Government must prevent aged care crisis in Wide Bay
27th July, 2011
Federal Member for Wide Bay, Warren Truss today said that up to 429 provisionally allocated residential aged care places are yet to be delivered to the Wide Bay Aged Care Planning Region and has warned of a crisis in aged care if the Government fails to ensure that providers can deliver the allocation. “Demand for aged care places is rising, yet incredibly up to 429 places in the Wide Bay region have not been delivered,” Mr Truss said.
“These are 429 places that the Government has committed to fund, but the Government funding offer has failed to keep up with the actual operational costs that aged care providers would incur in delivering the places.
“My office constantly receives calls from anxious families who are worried about securing residential aged care for their elderly and frail relatives, but until the Government matches the places it offers with appropriate levels of funding, aged care providers will be reluctant to take them up.
“This should ring alarm bells. The Wide Bay region has clearly identified the need for more aged care places but providers have not had the confidence from Government necessary to deliver the places the region needs. The Government cannot afford to ignore this problem any longer.
“The Wide Bay region also has the worst target ratio of beds for people aged 70 and over in Queensland. The latest available statistics show that the Wide Bay region stands at 69.1 per 1000 people aged 70 and over, compared with the national target ratio of 86.8 per 1000 people aged 70.”
Mr Truss said the absence of aged care beds in an area with an ageing population causes hardship and strain to the elderly, their families and carers.
“The elderly deserve to have access to the care they need. Families and carers do as much as they can to help the elderly and frail to stay in their homes for as long as possible, but it is not fair to expect them to act as substitutes for full residential care,” Mr Truss said.
“The Government has known for a long time that reform of the aged care system is needed. There will be real crisis in aged care unless the Government takes immediate action to ensure the region’s full allocation of beds is delivered.”
The Government is yet to release its response to the Productivity Commission’s report Caring for Older Australians which is expected to identify measures to ensure aged care providers can deliver the services expected of them.
“The elderly, their families and carers, and aged care providers want security and certainty about the future. The Government must release its response to the report and detail the initiatives that it will undertake to ensure that the backlog of aged places is delivered and ensure that future needs are met.”
