The Minister for Aged Care, Senator Richard Colbeck, has denied the Government ‘dropped the ball’ on ensuring Newmarch House had enough staff to support its residents in an ugly interview with Today Show Host Karl Stefanovic yesterday morning.
You can watch the full story here – the ‘interview’ starts from the 5:30 mark.
Today Show host Karl Stefanovic took the Minister to task from the get-go – accusing him of “effectively” leaving residents to “die on your watch”.
The Minister – speaking from his home in Devonport, Tasmania – argued the Government has been working on its response to the pandemic with the aged care sector since January.
“We have provided considerable resources to the sector to assist them in the circumstance where unfortunately like we have here now, distressingly like we have here now, you’ve got an outbreak within a facility,” he said.
“That’s why we’ve got Aspen [Medical] in there doing the work that we’re doing.”
Minister Colbeck also rejected allegations from families that the Government had not yet sent in additional staff to support the home.
“Well, that’s not correct Karl, the reports I received last night was that we are very close to being back to the staffing levels that we want.”
The Minister said extra staffing and doctors from the local public health unit were all on site.
“We’re throwing everything we possibly can at this because we need to restore the situation quickly,” he said.
Karl would not accept this explanation however.
“What took you so long?” he asked, saying concerns were raised at least two weeks ago.
But Minister Colbeck stood his ground, saying that the staffing issues had only manifested on Monday after 55 of the home’s 90 staff were quarantined over the past two weeks.
The Today Show host maintained that families had raised staffing concerns on Saturday.
“Would you be happy to have your grandmother in there?” Mr Stefanovic quipped.
“I’d be very distressed if I had a relative in there,” the Minister began as the TV host threw his hands in the air.
Clearly Mr Stefanovic didn’t want to listen.
