Blue Care hands back beds
Another leading provider has returned provisional licences to the Commonwealth, saying the current funding model is not keeping up with rising costs, particularly in high care.
The industry’s ongoing capital concerns are growing, with another leading provider announcing that it is unable to build provisionally allocated beds.
Queensland organisation, Blue Care has handed back 210 licences to the Commonwealth, saying it is not viable to build conventional nursing homes in current circumstances.
“There are a couple of reasons for [the decision],” said the organisation’s Executive Director, Stephen Muggleton.
“It’s partly to do with capacity as we are currently building 250 other places but quite frankly, I don’t want to expose Blue Care to any more losses.”
“The only thing that is viable in high care is extra services places.”
Mr Muggleton said the issues currently facing Blue Care are the most serious he has experienced in his six years with the organisation.
“As a large provider with more than 4,000 aged care beds, we have reasonable efficiencies and advantages of scale, but even so we have been experiencing some alarming downward trends,” said Mr Muggleton.
“We are finding that a lot of the things that were speculated about scale within the industry are not ringing true.”
Blue Care’s decision follows a similar announcement from Western Australian provider, Bethanie, which chose to hand back 110 bed licences last month.
In a separate development, two of Victoria’s largest providers – Uniting Aged Care and Benetas – have also announced that they will not apply for standard high care beds in the current Aged Care Approvals Round (ACAR).
