Volunteers essential to meal service viability

The national review of HACC-funded meal services is indicating that volunteers are an essential component in ensuring the financial viability of services.

Meals on Wheels SA CEO Sharyn Broer, who took part a national review of HACC-funded meals services consultation workshop this week

By Natasha Egan

The necessity of volunteers and how to maintain their supply was a recurring theme at a consultation on commonwealth-funded meal services in Adelaide this week, says a delivered-meal service CEO and workshop participant.

The consultation, which is being carried out by the Australian Institute for Primary Care and Ageing at La Trobe University, is part of the third phase of a national review of meal services provided under the commonwealth Home and Community Care (HACC) program. 

Meals on Wheels South Australia (MoW SA) CEO Sharyn Broer said she joined about 40 representatives from delivered-meal services, centre-based meal services and peak bodies that included a strong CALD component, at Monday’s workshop, which is one of 14 being held across all states and territories from July 1 to 19.

“The recurrent theme in the discussion was the value of volunteers and retention issues,” Ms Broer said.

“There was a strong level of inquiry around how we can maintain the needed number of volunteers.”

Recruiting and retaining volunteers is an issue across the sector, she said. 

The researchers from La Trobe University have already undertaken a literature review and mapped existing service and funding models across all jurisdictions.

Following an overview of the literature review findings, which supported opinions about the benefits of volunteers to services, the day’s round table discussions looked at funding models, service models and clients.

In the funding model discussion, participants were asked to discuss the contribution of volunteers to the financial viability of the service, Ms Broer said.

“The outcome was services wouldn’t be viable without the volunteers,” she said

MoW SA for example has 8500 volunteers and 40 paid employees with a full time equivalent of 300 volunteers and 30 paid staff.

Ms Broer said a conservative estimate shows that the volunteer contribution at her organisation is worth at least $13 million a year to the financial viability of the service.

That works out to an extra $13 a meal which would otherwise need to be charged to the client or recovered through funding, she said.

“That’s the absolute lowest estimate that volunteers are worth. It really is a significant contribution to government subsidised delivered-meal services,” she said.

The funding discussion also looked at the variance in costs to produce a meal. 

“I am anticipating there will be significant national variance,” Ms Broer said. 

“It’s important to get some baseline information so we can move to a more consistent funding model,” she said.

National guidelines and changing client needs

Elsewhere the groups discussed whether national standards of nutrition content would improve client outcomes.

While there was general support for national guidelines there were concerns about the need for flexibility to ensure the cultural needs of a client were given higher weighting than nutritional needs, Ms Broer said.

This view is based on the importance of the client actually eating the meal first, she said.

The final discussion was on the shifts in client needs and circumstances and whether there were gaps in serving client needs and geographical areas.

The views given depended on the scale and scope of the service provider, Ms Broer said.

“However, there was evidence service providers are adapting to the changing needs of consumers by offering increased variance, choice and flexibility,” she said. 

The outcome expected from the national review is a clear picture of the diversity of HACC-funded meals around Australia, Ms Broer said.

Whatever the new system is, it can’t be a one-size-fits-all approach, Ms Broer said the discussions showed her. 

“It needs to be a very broad and flexible system that builds on the successes of existing models.”

The final report from the review is scheduled for release later this year.

Find out more about the review here: Review of Meal Services under HACC

Tags: australian-institute-for-primary-care-and-ageing, hacc-funded-meals, la-trobe-university, meals-on-wheels, sharyn-broer,

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