ACAR figures: No cause for comfort
The future of residential aged care looks grim if the recently announced ACAR figures are anything to go by.
The 2009/10 Aged Care Allocations Round (ACAR) announcement may be well overdue but finally the figures are in and the news of a national undersubscription of residential aged care beds is out.
The federal government has allocated only 5,643 new aged care bed licences even though the 8,140 places were up for grabs. The shortfall of around 2,500 places marks a decline from last year’s allocation by more than 100 beds.
Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, Mark Butler, made the ACAR announcement yesterday, stating that the government also provided a further 2,551 community care places, on top of more than 4,000 that were originally advertised.
CEO of Aged and Community Services Australia (ACSA), Greg Mundy, said that the extra community care allocation however merely represents the conversion of funding from residential aged care.
“These figures give no cause for overall comfort,” said Mr Mundy.
“This is the third ACAR round in a row that has been undersubscribed in Australia. That means that providers are much closer to the point where won’t have enough beds to meet the demand which is around the corner.
“There is good and bad but like the last approvals round, it shows that there are some serious issues that need to be fixed.”
Mr Mundy insisted that the reallocation of more resources towards community care “is not a terrible thing but we do need to fix residential aged care or we will start to run out of it as the older population grows”.
“It may not be a problem in the next six to nine months but it takes, on average, three years to build from go to woe so in the future, they will not be able to afford to build.
“We need to be building the beds that we need in three years time right now.”
CEO of Aged Care Association Australia (ACAA), Rod Young, noted the alarming decline in the number of residential allocations in most states and territories.
Providers in Victoria and South Australia sought most of the aged bed licences allocated, while NSW and Western Australia took up the least.
Western Australia fared the worst with only 314 aged care providers in the state applying for new beds which was well short of the 1,564 licences on offer.
And the situation, according to Mr Young, is getting worse.
“I can’t describe it as anything else,” Mr Young said. “There certainly will be a return to no choice for consumers if we continue down this path. That will really be unfortunate as the industry has worked together with the government for the last six to seven years to provide choice for consumers.
“…This also raises the issue of the methodology of planning aged care place allocations in Australia. With 33,000 places now in the pipeline and many providers being unwilling to invest especially in areas with high vacancy levels, the whole process of the existing centrally controlled allocation process is under considerable scrutiny.”
CEO of Catholic Health Australia (CHA), Martin Laverty, believes that regulation controlling residential aged care financing remains a disincentive for building extra beds.
But given that the draft report from the Productivity Commission’s inquiry into aged care is soon to be handed down, change could be around the corner.
“The government was right to ask the Productivity Commission to provide a blueprint for the future of aged care,” Mr Laverty said.
“To meet the growing demand of the baby boom generation, this blueprint will need to address the regulatory disincentives that currently constrain aged care services from being expanded.”
