged-care system.

He said government needed to focus on developing a comprehensive national aged-care services funding and planning strategy and long-term sustainable solutions.

“We’ve known we have an ageing population for decades and while the government has pumped a lot of additional funding into home and residential care, it’s always playing catch-up,” Mr Henschke said.

“We can’t afford to wait for the Royal Commission into aged care to come up with a solution.”

National Seniors also is calling on the government to immediately improve the quality and safety of residents by requiring aged-care providers to publish staff-to-resident ratios.

“Hopefully this will lead to more suitably qualified and dedicated professional care staff to be employed,” Mr Henschke said.

“As well, all aged-care staff in direct care roles must have basic dementia training as a minimum service requirement.”

National Seniors commended the Federal Government on committing to new aged-care places in regional and rural areas and a $60 million capital works program to refurbish aged-care homes in priority rural and regional centres.