Aged care’s next test won’t be passing legislation – it will be tracking what actually happens when the new rules collide with real lives.
Tom Symondson, CEO of peak body Ageing Australia, says the design intent behind Support at Home is sound: to push older Australians to use more clinical care and avoid preventable hospital stays.
“People were being assessed for clinical services but still spending the majority of their Package on independence-type, everyday living services – and then ending up in hospital anyway,” he told The Weekly SOURCE ahead of 1 November.
That’s why clinical services remain contribution-free by design. But if new co-contribution requirements deter people from getting the help they need at home, he warns, the Government must move quickly.
“If people are saying, ‘We can’t afford to have showers now because you’re charging us for them,’ we’ve got to change the policy,” Tom said.
The sector, he added, needs to stop relying on economic models and start tracking lived behaviour to determine the impact of the reforms.
“Modelling is still guesswork by economists… we don’t know what people will do until they do it,” he said.
The immediate priority for providers: gather data on hardship claims, service mix shifts, and consumer withdrawals – and pivot policy accordingly.
Home Care Packages must grow for next 20 years
Beyond home care reform, Tom argues Australia must plan long-term growth in Home Care Packages rather than plead for more each Budget.
“We’ll need a net increase every year for the next 20 years,” he underlined. “That should be based on population logic, not political cycles.”
The bigger transformation, though, is redefining aged care as part of a “continuum of ageing” – a system that links housing, prevention and health – a key priority for the peak body looking ahead.
“If we have more accessible retirement living – including affordable rental – it becomes one of the key ways to stop people going into hospital or residential care prematurely,” he said. “Services to older people, not just aged care, have to be the lens.”
Finally, Tom said it’s time to end the silo wars between hospitals and aged care – along with the “mudslinging between States and the Commonwealth,” which helps no one.
Too often, he noted residents declared “medically fit for discharge” arrive with unrecognised clinical or behavioural needs, pushing unfunded risks onto providers.
“At the centre of all this is a human who deserves respect and dignity,” he said. “Right now, they’re not getting it.”