Dear Minister, do you mean it?
You tell us regularly we need to be opening one new aged care facility every three days for the next 20 years. Is that really your plan?
That is 10,500 beds, per year, for 20 years.
We don’t ask this question out of cynicism toward Government.
We ask because you have acknowledged the challenge yourself.
"We can't magic up the number of aged care facilities that we need next week." (Mark Butler, 11 June 2026)
Quite right. But let's consider the numbers.
Each residential aged care bed costs you $150,000 per year in our taxpayer money. For 10,500 beds per year, you/we need to find an additional $1.57 billion. Not just one year. But every year.
By year 20 that is $31.4 billion a year (with no inflation). Will the taxpayer in 20 years’ time be happy with this?
AI tells us there are 13.3 million taxpayers today but only 18.5 million in 2046. Will they want to pay this extra tax every year.
So, when we ask do you mean it, we are also asking – can we afford it?
The Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964) will be gone by then and all these new beds will likely be redundant. AI and medicine may have changed ageing by then, we guess.
Do you really want new beds built? This also becomes a number you can’t control. Bed licenses are no longer a thing. Operators bring these projects online – you/we are committed to fund them.
Or is that not your plan?
Support at Home is a tap that the Government can loosen and tighten with demand. That same level of funding – $1.57 billion – could release an additional 31,500 packages.
That same level of funding could also be turned to other measures to reduce the number of days older Australians spend in aged care. Think prevention. Reablement. Wellness.
Other countries have adopted a proactive lens. Denmark. Singapore. Others.
Our average length of stay in Australian residential aged care is the longest of any OECD country – 2.2 years.
Reduce this by six months, and we need to deliver 25% less beds.
When we ask do you mean it, we are also asking – what exactly is your plan?
We have the privilege of speaking to leaders across the Support at Home sector. (Not to mention retirement living and land lease sectors.)
They tell us if this is the plan, they are struggling to see it.
The challenge isn't that providers lack courage as there are operators ready to build new beds.
The challenge is that the arithmetic appears to be pointing in two different directions.
- Build more beds.
- Find a way to exist with fewer of them.
So, Minister, we ask one final time.
When you say Australia needs a new aged care facility every three days, do you mean it?
