NACA: It’s time

Left to right:  Rachel Siewert, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells and Mark Butler accept the NACA Blueprint for Aged Care Reform from COTA chief executive, Ian Yates.

By Keryn Curtis

The National Aged Care Alliance (NACA) didn’t mince words in presenting its Blueprint for Aged Care Reform to a hall full of politicians and senior decision makers at Parliament House in Canberra last Thursday.

“Putting off aged care reform is not an option,” COTA chief executive, Ian Yates, speaking on behalf of NACA, told the breakfast event. “It’s well past time for older people’s needs to be given priority.”

The foundation message for the NACA reform campaign is the right – and the social and economic necessity – for all Australians to have the opportunity to age well.

Above: The ‘head table’ at the launch – facing the camera, L – R: Ian Yates, Denise Scott, Minister Butler, Greens Senator Rachel Siewert.

“If the system can’t provide what older Australians need now, and we keep running it the same way in the face of a threefold increase in the number of people it needs to support, none of us will age well. 

“Life will be harder for older people, their carers and the workers. And it will cost the taxpayer more at a time when there will be less of them,” Mr Yates told the packed hall.

Despite the early start, it was a full house at the breakfast launch event, with 120 guests, including more than 50 politicians.  The political guest list included Minister for Ageing, Mark Butler; Shadow Minister for Ageing, Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells; and Australian Greens spokesperson on ageing, Rachel Siewert.

Also attending were Liberal Member for Swan, Steve Irons MP and Labor Member for Shortland, Jill Hall MP, co-conveners of the bipartisan group, Parliamentary Friends of Seniors, established in September last year.  Comedian, Denise Scott, whose mother died two years ago from Alzheimer’s disease, was MC.

Above: Comedian, Denise Scott, was MC for the breakfast event, pictured here with Ian Yates.

Yates was unequivocal in his expression of NACA’s expectations of the decision makers in the room.

“As Parliamentarians, you have a key role to play in planning for the future. All Australians – including you – deserve to age well.

 “Government action now is critical. Bipartisan support for reform now is critical.  

“So we look to all of you, whatever your political persuasion, to put aged care ahead of political point scoring and ensure reform commences in the 2012-13 Federal Budget.

Taking the stage after the speech, Steve Irons MP thanked Ian Yates for his speech and for NACA’s focus and commitment on reform before promising that the reforms would indeed have bipartisan support.

Above: Ian Yates, COTA CEO and NACA spokesperson, addressing the crowd at the NACA Blueprint launch

The budget context

Mr Yates said the 28 members of NACA understood the difficulty faced by the Government in implementing major reforms in a challenging economic environment but that this could not deter the Government from making the important decisions.

“We know that it is difficult to ask for major reform of aged care in a fiscally constrained environment. But we do ask and we do expect it now because the current system is increasingly failing; the question of what to do has been asked of and answered by the PC; and those answers are supported by an extraordinary consensus across the sector.

“Not acting now will still mean spending money on bandaids that don’t really work. If we don’t start preparing now for the massive increase in the numbers of older people, future generations will not only inherit a huge financial burden but we’ll all suffer through poorer quality and harder to access services. 

“We are confident that the Blueprint’s reforms will increase our country’s ability to pay for aged care services through a combination of Government funding and appropriate and reasonable co-contributions from older people according to their financial capacity,” he said.

While neither the Minister nor either of the shadow spokespeople made any comments at the event, both Opposition Senator, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells and Greens Senator Rachel Siewert, issued subsequent statements, calling on the government to respond to the recommendations of the Productivity Commission inquiry into Caring for Older Australians.  

While Senator Fierravanti-Wells criticised the Gillard Government in her statement for its long delay in responding to the report, asking “how much longer will older Australians be forced to wait,” she did not express specific support for the NACA Blueprint’s recommendations, nor demand that the Government support or accept them.

In her own statement, Siewert congratulated the National Aged Care Alliance on the Blueprint, which she said “makes strong and sensible recommendations for reform”; and urged the Government to accept them.

“It is essential the Government takes on board these recommendations and starts the process of aged care reform with this budget,” Senator Siewert said.  

Above: NACA staff with a message to wear!  Second from left: Pat Sparrow, Director Stakeholder Engagement.

The NACA Blueprint 

The National Aged Care Alliance is calling on the Government, supported by all of the Australian Parliament, to undertake the following specific commitments in the 2012/2013 Budget period:

• Make a public commitment to an entitlement-based aged-care service system, and set out a timetable for its implementation
• Start developing an entitlement-based system, including wellness-based assessment tools for older people and carers, with an integrated funding model, incorporating the HACC Program.
• Establish the key bodies – the Gateway (for information, assessment and support) and the Australian Aged Care Commission (AACC) – which will drive and enable reform to occur. 
• Undertake an independent cost of care study to set initial prices for care entitlements (pending the establishment of the AACC) which will provide enough funding for quality service delivery and enable the payment of fair and competitive wages.
• Respond to the increasing and unmet demand for care at home by continuing the phased increase in community-care packages, particularly at the high-needs level, along with the introduction of a mid-level package between CACPs and EACH/EACHD .
• Start the phased increase in the Government accommodation payment for supported residents until it reflects the real regional cost of construction as determined by the AACC.
• Establish the Australian Pensioners Savings Account and the Australian Aged Care Home Credit Scheme to give people greater flexibility in making aged-care co-contributions, without having to sell their homes.
• Remove the outdated and dysfunctional distinction between residential low and high-care places, giving consumers the right to the best package of care for their needs and giving service providers the flexibility to respond by tailoring service models and planning to meet local needs.
• Announce a wages-bridging supplement, sign a Heads of Agreement, establish the payment mechanism, and pay the first instalment of higher wages.
• Establish an Aged Care Workforce Ministerial Taskforce.
• Invest in dementia-risk reduction and research to reduce future numbers of people with dementia.
• Establish a high-level Aged Care Reform Council involving representative stakeholder groups to work with the Government to drive the development and implementation of reform.