ALICIA PAYNE, MEMBER FOR CANBERRA: Okay. Good morning. I'm Alicia Payne, the Member for Canberra. And it's great to be here today in the electorate with Aged Care Minister Sam Rae and Executive Director at Silverchain Carolyn Bell.
Today, 1 October, is actually the International Day of Older People. And it makes it a really special day that we are making this announcement that, from today personal care is fully funded and free for older Australians under the Support at Home package.
This is just one of the things that our government is doing to rebuild the aged care system that suffered so much under the previous government. And putting the care back into aged care and making it something that older Australians really deserve and something that we can actually not be fearful about going into, but something that provides our parents, our grandparents, our loved ones the support that they absolutely deserve.
It's great to be here at Silverchain, which is the largest not-for-profit provider of home support in Australia, and we look forward to hearing from Carolyn as well. Right now, I’ll hand over to Minister Sam Rae. Thanks.
SAM RAE, MINISTER FOR AGED CARE AND SENIORS: Thank you. Good morning. Lovely to be here on a beautiful Canberra spring morning of course with my colleague Alicia Payne, the Member for Canberra, a fantastic colleague, someone who advocates relentlessly to me and across the Parliament for her constituents, for people across Canberra, including older people. And it was obviously very nice to be here with Carolyn Bell as well. Silverchain are the largest not-for-profit provider of at home aged care services. We've got some wonderful staff and participants who we're going to be having morning tea with this morning as well.
As Alicia said, today's an important day. It's the International Day of Older People. It's an opportunity for us as a country and as a community to reflect on the enormous contributions that older Australians make within our families, within our community, and to our country more broadly. I’ve come this morning from a meeting with the Council of Elders, our premier advisory body for older people, to contribute to public policy as it pertains to aged care as well as ageing well across our society.
And today's a really important day in regards to the Support at Home program. Today marks the beginning of fully funded personal care under Support at Home. This is the kind of care where older people need assistance with showering, dressing, continence care, feeding - these type of critically important things that allow older folks to live with dignity and ensure that they can maintain an ongoing level of health.
From today, there will be no co-contributions associated with that personal care. The Federal Labor Government will fully fund all that care as it does with all clinical care under the Support at Home program. Now we always said, from the time that support at home began 11 months ago on 1 November 2025, that through this generational reform program, we would listen, we would pay attention, we would monitor and, importantly, we would respect the advice that older people gave us about the care that they needed as well as the advice that came from these incredible human beings, the workers who provide that support every single day. And that's what this change is about. We’ve listened, we’ve heard, we're removing co-contributions for personal care. And as a result, we'll be able to deliver a higher level of care for these amazing older Australians who continue to make such extraordinary contribution.
On that note, I'm going to hand over to Carolyn, and then we'll take some questions.
CAROLYN BELL, SILVERCHAIN EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Thank you, Minister. We welcome today’s announcement from the government that Support at Home personal care will be fully funded from 1 October, and that there will be no out-of-pocket costs for older Australians. Personal care, it's not optional and it's not incidental. Showering, dressing, hygiene, continence support, medication assistance are vital to a person’s care, to their independence, to their dignity, to their safety and to their health.
This is a really important decision and change for our older Australians. No Australian, older Australian, should have to make a choice between essential care and other household expenses. This decision is welcomed by us. Silverchain, as Australia's largest not for profit provider of in-home aged care, has seen just how vital this decision is. It's removed a really significant barrier and has provided peace of mind for our older community to be able to access care that they need, and for us to be able to provide the support that older Australians need. Thank you.
RAE: Wonderful. And on that note, if there aren’t any questions, we have some older Australians and some fantastic aged care workers than we need to spend some time with on this International Day for Older People. So thank you very much.