Departmental logo
No images

THE HON JUSTINE ELLIOT MP

Former Minister for Ageing

Australian Government Acts on New South Wales Nursing Home

Print page  Decrease text size  Increase text size


The Australian Government has imposed sanctions on Fairfield Nursing Home Holdings Pty Ltd, the approved provider of Fairfield Nursing Home in New South Wales.

PDF printable version of Australian Government Acts on New South Wales Nursing Home (PDF 21 KB)

9 July 2010

The Australian Government last night (8 July 2010) imposed sanctions on Fairfield Nursing Home Holdings Pty Ltd, the approved provider of Fairfield Nursing Home in New South Wales.

The Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency (the Agency) identified serious risk to the health, safety and wellbeing of residents during a Review Audit.
Areas of serious risk identified by the Agency included the home’s failure to:

  • Provide adequate wound management;
  • Manage challenging behaviours effectively; and
  • Ensure that staff have the knowledge and skills required to provide appropriate care to residents.
In response to the serious concerns, the Department of Health and Ageing has imposed measures to immediately address resident care, including:
  • Revocation of approved provider status unless the approved provider appoints an Administrator with clinical and nursing experience– approved by the Commonwealth for a period of six months;
  • Cessation of Commonwealth subsidies for new residents entering the home after 23 June 2010 for a period of six months; and
  • Revocation of approved provider status unless the approved provider agrees to provide training for its officers, employees and agents.
The Agency will visit the home each day while serious risk remains and the Department of Health and Ageing will closely monitor the home to check that action is taken promptly by the provider.

Minister Elliot said: “When aged care providers fail to meet their obligations the Government will act to protect our frail and elderly citizens.

“We are committed to continuing to work in partnership with older Australians, their carers and families, staff, volunteers and care providers to improve the quality of aged care in Australia,” Minister Elliot said.

Anyone with concerns about the care or welfare of residents should contact the Aged Care Complaints Investigation Scheme on 1800 550 552.

For more information, contact Mrs Elliot's office on (02) 6277 7280

Help with accessing large documents

When accessing large documents (over 500 KB in size), it is recommended that the following procedure be used:

  1. Click the link with the RIGHT mouse button
  2. Choose "Save Target As.../Save Link As..." depending on your browser
  3. Select an appropriate folder on a local drive to place the downloaded file

Attempting to open large documents within the browser window (by left-clicking) may inhibit your ability to continue browsing while the document is opening and/or lead to system problems.

Help with accessing PDF documents

To view PDF (Portable Document Format) documents, you will need to have a PDF reader installed on your computer. A number of PDF readers are available through the Australian Government Information Management Office (AGIMO) Web Guide website.