Some aged care homes are running at just fifty per cent capacity due to worker shortages. The committee for economic development conducted research into the situation and is now calling for urgent reform.
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TVTranscript
00:00 There's substantial vacant beds across the country and when we look at the overall number,
00:06 there's around 14% of beds that are vacant. That's pretty significant and that's been
00:11 increasing over the past couple of decades. But what is actually worse, even worse than
00:17 that is when we look at some of the disparity in the figures and some homes are operating
00:22 at capacity levels as low as 50% and they're usually in regional areas because they're
00:27 struggling to attract the staff that they need to be able to fully staff their facilities
00:33 and open all the beds. And this is a real challenge when we have increasing demand for
00:37 aged care services and wait lists for most of these providers.
00:41 Yeah, and so what is demand like?
00:44 So demand is really high and it's growing for aged care overalls, for both residential
00:49 and home care. And there are waiting lists across the country for many residential facilities.
00:55 And what we're seeing happen is that because there aren't these aged care beds for people
00:59 to move into, that people are either getting inadequate care at home or they're getting
01:03 stuck in hospitals. And hospitals are not a great place to be if you don't need to be
01:07 there and they're not designed for people to stay there longer term. So we're hearing
01:11 that people are staying in hospital much longer than they need to because there isn't capacity
01:16 in the aged care sector to take them.
01:17 And so increasing pressure on the hospital system too.
01:21 Absolutely. And it's a very expensive way to care for people. Hospitals aren't set up.
01:28 They're not aged care facilities. It's really expensive and it's not good quality of life
01:32 for people who are having to stay there longer than they should.
01:35 And how have recent regulatory requirements affected the sector?
01:40 So we've had some changes fairly recently which have come out of the findings of the
01:44 Royal Commission, which was two and a half years ago. So that's an increase in aged care
01:49 staffing minutes per client in the aged care home and a requirement for 24/7 registered
01:56 nurses in homes as well. These are good reforms, but they haven't taken into account what conditions
02:04 are actually like in the sector and in the labour market. So they are the sort of things
02:08 that we should be aspiring to, but we don't have the workforce to be able to meet those
02:14 levels of staffing at the moment. And because of that, we are seeing care homes reduce their
02:21 capacity and in some cases even closing altogether because they can't meet the staffing requirements.
02:27 So you say those requirements are good reforms, but it seems that you're suggesting the requirement
02:33 that they be introduced be postponed.
02:35 Look, I think it's around some implementation challenges and making sure that the government
02:40 is supporting the workforce in other ways as well. So looking at paying conditions and
02:45 attracting people to the industry and looking at the timing of that and what might be achievable.
02:51 So it might need to be slowed a little bit, but we really need to be putting all the effort
02:56 that we can into increasing this workforce so we can provide higher quality care to all
03:02 older Australians, which is what the key findings of the Royal Commission were, that we were
03:07 not providing high enough quality of care and we haven't made any real progress on that
03:12 two and a half years in.
03:13 But if we're not providing high enough quality care and the Royal Commission has recommended
03:19 this regulation be introduced, you're suggesting it kind of be postponed for some operations
03:26 in the aged care sector. Are you really comfortable suggesting that?
03:31 Look, I think it would have to happen for some of homes, particularly some of the smaller
03:35 homes that are struggling. But what's most important is that we look at all the other
03:38 options to increase the workforce because we do need to increase staffing levels. So
03:43 we need to look at how we can attract more people to the sector and we really need to
03:47 look at the role of migration because the huge number of workers that we need and we're
03:52 predicting that if we don't make any changes, we'll be short 110,000 workers by 2030. The
03:57 huge number of workers that we need can't be met through the domestic workforce alone.
04:02 We're going to have to look at the role of migration and having better visa systems and
04:07 better conditions for migrants that are qualified and motivated and want to work in the sector.
04:12 And accommodation would have to be addressed as well. I think I've read somewhere today
04:16 someone was suggesting, I'm not sure if it was you, but that some of these aged care
04:21 operators should start building accommodation for their workers too.
04:26 So that's one of the big challenges that we found, particularly in the regional areas,
04:31 that there's no rentals available or if they are available, they're completely unaffordable
04:35 for someone on an aged care wage, which remains very low. So we need to look at how we can
04:41 expand accommodation. This is a challenge throughout Australia, but we particularly
04:46 see it in regional areas with really high costs of living and struggling to attract
04:52 essential workers. So we need to look at how we can build more housing in these areas.
04:58 The government has committed to 1.2 new million new homes under the housing accord. So we
05:04 think some of that should be prioritised for key workers in the regions. And also looking
05:09 at whether there might be a role for some rental subsidies as well to lower some of
05:13 those costs. But there's certainly a role for providers as well. And we do hear from
05:17 providers that they understand these challenges and they are looking at ways to accommodate
05:22 their staff if that's something they can do.
05:25 And just how urgent is it that this is addressed?
05:28 It's incredibly urgent. We've been talking about this for a couple of years now. We saw
05:33 the findings of the Royal Commission, which was showing that aged care homes were understaffed
05:37 and not providing the quality of care that is required. We haven't seen anything that's
05:42 changing the trajectory. So we've got staff shortages now, but they're only going to get
05:47 worse if we don't do something. So we really need to address this. We need more action
05:52 from government and we need to increase the number of workers in the sector.
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