CHARLIE PICKERING, HOST: Sam Rae is the Minister for Aged Care. Thanks for joining us.
SAM RAE, MINISTER FOR AGED CARE AND SENIORS: Hi, Charlie. Thanks for having me on.
HOST: Now, you just heard there from Stephen and Alex. They have family members who waited definitely too long for their care packages. It's safe to say, if a care package comes through after someone has died, that is too long.
RAE: Yes, it's always awful to hear from families or from older people themselves these sorts of stories where the system hasn't served them well. It's why our generational reforms in this space are so very important, Charlie. The system has been letting down older people for far too long. We saw a Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety that was damning of the former government and damning of the aged care system. And since we were elected in 2022, we've been working tirelessly to rebuild a system from the ground up that meets the needs of older people across our country.
HOST: So, this new system that you've been building from the ground up, why are we still seeing such long delays and waits to the point that it's stretching beyond death?
RAE: Well, notwithstanding those awful stories, and I assume that the ones that were shared with you yesterday were perhaps experiences under the old system or elements of the old system. The report that we put out earlier this week, while we always acknowledge that there's a lot more work to be done, showed the green shoots of improvement.
We're now seeing wait times for Support at Home package allocations starting to fall - that's the first time in a long time that we've been able to realise that ambition for older people. And as I said, there's a lot more work to be done, but having wait times across the board falling mean people are getting the care that they need quicker.
HOST: Patricia Sparrow from the Council on the Ageing said that she was happy to see those wait times coming down, but people are still waiting for six or seven months which can be very distressing for people who need care. And we've heard stories yesterday of people who, while they're waiting for the care they need they're having accidents and it's changing their long-term outlook and what their quality of life is now and going into the future. So, how can we stop that from happening, these long waits that still occur?
RAE: We have what's called a prioritisation mechanism, Charlie. That sits within the assessment process for aged care. What that does is, through the assessment process, the highly qualified assessors look at the needs of a person and what sort of supports they have in place. As part of that process they determine, essentially, what the priority is.
People who are classified as urgent priority in terms of their care always receive their package within a single month. And then, there's a high level, there's a medium priority, and a standard priority and, as you'd imagine, each of those are tiered. High priority receive theirs within one to two months. But you're right, out of the medium and standard priorities, people are waiting a little bit longer. And so, we want to keep bringing that down - that's what this report showed. I want us to continue to bring those wait times down and get as much care to people as quickly as we possibly can.
HOST: How common is it for cases like Stephen's to happen where a family member actually dies while they're still waiting month after month for one of these packages to come through?
RAE: It's such a distressing story that Stephen shared with you, Charlie, and with listeners. It does happen from time to time, unfortunately, when you are working closely with older people. Obviously their circumstances can change quickly, it's why we've invested in having an assessment system that can respond as quickly as possible. Under the old assessment system, sometimes people were waiting up to 10 months to get assessed for their aged care. And the new single assessment system that we've brought into place means that people are getting assessed within about a month. The median assessment time is now under a month consistently. Efficiency and fairness have been key priorities, key principles, about the way that we've sought to pursue these reforms.
HOST: We're talking with Minister for Aged Care Sam Rae and discussing the wait times associated with the Support at Home packages. The wait times you have told me on 1300-222-774 are still too long. Minister, when you joined this program a few months ago you spoke about the changes to the queue rate to reduce those wait times. Has that kicked in? Have those changes taken effect? And has there been any improvement?
RAE: Yes, they have. And they were put into place at that last time when I spoke to, I think it was Ali at that time, Charlie. They have been put into effect, and they're part of why we've been able to drive down these wait times.
Perhaps it might be helpful just to take a step back here and understand the problem that we face as a community. We've got an ageing population and the population is ageing at a rate that our country has never seen before. But one of the measures that the experts use is people turning 80, who's having an 80th birthday party this year. Now, next year, there will be 90,000 Australians who will turn 80. About 15 years ago, that was only 15,000 Australians. So, it's grown sixfold in 15 years.
And so, this question about an ageing population and their consequential care considerations, this is really one of the key public policy considerations of our time. Demand is going to continue to grow. We need a sustainable aged care system that delivers high-quality, dignified care and delivers it fairly across our community.
HOST: You said the wait times are a month for an assessment, and that has improved significantly. Why then is there such a long wait, once the assessment is done, for the care packages to actually come through? Are they going through third parties? Is there an extra layer of administration? I mean, if someone is approved, surely, it's time for action at that point.
RAE: We have what's called the national priority system. As I mentioned, there's a priority process, a prioritisation process. Anyone who's assessed as urgent receives their package within a month, within a single month always. If you're high priority, it's one to two months. The way the national priority system works is that it looks at the people who need the care the most as determined through their assessment process, and it allocates the available care accordingly.
But we know that there haven't been enough packages in the system. It's why this financial year, we've released an additional 83,000 packages of care. And next financial year, we're going to go again, we're going to put another 32,000 packages of care into the system. We need to keep growing the system to meet that growing demand.
HOST: Given that there's still the impression - a number of callers and texters that we've had coming in that [say] that wait is still long. Despite those added numbers that you're talking about, it's still taking too long to come through. That combined with the problem that you talk about - that we are getting older and we are only going to have more and more Australians who need and deserve these packages - do you have a plan for how we not only solve the problem now, but how we handle that growth going forward? Are you confident that you can meet that demand when it comes?
RAE: This is why this reform process is so important, Charlie. This is a generational reform. This is not tweaking around the edges. We've written a whole new Aged Care Act - it's the first time that we've had a new legislative framework for aged care since 1997. I was in Year 5 at Fadden Primary School back then, I'm not sure what you were doing. So this is such a drastic change to the way that our aged care system works.
We've also introduced this new Support at Home program. We know people want to age in place. They want to stay in their homes for as long as possible, as long as it's safe to do so. They want to be close to family and friends and community, and we want to support them to do that. But of course, we need to grow the system in order to keep up with that demand. It's why we're continuing to invest year after year, Budget after Budget, to make sure that the system can keep up with the demand growth that's coming down the pipeline.
HOST: Sam, I'm grateful that you came on to talk about it today, so soon after we brought it up on the show and decided it was something that needed our attention. But as I said, it's on our to-do list. So we've done the talking. Minister, if it's okay, we'll check back in a little later in the year. We'll let some time pass, and we'll see how it's performing in the coming months. It's on my to-do list to shorten these wait times, and I realise that's probably on your to-do list as well -You're maybe more responsible than I am. But Sam Rae, Minister for Aged Care, thank you for your time this afternoon.
RAE: Thanks, Charlie. I look forward to coming back again.