‘People are dying’: MPs call for overhaul of aged care reforms

A group of senators and MPs of all political colours are demanding urgent government action to fix aged care reforms amid widespread reports they are failing older Australians.

They are warning that “people are dying” on Labor’s watch as they wait for desperately needed services, while peak bodies have complained about the reforms since they were introduced in November last year.

“Anthony Albanese and his ministers told older Australians that no older Australian would be worse off under these reforms,” opposition aged care spokeswoman Anne Ruston told reporters on Monday.

Flanked by crossbenchers, including Greens counterpart Penny Allman-Payne and independents Rebekha Sharkie and David Pocock, Senator Ruston said that “what we’re seeing is every single day, older Australians are coming to us and telling us that they are significantly worse off because of these reforms”.

“We find out also that the government has implemented an algorithm by which there is no human intervention in an assessment of somebody and their care needs,” she said.

“These algorithms are spitting out care packages that are well below the care needs that their doctor has assessed, that an older Australian needs.

“And we’re also seeing that the structure of these reforms is pushing up price, not because there’s additional care, but because there’s additional cost in red tape and compliance.”

Hailed by the Albanese government as a landmark achievement, some in the industry claim that the new rules are overly complex and bureaucratic, with nurses reporting documentation requirements for the new quality standards are taking them away from direct resident care.

Senator Sharkie stressed delays in care, worsened by sluggish efficiency, were a matter of life and death.

“Government isn’t just failing older Australians with aged care – people are dying waiting for care,” she said.

“In the last year, nearly 5000 older Australians died waiting for care.

“And under this government’s new system, out of 130,000 older Australians who are patiently waiting for care, the government deems only 129 of them are urgent.

“This is an abject failure,” she said.

Senator Pocock added that the problems were within the government’s control and “not a foreign war in the Middle East”.

“This is a problem in our aged care system here in Australia, and it is solvable, and you have every non-Labor member of this parliament wanting to work with them to solve it,” he said.

The group also condemned the use of algorithms, or automated decision-making, in assessing patients’ needs.

With the deadly legacy of the illegal Robodebt scheme still haunting Canberra, independent MP Kate Chaney took issue “with the lack of transparency around how assessments are being done and whether those tools are actually delivering accurate and appropriate assessments”.

“I’ve heard some really sad stories, and common sense just says that these people are worse off than they were before this was rolled out, and it’s got to change,” Ms Chaney said.

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Originally published as Parliamentarians demand urgent action on Labor’s ‘botched’ aged care reforms