Call to slow CDC rollout
ACSA has proposed slowing down the implementation of consumer directed care, to the surprise of consumer advocacy organisation COTA, which says ACSA is jumping the gun.
Aged and Community Services Australia (ACSA) has proposed slowing down the rollout of consumer directed care in its initial meeting with Assistant Minister for Social Services Mitch Fifield.
The move has drawn surprise from consumer advocacy organisation COTA, which says ACSA is jumping the gun.
ACSA CEO John Kelly said in ACSA’s most recent National Report that the 10 October meet and greet with Assistant Minister Fifield included a discussion about “taking a slower and more cautious approach with CDC as some providers and consumers are on a steep learning curve.”
ACSA’s government relations advisor, Heather Witham, who was at the meeting, said ACSA wanted to ensure all the issues related to moving to a new system were properly addressed and managed.
“We also need to take time to evaluate and ensure that it works,” she said.
“This program is now being delivered on a much larger scale than in the CDC pilot program and there are issues, such as workforce support implications, that need to be dealt with.
“ACSA believes we could slow the rollout of CDC down to prevent some confusion with how to implement the new program. Also, for example, some providers think they have to convert existing packages now, which isn’t the case,” Ms Witham said.
As part of the Living Longer Living Better reforms, from 1 August 2013 all new homecare packages need to be delivered on a CDC basis.
Existing packages must be converted to a CDC arrangement on or before 1 July 2015 with the intention that lessons learnt in the first two years inform future delivery models.
The chief executive of seniors advocacy organisation COTA Australia, Ian Yates, said COTA did not support any slowing down of the CDC implementation schedule.
“We are surprised that they have raised it as an issue. It hasn’t been brought to back of table. It hasn’t been brought to the consumers.
“CDC is actually only half way towards [full entitlement], which all of us, including providers, have supported so it is unclear to us what the issues are and why you would want to slow it down,” Mr Yates said.
He said while the process did need to be better resourced, those resource requirements would be identified through its three-year capacity building project to support provider implementation of CDC, which involves ACSA as well as Leading Age Services Australia.
“We have always said after we have scoped it out, if necessary, we will go back and seek additional resources if that is what proves to be needed.
“But let’s not jump the gun. Let’s find out what the issues are first,” Mr Yates said.
He said providers had until 1 July 2015 to prepare for CDC and should only apply for packages before then if they were ready.
“If you are applying for CDC packages, you are saying that you know how to manage them. If you are not ready, then wait, because there are plenty of other people who have applied for them and didn’t get them.”
In the 2012-13 Aged Care Approvals Round announced in July 18 applications were received for every home care package available, all of which were CDC.
Ms Whitham said: “While there is the CDC capacity building program being developed, and is very welcome, the funding for this is significantly less than that to support the roll out of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) – and both programs have similar aims.”
Mr Yates said while that was true, the NDIS also required a major system overhaul to put the resources in the hands of the consumer, which involved a significant transformation for providers.
“I believe we will need a larger level of resources for the aged care sector particularly as we go towards full implementation.
“But at the moment we’re trying to map out, in conjunction with providers and consumers, what the scope of that is because there are providers out there who have been running CDC as part of the pilots and believe that they have learnt quite a lot.”
ACSA will present a full-proposal to Assistant Minister Fifield in the near future.
Evaluation
When asked what the minister’s response to ACSA’s proposal was, a spokesperson for the Department of Social Services said: “The consumer directed care arrangements will be closely monitored and evaluated.
“Evaluations will consider the impact of the new home care arrangements on consumers and providers, including how services are delivered in rural and remote areas and to people from low income and other special needs groups,” the spokesperson said.
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Everyone who has new CDC packages said that they could roll them out immediately, so no extension is required. Many very good providers missed out in that competitive tender, so it would incredibly unfair to now decide that those who received the CDC packages do not need to deliver them as they said they would in their tender application.
As far as the transfer of the old packages to the new CDC model goes, that should not be too difficult. Yes -cultural change and up-skilling of staff are needed, but not more that the sector has coped with for other changes.
For me the most significant issue is that even when CDC is fully rolled out, aged consumers, unlike NDIS consumers, will not be allowed to choose their own provider. They are able to chose only from the providers who have received CDC packages in the tender processes that, from this article, appear in some cases to have given them to people who are not ready to roll them out!
If the CDC packages were like the NDIS ones where consumers could choose their own provider, one may be able to justify the additional funds that the article is saying are needed for the transition. However, when older consumers will still be forced to choose their provider from the local provider with CDC package vacancies, then I cannot see the justification for that additional funding.
If you want to complain about something – then complain about the fact that the aged care system will continue to waste funds on ACAR and similar funnelling strategies, when they could simply skip all that by letting consumers choose the provider of their choice from all Approved Providers for the relevant form of care, rather than the local one who has a CDC place vacancy. You could still limit places to what is fundable, but by location/community, not provider.