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Speaker 1: Let's look at aged care and self funded retirees face

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Speaker 1: a huge rise in what they would pay If recommendations

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Speaker 1: made to the federal government go ahead, the cost of

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Speaker 1: age care set to rise in a bid to improve

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Speaker 1: the financial viability of the sector. The government and the

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Speaker 1: opposition say they're still talking trying to reach a bipart

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Speaker 1: as an agreement, but some of the changes could see

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Speaker 1: self funded retirees who enter a nursing home after July

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Speaker 1: next year pay an average of forty thousand dollars more

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Speaker 1: for their care over a couple of years. The additional

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Speaker 1: payments would apply to over half of all nursing home

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Speaker 1: residents who don't receive a government pension. Co contributions for

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Speaker 1: home care services could also increase by an extra thirty

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Speaker 1: eight hundred dollars a year. If the changes pass Parliament,

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Speaker 1: they would add more than a billion dollars to the

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Speaker 1: cash strapped aged care sector every year. Grant Corduroy is

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Speaker 1: partner Stuart Brown and member of the government's task force

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Speaker 1: that has presented these findings to the government. Cameron Grant rather,

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Speaker 1: good morning, thank you for your time. Why are these

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Speaker 1: changes so important?

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Speaker 2: I think the changes are very important because at the moment,

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Speaker 2: the residential age care sector has lost over five million

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Speaker 2: dollars over the last five years. What that's meant is

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Speaker 2: we have in the centsic capital strike where new homes

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Speaker 2: aren't being built. We've got an elderly population, we've got

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Speaker 2: a long population that's living longer, and we're not meeting

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Speaker 2: the needs of creating homes from places where they can

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Speaker 2: go to. And this also impacts the health sector because

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Speaker 2: we then get elderly persons in hospital and staying in

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Speaker 2: hospital where they can't actually go to an age care

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Speaker 2: home where they belong.

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Speaker 1: So this is essentially about propping up the aged care

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Speaker 1: homes that are currently in existence any that might come

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Speaker 1: alonger I imagine.

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Speaker 2: Exactly right is saying when you say propping up, it's

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Speaker 2: saying that we need a sustainable sector. People in the

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Speaker 2: earlier years deserve to have quality care and quality accommodation

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Speaker 2: and quality services, and to do that we need to

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Speaker 2: have a stainable sector. Given that the taxpayer is already

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Speaker 2: paying over seventy five percent of the costs and paying

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Speaker 2: nearly ninety six percent of the cost receiving direct care needs.

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Speaker 1: I understand the user pay argument and There's a lot

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Speaker 1: of people though, in self funded retirees and others who

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Speaker 1: would say, well, taxes should go towards this. What have

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Speaker 1: I paid them for all my life? And for self

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Speaker 1: funded retirees who would very have a very valid question

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Speaker 1: to ask in I haven't put aside savings and perhaps

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Speaker 1: deprived myself of holidays or whatever luxuries while I was working,

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Speaker 1: so I would have enough in retirement to enjoy a

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Speaker 1: suitable standard of life to which I've become accustomed, And

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Speaker 1: suddenly a whole branch of money has to be diverted

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Speaker 1: into my aged care. That seems unfair. What do you

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Speaker 1: say to that?

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Speaker 2: Look, I think it's very valid point, and you're raising remembering,

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Speaker 2: of course, as you say, if I'm a self funded

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Speaker 2: retiree and I want to go on a trip or

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Speaker 2: do things or as is, you say, don't do it.

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Speaker 2: When you go to residential age care, that's a decision

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Speaker 2: where you've got really no choice. You can't stay at

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Speaker 2: home and you can't be cared for in a non

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Speaker 2: age care environment. So in a sense, at that point

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Speaker 2: you've got a different decision making. Now, remembering that the

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Speaker 2: task Force recommendations aren't saying that people have to pay

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Speaker 2: more for their care. It's basically saying that for your

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Speaker 2: everyday services, your food, cleaning, your laundry, and your accommodation.

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Speaker 2: Because you're moved from your own place of accommodation, you

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Speaker 2: age your home. What the tasks are basically saying that

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Speaker 2: the residents, if they have the means, should beat that cost,

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Speaker 2: as they've done all their lives. So we're not saying

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Speaker 2: it's user pay in a sense for your care. It's

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Speaker 2: just meeting the costs of your everyday services, all.

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Speaker 1: Right, the home to what extent should the home be

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Speaker 1: treated as collateral if you like, or as a deposit

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Speaker 1: for aged care?

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Speaker 2: Right? So at the moment, there's about two hundred month

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Speaker 2: thousand dollars. So if you've got a home, whatever the

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Speaker 2: value that it's worth, it's only assessed for your accessible

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Speaker 2: income as for two hundred month thousand. So if I've

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Speaker 2: got a home worth six hundred thousand dollars, then it's

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Speaker 2: only the first two hundred month thousand that's treated as

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Speaker 2: an asset.

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Speaker 1: But nevertheless, if you have to find that you've got

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Speaker 1: to sell the home.

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Speaker 2: Oh, that's exactly right, And that's where I guess the

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Speaker 2: next trans of discussion has to come for people who

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Speaker 2: don't want to sell the home, or they might have

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Speaker 2: spouse still living at home, or other circumstances. I think

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Speaker 2: we need to look further at the where there are

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Speaker 2: other financial products that allow someone to in a sense,

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Speaker 2: leverage off their home to pay for their age care accommodation.

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Speaker 2: That's effectively what you're doing. Your home is going to

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Speaker 2: be using to pay for your accommodation and agecare. I

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Speaker 2: don't think there's any risk that you're going to lose

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Speaker 2: a great value of your home, but I do agree

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Speaker 2: there's this considerable concern now do I have to sell

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Speaker 2: my home or what are my alternatives? But I think

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Speaker 2: that's something that the government, together with the financial markets,

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Speaker 2: are going to say what alternative products can be put

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Speaker 2: out there to assist this process.

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Speaker 1: Do your changes are your recommendations? Do they shift the

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Speaker 1: ball too far into the court of aged care providers

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Speaker 1: as opposed to the individuals who go into those aged

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Speaker 1: care homes.

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Speaker 2: Well, in a sense, what these changes are saying the

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Speaker 2: age care providers today are paying obviously paying for all

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Speaker 2: your everyday living and paying for your accommodation. At the

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Speaker 2: moment they're not recouping enough money for the cost of

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Speaker 2: providing that. So the providers themselves are now starting significant

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Speaker 2: financial financial decline. So what the changes are saying in

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Speaker 2: a sense for the residence of age care the future

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Speaker 2: residence it is all existing resons to be grand parented.

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Speaker 2: They won'tificed any existing reason for the future reason to

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Speaker 2: be paying for the cost of providing that accommodation of

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Speaker 2: everyday services.

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Speaker 1: Now, I imagine Grant too. The motivation here is we

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Speaker 1: are aging as a country, aren't we. There's going to

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Speaker 1: be a lot of baby boomers and Gen X I

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Speaker 1: suppose over the next however period decades, but moving into

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Speaker 1: age care needing the services they provide.

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Speaker 2: And look absolutely, I think that we want elderly people

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Speaker 2: and we all want elder people to have to remain

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Speaker 2: in their own homes as long as they can. If

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Speaker 2: they move into at HDT home, we want those homes

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Speaker 2: to provide the comfort and the luxury and the services

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Speaker 2: that they need. And this is something that as a

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Speaker 2: society we're all facing increasingly.

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Speaker 1: All right, appreciate your time this morning.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, my pleasure.

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Speaker 1: Grant Corduroy partner Stewart Brown and member of the government's

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Speaker 1: task force that has made the suggestions I've spoken about.

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Speaker 1: There money into aged care for self under retirees and

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Speaker 1: additional forty thousand for the average two point two years

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Speaker 1: stay in aged care. Corey Earlham is acting CEO Coder

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Speaker 1: Council of the Aging and joins me Now Corey, good morning.

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Speaker 1: These changes do they go too far?

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Speaker 3: Well, we don't know what the changes are yet and

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Speaker 3: part of the problem here is this uncertainty is creating

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Speaker 3: a level of anxiety amongst older Australians, which is why

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Speaker 3: we're asking the Opposition and government to finalize their formal

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Speaker 3: agreement around their bipartisan discussions have been going on for

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Speaker 3: months now, and introduce the bill. Announce the details so

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Speaker 3: that people can assess whether this is fair, whether it's sustainable,

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Speaker 3: whether the details are transparent, whether there's a robust safety net,

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Speaker 3: and how they'll actually affect their individual circumstances.

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Speaker 1: All right, let me ask the same question, but substitute

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Speaker 1: changes for recommendations in this task force report. Do you

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Speaker 1: a read with what's been proposed?

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Speaker 3: Well, again, you need to look at the package. So

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Speaker 3: we're talking today about the dollar amounts, for example, what

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Speaker 3: we're not talking about is Examples that are in the

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Speaker 3: task Force report around things like there shouldn't be contributions

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Speaker 3: on clinical care. So I know of a couple of

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Speaker 3: people who contacted Coder they needed a community nurse. They

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Speaker 3: couldn't afford to pay for community nurse privately. The current

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Speaker 3: system has a package of care where you get an

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Speaker 3: amount of money and you pay a contribution towards that

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Speaker 3: amount of money, irrespective of what you use or whether

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Speaker 3: you don't. The future system, according to the Task Force,

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Speaker 3: might be that you paid only for the services that

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Speaker 3: you use. So in that scenario, for somebody who was

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Speaker 3: just meeting nurses and if the rules are there's no

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Speaker 3: co contributions on that, that person wouldn't be paying anything

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Speaker 3: towards the cost of that nurse coming into their home.

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Speaker 1: All right, ideal word for code, What would you like to.

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Speaker 3: See the details of the bill asap?

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Speaker 1: But in terms of changes moving forward, you must not

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Speaker 1: put in submissions of your own.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Look, there is a range of things that we want

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Speaker 3: to see. One of the cornerstones of this new act

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Speaker 3: will be a statement of rights. We want to see

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Speaker 3: that enforceable so that people actually know for sure that

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Speaker 3: they're going to be protected in age care. We want

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Speaker 3: to see an independent complaints commissioner, so that there's an

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Speaker 3: independent umpire that's looking between the provider and the complainant

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Speaker 3: that's usually the consumer of the family member, and actually

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Speaker 3: getting resolution. There are thousands of complaints a day where

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Speaker 3: older people say to us, Oh, they gave me an answer,

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Speaker 3: but it's not resolved and they don't know what they're doing.

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Speaker 3: We need to fix that process. And yes on fees

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Speaker 3: and charges. We want to see that it's fair, equitable

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Speaker 3: and sustainable. The suggestion without a sustainable system, there's not

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Speaker 3: going to be the available beds, there's not going to

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Speaker 3: be the available workforce for people to get care when

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Speaker 3: and where they need it.

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Speaker 1: The suggestion of forty thousand more for self funded retirees.

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Speaker 1: How does that sit with your organization?

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Speaker 3: It sits as a hypothetical, and I'm very disappointed that

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Speaker 3: we're out there with hypotheticals throughout the details. I think

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Speaker 3: all it does is add to the anxiety that's being

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Speaker 3: created because of the lack of information.

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Speaker 1: All right, that's a fair point and that we'll leave

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Speaker 1: it there. Thank you for your time.

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Speaker 2: Thank you.

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Speaker 1: Cory Elin, who is acting CEO, coder,