Webinar 10: Aged Care Reforms – Impacts on the MPS program & providers – webinar recording

[Opening visual of slide with text saying ‘INTERNAL INVITE: Aged Care Reforms – Impacts on the MPS program and providers’]

[The visuals during this webinar are of each speaker presenting in turn via video, with reference to the content of a PowerPoint presentation being played on screen]

Cathy Milfull:

Hi all. Thanks for joining us. We’ll just wait a minute or two to give a few more people a chance to join and then we’ll get started.

All right. Thanks everyone. Look we might get started. So thank you for joining us again today for this next webinar in our MPS Reform series. For those who don’t know me my name is Cathy Milfull. I’m currently Acting Assistant Secretary of what’s known as Thin Markets Branch in the Department and we have responsibility for the Multi-Purpose Service Program. So I’ll be hosting the webinar again today. It’s great to be with you again after a little break. I’m also really pleased to introduce Kate Harkins who’s on the screen as well. Kate’s the Director of the MPSP team and she’ll be presenting today as well and joining me on the panel.

So as per normal we’ll do a bit of a formal presentation to start with as well as a question and answer session at the end. So as usual we’ve got the comments on the right and the Q&A function so please feel free to pop through your comments, your questions. You don’t need to wait until the end. And we’re really keen for you to do this to make that as interactive as possible. 

So that’s basically I think the housekeeping for today. I’ll get the team to bring up the slides so we can get going with the presentation. 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Multi-Purpose Service Program (MPSP)’, ‘Webinar #10’, ‘Aged care reforms:’, ‘Impacts on the MPSP & providers’, ‘5 August 2025’, ‘Thin Markets Branch’, ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘www.health.gov.au’]

But before I do I just wanted to acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands on which we are all meeting today across Australia where we live, learn and work. I would like to pay my respects to Elders past and present and emerging and recognise their resilience and strength and their rich contribution to society. And also of course to extend my special respect to any Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples here with us today.

So let’s get started. So this first slide really outlines what we intend to cover today. As you can see it’s been a little while since our last webinar. So today I’m afraid you’ll hear quite a bit from me today and just giving you a series of MPSP reform updates so we’re all up to scratch. I’m then going to talk a bit more about home care specifically in the Multi-Purpose Service Program from the 1st of November as we’ve been getting quite a few questions about this. We also want to touch base with you on some work we’re hoping to progress around what home care under the program should look like into the future. I’ll then pass to Kate and she’s going to talk to you about some further resources that are being developed in her team to assist you to prepare for 1 November and the implementation of the new Act. We’ll then round up the day as normal with our Q&A session.

So the next slide again just a reminder of our suggested schedule for the next webinar topics. You’ll see we’ve shifted back to monthly webinars again. This is really just to ensure we keep talking to you in the lead up to the implementation of the Act which as you’d be aware has been delayed just slightly until the 1st of November. We’ll then reconsider our webinar schedule again in the new year.

As you can see on this screen at the September webinar our intention is to walk you through key information that will be contained in our new MPSP Policy Manual. So I’d really encourage you to attend that webinar. We’ll also try and give you an update on some of our broader Thin Markets projects that are underway, namely the MMM review or the review of remoteness for aged care which I’m sure some of you would be aware of with consultation period recently just closing. And many thanks to all those who participated in that.

The October webinar will then really focus on final preparations for 1 November and we’re hoping to have our My Aged Care or MAC team along to talk to you about systems functionality that will be available from 1 November to support older people accessing services under the MPSP from that date. The November webinar, really we’re just keeping a placeholder to make sure there’s a chance for you to talk to us directly if you’ve got implementation questions after the new Act commences. And so if there are particular hot issues I’d encourage you to send them through from November and we can make sure that we address them then and also get along any guest speakers from other areas if needed. At the moment December we’re thinking we’d focus on the MPSP funding model review including deep dive outcomes.

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘MPSP reform updates’, ‘Cathy Milfull, Thin Markets Branch, ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘www.health.gov.au’]

All right. So moving on. We’ll go into the updates now. So the first thing I just wanted to mention, you’ve probably seen in the media but our Aged Care and Other Legislation Amendment Bill was introduced to Parliament last month and it’s making its way through the Parliamentary process. So this Bill passed the House on the 30th of July and it’s now before the Senate. But it has been referred to a Senate Legislation Committee with a report due back by the 21st of August. So I just wanted to clarify for everyone this Bill basically amends the new Aged Care Act for 1 November as well as the Consequential and Transitionals Act that went through Parliament. So I’ll ask the team to put the link to the Bill in the chat for you in case you’re interested. But I guess just to say no major concerns here. There’s really no major impact for MPSP in terms of these changes. The Bill just contains a couple of technical amendments for us just to actually make sure that things operate for 1 November as we intended for MPSP and as per our conversations with you through these webinars.

Next up just to touch base on the Rules. So I think the good news for everyone is that there is now a full consolidated draft of the Aged Care Rules available on our website. Again I’ll get the team to put the link in the chat for you. Essentially that’s all the Rules together, so the ones that you would have seen come out in tranches over the year. It’s put together in one consolidated version. It also contains any amendments based on stakeholder feedback. And I won’t go through them all now but there’s a bit of a list on the slide here for you as to the main changes related to our program. Again very minor and technical amendments and don’t actually really make any significant changes. They were more to clarify things that we had always intended to be the case.

I will just probably point out too there were some amendments to sections 166 and 155 and that was just to make sure that MPS are exempt from certain obligations that we considered appropriate. So that was missed apologies in previous tranches, but we’ve caught that on this round.

The last thing then to come will be the Transitional Rules and I’m hoping that I can take you through those at the next webinar. But we’ll share information on that with the jurisdictions as soon as we can.

All right. Next up. The new Act is obviously a very critical step for the Commonwealth aged care system with a new person-centred rights-based system to be implemented. But we also of course want to continue to improve MPSP arrangements to ensure older people in rural and remote Australia can continue to access quality and safe aged care. So for this reason – and noting changes in the timeframes for the new Act – it’s really been time to update the MPS reform schedule that we’ve been using at these webinars to reflect our priorities post 1 November. So I just wanted to flag we’ve developed a draft revised schedule in consultation with the MPSP Working Group and subject to the agreement of the Government and jurisdictions we hope to share this with you at either the September or October webinar.

But in the interim I’d certainly encourage you to have a think about any further reforms or changes to the MPS that you think you would like us to prioritise and I’d encourage you to share that with your state and territory health representatives or with my team.

But just before moving on obviously this is kind of the old reform schedule on the screen and shows you what we’ve done recently and the next things for October and November. So I just wanted to say overall a massive thank you to everyone. It has been a big 12 months in particular and we really couldn’t have got to where we are without the help of everyone on this call. So thank you.

And just on that note this next screen just gives you an idea of where we will be when we reach 1 November. And as you can see from the table here I think you can see that quite a lot will have changed for the MPSP. But in saying that this doesn’t mean that we’re done. Far from it. We want to ensure that the program continues to be sustainable, future focused and reflects the challenges providers in thin markets face in terms of viable service delivery and the benefits that can be delivered to local communities through integrated care arrangements. But as always we want to make any further changes to program arrangements in close consultation with jurisdictions and providers and in a way that works for the program. So we’ll continue to do that.

All right. Next topic is just a bit of an update on the reform trials that we’ve had underway, so starting with the 24/7 registered nurse trial. So just to flag that phase two of this, which basically required all our MPS to report on their 24/7 situation, has now been completed. All but five of our sites reported as required which is great and compliance rates were extremely high with over 90% compliance noted across the program. So a big thank you to everyone for their participation in that second phase.

Just to let you know my team has finalised analysis of data collected during that phase and will send a summary of findings in the coming weeks. But I did want to share with you just in advance that essentially what the team found was that there were 15 sites overall that did not meet the 24/7 requirement during this period, however ten of those would be eligible to apply for an exemption under the mainstream exemptions currently in place for 24/7. So as a result when we roll out fully the intention is to make sure those mainstream exemptions are available. My team will then be meeting individually with the five sites who fall outside of that criteria to explore the best way forward in their specific situation and any further adjustments that are needed.

So given that situation and the success of the trial we’re confident that we can now move to formal implementation of 24/7 registered nursing for the MPSP. And that’s a position that’s supported by our reform sub-working group and the working group. So subject to Government agreement that’s our intention and we’re planning a phased implementation for 2026. Just to flag the reason that that’s been delayed a little bit is to allow for completion of the necessary legislative amendments to ensure we can do some further monitoring and analysis of required exemptions and work with those providers who didn’t meet the requirement but fell outside of the exemption requirements, and to ensure that we only have a limited gap between formal implementation and the availability of online reporting functionality.

So you can see kind of the phased approach that we’re talking about in the diagram on the bottom of this slide. And basically the intention is until that time we would extend the actual trial arrangements to cover us up until 30 June 2026. And during that extended trial period we will just do some ad hoc manual reporting for three one month periods. So you can see at the moment AN-ACC commences. Then February and April next year. And then all going well we would commence the obligation from 1 July. On 1 October or soon after we would then commence monthly reporting obligations. And that will be when online functionality is available in GPMS for you to do that so that you don’t have to do it manually.

All right. So that’s 24/7. Next up is the direct care target trial. So again this is proceeding a little bit slower but it is now moving along which is great to see. So we’ve just finished pilot one under that phase. So that’s piloting AN-ACC assessments being undertaken at specific trial sites. So as you can see from the screen here 260 residents at 16 MPS had an assessment undertaken. And that included one site in Tassie, three sites in South Australia, New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and WA. In Victoria and WA we also conducted separate assessments where there was a low acuity lodge separated from the main MPS site to again help inform design of direct care targets in an MPS context. So thank you very much to absolutely everybody who helped with that pilot. There were some quite short timeframes and we really appreciate everybody’s assistance to do everything in time and finish that off by the end of the financial year.

All right. So in terms of calculating the direct care targets basically following the trial results the assessment data was sent through to my team from assessors on the ground. This includes resident scores which had an algorithm applied to determine the classification for each resident. My team then used this score plus the care minutes target calculator that you might have seen on our website to calculate acuity levels for each individual resident, the AN-ACC score for each site and the required RN minutes per site and an average as well where there was that low acuity lodge situation. They also calculated a state average across the trial sites.

So what’s coming next. Well basically as I said the team is now working on a summary of findings for each trial site and that will go to the reform sub-working group in the coming weeks. The next steps for phase 2 then is also to explore appropriate methods that can be used by providers to report against agreed direct care targets. This includes a time in motion study which has been brought forward to September to again avoid overlapping with implementation of the new Act. The current 16 trial sites that participated in pilot one will be prioritised for this work but it is open to all MPS who are interested regardless of their current levels of participation. So if you do want to participate please email us at our MPS reforms mailbox and my team will get back to you.

Also just flagging that alongside the time in motion study my team are also researching state and territory mandated staff nursing ratios to see how they could potentially link in and/or reduce required direct care reporting. So that’s again to explore different ways of how we could provide assurance of direct care targets being met in an integrated care context.

So then at this stage just to clarify for everyone we’re now looking at commencing a full trial of the direct care target arrangements from 1 October 2026. And what that looks like will obviously depend on what we get out of those final pilots and further discussions with you all and the states and territories. The idea then again is quite similar to 24/7. We trial it for a year with everybody prior to full implementation which would be on 1 October 2027 or after that. Noting that depending on what solution we all decide on there is likely to be required IT changes to facilitate reporting functionality for this obligation as well.

All right. That’s trials. Next up we just wanted to touch base on some data collection matters. So client deeming which we’ve talked about quite a bit in the past. My team have advised that as of mid-July we had received all but one of the 183 tranche two client deeming workbooks. So firstly and most importantly just want to say a big thank you and well done to everyone. That’s fantastic. Also the team have said that they’ve sent back feedback on those workbooks to everyone except those that perhaps possibly came in a bit later. And the positive news was that those second set of workbooks showed a lot less quality data issues. So we’re hoping that we will be actually in a good position by the time the third workbook gets submitted at the end of October. So after that occurs my team will be in touch in early November to clarify if there’s any additional information or adjustments required.

I also just wanted to flag that we will need everyone alongside that October workbook submission process to email the Department to confirm that the information provided is accurate and that the client consents were obtained in accordance with instructions that we’ve provided you earlier. So don’t worry. We will give you some draft words that you can use for this process and that’s just to make sure we’re clear noting that this has been an iterative process.

After the third submission is finalised just flagging too that the Department will be asking providers to distribute to people in their care a form letter developed by the Department which will basically confirm their approval to access care under the new Act. But we plan to talk about that with you at the next webinar. So more to come on that one.

Other thing in terms of data. Just wanted to flag I’m sure you’re all aware that providers now have until the 31st of August to complete their annual activity report and their client demographic documentation. I just wanted to flag that sorry, we’re normally pretty flexible, but this is a hard deadline as the information is required by this date to enable the Department to meet its own annual reporting deadlines. As a result your assistance to meet this timeframe is appreciated. And if you do need assistance I’d just ask that you reach out sooner rather than later. You can email my team at the MPS aged care mailbox if you need some help. You might also be aware the team actually did a webinar on the reports back on the 2nd of July to help with lots of frequently asked questions answered there. So if you missed that I believe it’s now up on the Department’s website so I’d encourage you to check that one out.

I did want to say too we do appreciate the volume of the work required to gather this data but it is important that we have it to inform policy development on the program, also to assess the Department’s performance in terms of improving access to services in rural and remote Australia which we are responsible for, and also to measure current and future demand for services including occupancy rates across Australia.

So in short all the reporting documentation and links were emailed to providers in early July. So if for some reason you didn’t get those please let us know as soon as possible and my team will send that out to you immediately. And I guess just on a positive note – makes you feel better about the task ahead – you’ll be pleased to know that the annual activity report has also been streamlined. So there’s 29 less questions than you had to do last year. The statement of income and expenditure report which is not due until a bit later on the 31st of October as well, so that gives you some more time. And the team have updated the declaration on this document so you only need one signature instead of two. So hopefully that’s a bit of a further saving for you as well.

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Home care in the MPSP’, ‘from 1 November 2025 and beyond’, ‘Cathy Milfull, Thin Markets Branch’, ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘www.health.gov.au’]

All right. So next up I think we’ll just go to the next topic. So we’re going to now talk about home care in the MPSP. So look basically just to explain this session we have been asked to come back to you all with a bit more information on how home care would actually operate for MPS under the new Act. So I hope to use this session to do that. But I’m also really keen to start a broader conversation with you all regarding the role and value proposition of home care moving forward in the context of the MPSP. So with the new Act and obviously new funding model for MPSP being explored I think it’s really important for us to think about are the current arrangements working effectively or are there things that we can do better, particularly when we’ve got Support at Home also commencing on 1 November.

So just to give you a bit of context before we dive in you may remember that the Department distributed a survey last year and we specifically asked some questions about how you deliver home care. So we got about 180 responses and these really showed that all MPS in some way are basically involved in delivery of home care. So that might be directly. It might be indirectly through subcontracting arrangements. And it could be under MPS but alternatively it could be under other programs like HCP or CHSP.

So as you can see here the survey results indicated that 108 MPS actually provide home care services through MPS using their MPS funding and 97 of those MPS are directly funded for this through basically having home care places allocated to their MPS. What the results also showed was that basically MPS used home care funding for 77% of clients. So that’s where they actually used their MPS funding to deliver the home care. In other cases they were using funding from other programs like HCP or CHSP. Or some providers, which is completely legitimate, were using their MPS residential care place funding flexibly to cater for home care in their community.

All right. So in that survey and in subsequent discussions we’ve also been asking MPS providers to categorise which home care services they delivered to inform discussions around registration arrangements and the new Act and future thinking. So what we found is that personal care, domestic assistance, transport, social support and meals are the top categories of services that seem to be being delivered by MPS across the country. But if you want some more detail this slide just shows you the services that were most commonly provided.

All right. So moving onto the new world. As we’ve talked about before – and sorry, this might be a little repetitive but we just want to get everyone on the same page with this – under the new world home care can be delivered through three service groups. Home support, assistive technology and home modifications. Service delivery must be consistent with a person’s access approval and the provider’s registration. But at this stage that shouldn’t be such an issue for us with all MPSP providers registered across all registration categories at this stage. Services must be delivered as well in the location specified in your MPS Agreement and delivered through your MPS but that can be via subcontracted service delivery arrangements. The real restriction here is that the location that’s in your MPS Agreement can’t be an MMM1. So it can’t be a metropolitan area because we have legislative restrictions on the use of the MPS Program because it is designed to cater for regional, rural and remote but particularly rural and remote areas of Australia.

So just flagging that as a default the new Act Agreements that are being signed at the moment have listed the approved location for service delivery for home care as the town in which the MPS is located. This will also then be reflected in transitional conditions on places already allocated to providers. But if you want to change this you can have that discussion with us. We will just need to vary the condition on your places and/or potentially update your agreement.

All right. So just in terms of – probably today really the focus is on home support service group because as you can probably see from this slide the most common services delivered by MPS will be available through this service group. But we did just want to again clarify that where a person has been approved for services to be – so if someone’s got a home support approval and they’ve been approved to get those services on an ongoing basis – so under legislation that’s known as a classification type of ongoing – there are no restrictions on the amount of those services that can be provided by the MPS. So you can determine at your own discretion based on the needs of the client how much of these services should be provided using the Commonwealth funding that we provide on a block funded basis. There is also no requirement to spend a particular amount on a person either.

Duration time limits however should be complied with under policy where the person is approved for short term services only. So just to clarify what I mean by that. If you’re looking at the access approval and you see someone has been approved for home support but it said it’s short term, and you’ll probably see that they’ve either been placed in the restorative care pathway or the end of life pathway, that means they don’t have approval for ongoing services. So here we would ask that you comply with those time limits. But at the same time the same normal MPSP rules apply in that there’s no restrictions on the amount of services you provide for that time period or the cost of services delivered during that time period.

So in short an MPS provider can deliver services that a participant has been approved access using their block funding as long as they do so in a manner consistent with their MPSP Agreement and they are registered in the relevant registration categories.

Okay. So moving on just to give you a bit more detail here. As we’ve talked about in terms of accessing home care from November essentially I think the queries to be honest that have really come up is not sort of about MPS but what are the interactions for a person where they might access services under MPS partly and under another program partly. So that’s what we’re going to try and dig into a little bit more now. 

But firstly just to go back to basics as previously discussed to access home support services from 1 November all individuals will need to apply to the Department, be considered eligible, undergo a needs assessment, be approved to access the relevant services and given a classification. Just remember the only exception to that is alternative entry arrangements. And they don’t remove the need for that assessment and approval. They just effectively let you gain that retrospectively. For MPS we think that will be an important pathway and that’s why we actually provided a significant circumstance if you like in the rules that people under MPS can use for this circumstance. So if there’s going to be a significant delay in an individual getting their assessment you can commence services and then help them to apply retrospectively.

Okay. So next up. To deliver services as I said the person needs to be approved for one of those three home care service groups. They will also need to have a classification decision. For Support at Home I just wanted to clarify individuals also need to have a classification level in effect and be given a place allowing them to access funding after any necessary waiting periods. Individuals in this situation need to wait on the Support at Home prioritisation system for their place allocation. Just to make absolutely clear that is not the case if an individual wants to use the MPS Program. So the classification level or budget that is allocated to a person will not be relevant where a provider delivers home support services to them under the MPSP. And that’s because of our block funded arrangements.

So how will this work in practice? I just wanted to flag that if the person that you’re dealing with is an area where they can only access services through an MPS and that is what they discuss with their assessor and that’s indicated as their preference, they want to stay in their local area, they want to get the assistance of the MPS, they will be given an MPS referral code to give to the MPS. And this will be included in their support plan. Where that scenario occurs the person will not be placed in the prioritisation queue for Support at Home and that’s because they’re not actually seeking Support at Home services at that time. However if the person indicates they may also seek services from Support at Home they can be added to the prioritisation queue and given a Support at Home referral code. So that way you would actually have two separate referral codes.

You might want to know what happens if they change their mind. So a person can always contact My Aged Care and indicate that they are now actually seeking services for Support at Home even though they’d indicated differently in their assessment, and they can always be added to that Support at Home prioritisation queue and it shouldn’t be to their disadvantage in any way. To gain a new MPS referral code where one was not required upfront there is an issue that a reassessment will however be required. But I just wanted to say that’s just going to be on the papers. It’s not actually a full formal assessment. But the person or the provider on their behalf or their supporter will need to talk to My Aged Care, get a reassessment on the papers and get that referral code for them.

So look I appreciate that’s probably a lot to take in. We hope in one of our future webinars before November we can give you a demonstration on how some of that will work in practice on the systems. But I think the main point which some people were quite worried about is that yes you can access services under both the MPS Program and Support at Home at the same time through different providers or even the same provider provided the same services are not accessed on the same day. Because obviously the person shouldn’t effectively have been getting funding twice for the same service. 

Just to give you an example before we finish this topic, for example an individual might want to access gardening and meals through Support at Home and nursing care via the MPS. So that’s absolutely possible but just as we discussed Support at Home can only be available once they’ve got their place and gone through any waiting periods. Also just probably to flag that obviously if you’re a provider delivering services under these different programs the funding and service delivery should be tracked separately and reported on separately.

All right. So I might leave the 1 November world behind now but please feel free to put more questions in the chat or ask us in the Q&A session. Because I appreciate that is quite complicated. But I guess everyone I would like to do a bit of future thinking. So I just wanted to flag – and look I probably won’t talk too much about this but I wanted to put up for you a series of questions that I proposed to the members of the MPSP Working Group, so your state and territory health representatives actually yesterday. And this was really about how could we possibly improve delivery of home services under MPSP into the future. So this I guess reflects some of the things I have definitely been thinking about having been involved in this program since early last year, but you guys of course are the experts so I would really encourage you to look at these questions, have a think, and make some suggestions where you think we could do things differently or a better way that would help us increase access for older people in rural and remote communities. Even initial thought bubbles, suggestions, comments, very welcome on the chat today. As I discussed with your state and territory health representatives yesterday we then might think about actually running some targeted design and discussion workshops on home care specifically with jurisdictions. And I think it would be great if we could then bring those findings back to this broader group to test and improve.

But anyway that’s just really to give you some food for thought. But really the end of my formal presentation today, so I will now hand over to Kate who’s going to take you through some more practical matters regarding getting ready for the new Act on 1 November. Thanks Kate.

Kate Harkins:

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Preparation for 1 November:’, ‘Readiness checklist/Service Agreement template’, ‘Kate Harkins, Thin Markets Branch’, ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘www.health.gov.au’]

Thanks Cathy. And hello everyone. As Cathy mentioned a readiness checklist was developed earlier this year following some service providers asking for more clarification about what needs to be organised in the lead up to 1 November. So the good news is that work has progressed and this will now be cross checked against the final set of consolidated rules that have recently been published.

If we go to the next slide I can show you what the provider readiness checklist will look like. So as you can see it’s a very high level document that really takes you through the key aspects of things that you should start thinking about now to make sure that you’re ready for 1 November. So a couple of things I’ll just point out. In terms of the older person you really need to have some systems in place to make sure that they understand the Statement of Rights. You should check if they have a supporter or a representative that they would like you to engage with. And you should also let them know about how to provide feedback or raise a concern.

In terms of processes and systems you’ll want to start thinking about things like fees, making sure that your systems align with the new rules around that, the new referral process. You’ll also need to make sure that the system aspects have all been wrapped up before 1 November. So when I say that I mean client deeming and making sure that your MPS Agreement is back with us and signed ready to proceed.

And then I guess the kind of umbrella thinking – we’ll just go back – is around making sure that you understand the ICT processes and the reporting processes. The last thing in there that I know we haven’t spoken to you about too much but is continuous improvement. So it’s probably the time to start thinking about how you’re going to measure continuous improvement which is one of your obligations after November 1. So this readiness checklist as I say will have a final check against the rules that have just been released and the Act as its been amended and then that will be put up on our website and we’ll be sure to let you know when you can access that.

The next template that we’ve prepared to assist you with the transition to the new Aged Care Act is a Service Agreement template. So we’re currently working with our legal colleagues to make sure that it’s absolutely correct but it should be out there for you soon. So the really important thing for you to understand is that because the Service Agreement template is a new requirement we are putting this template together to assist you. It’s still really, really important that you look at your own requirements and your own needs and that you check that it’s suitable for use before using it. I’d also flag that it doesn’t incorporate everything that you need to do when a client starts engaging with you. So it doesn’t replace a care and services plan or an accommodation plan. You will still need to do both of those including with your transitional cohort in addition to the Service Agreement template.

So the Service Agreement template has been sent to the Working Group representatives that represent each of your state and territories and they will have a little while to look at it and provide some feedback. And then we’ll get that final legal clearance and we’ll be able to send that out with you shortly. 

I think that’s everything from me and so I’ll hand back to Cathy for the Q&A.

Cathy Milfull:

Thanks Kate. And thanks everyone. And thanks to my team who’ve been making my job easier by getting onto these questions in the chat early. So we’ve got a few questions answered already around 24/7 which is great. And just Cathy to you too, obviously there’s Support at Home materials but where possible we will certainly include information in our MPSP Policy Manual. From memory – Kate can correct me – but we certainly have a section that kind of explains some of these interactions with other programs and we’ll certainly continue to expand on that with some practical advice too I think as issues come to the fore past 1 November. Because I think this will be a bit of a test out the different scenarios that regularly occur and it might be quite different I suspect across Australia. So we’ll certainly keep you posted on that.

Apart from that I can see that we’ve got a few comments around my home care questions. So thank you for that. Ashlee just wanted to acknowledge transport options is a really interesting one and I’d be keen to pick that a bit more with everyone. Certainly as you’re aware my team have been out and about as well doing our MMM remoteness classification review and I’ve got to say that travel and transport costs are already a common theme raised in those consultations to date. So particular concerns about the costs of transport, long travel distances and insufficient availability of transport in rural and remote areas. So it would be I think really interesting to explore the role of the MPS in that space and whether I guess – again I guess this is sort of my question. Could we support MPS to provide that kind of broader role in certain regions to really support for example gaps in supply with that. 

And Clare as well. Thank you for your comments around block funding. And I think yes that’s certainly something that (a) we need to explore in the context of the MPS funding model review but Clare to your point as well I think community expectations is an important one. And Kate and team have put together some great fact sheets for clients as well. I think come 1 November that is something we do need to kind of work together as a group to make sure people understand obviously that MPS is there to support their local community but it doesn’t mean they’re going to be able to provide all services at all times. And we certainly understand that. So I will say some of our systems probably will not provide the clearest advice in that regard and that’s why Kate and I have been working hard to make sure those comms materials are available and we can communicate those messages out to the community.

All right. I think Clare’s got a fact sheet question I can see that Kate can probably answer while I’m reading other ones.

Kate Harkins:

Yes. Hi Clare. The good news is that the fact sheets should be available hopefully next week, worst case the week after. They will be available on our website. So what we’ve done to help both older people and providers is that we’ve got a version of the fact sheet that kind of prepares people for the change and then we’ve got a separate set of fact sheets on the same topics that will be uploaded on the 1st of November and reflect that this is now the current situation. So instead of waiting for 1 November we’re definitely working towards giving everybody as much advance notice as we possibly can. So I will definitely let everybody know as soon as they do go up.

Cathy Milfull:

Thanks Kate. And really great work with those fact sheets. And look if people have other ideas or suggestions please just let us know. There may be new things that come up past 1 November that we want to deal with and we’ll be very responsive to that. I can see Monique from New South Wales asking a tricky question around direct care trial funding. So thanks Monique. I’ll try my best. We might need to clarify this one offline. But I think in short as you know the current MPS direct care trial funding if you like basically was provided to all sites and the idea was so that everybody can start thinking and getting ready for the formal implementation of direct care when it happens, but also we wanted to reflect that asking you all to participate as well in our trials and activities is at cost to you all. So that was kind of the approach at this stage. So I don’t think at this stage Monique – my initial answer. I will ponder that further – I don’t think that needs to change for now. I think it’s probably a bit early. We just need to consider what happens in the further pilots and work out what it is – because as you know we’re not saying we’re just going to implement the current direct care minutes approach. We are exploring other options. So I would suggest probably a bit early to be considering shifting that funding around. But happy to have a further conversation with you and others perhaps at the next Working Group if that helps.

What else have we got team? Wynne. 

Kate Harkins:

We have a question from Wynne about how do we essentially support older people who may not wish to undertake the formal approvals process?

Cathy Milfull:

Yeah. Okay. All the tricky questions today guys. Thanks. No. That’s actually good. And thank you Wynne. Look I think it is an issue and I think we even touched on it a bit at the Working Group yesterday in the sense that the reality is that we have the new Act and it does restrict access to Government funding for those who have gone through the approvals process or as I mentioned the alternative entry. So that is important in terms of the Government’s decision but also legislatively and constitutionally the Department is actually restricted on what it can use its funding for and what we provide it to providers to use for. 

So we are restricted but I think Wynne as you know one of the strategic priorities of this Department is really to focus on health prevention. So we are trying to make sure that we’re taking a proactive approach. So again that’s something I’m really interested to look at and I think particularly in this home care space, future home care space, we know that some MPS are running kind of sessions to help people age well and stay healthy and of course that’s something that obviously is very positive for our rural and remote communities. I think we just need to work together to have a think about what is the scope of those activities and how can we make sure they’re funded correctly. What does fall under aged care for which the Commonwealth’s responsible for and what options do we have available? So very happy to have that conversation moving forward as well.

All right. Anything else Kate have I missed?

Kate Harkins:

Yes. So Elissa. I think you’ve just answered Elissa’s question because she was also asking about clients who are not assessed under the Act and them accessing kind of preventative health services through the flexible funding. But I think that that falls under that same category, that we just need to make sure that we’re complying with the law and looking at other options there.

And Roslyn Smith has I guess more of a comment than anything. She’s reflected on an MPS provider who’s funded to deliver CHSP as well and in those environments there’s duplication and competition for resources. And the current situation is that where that occurs they deliver those services under the CHSP and not under the MPS. So I’ll let you jump in. 

Cathy Milfull:

Yeah. I think that’s really useful Ros and I think that’s one of the things we’re keen to explore is at the moment even why is a provider – and I can think of a few – but why are they delivering that particular service with their HCP hat on, why with their CHSP hat on, why with their MPS hat on. And I think I’d be really interested to explore that and particularly with Support at Home coming and eventually subsuming if you like CHSP hopefully from 2027 onwards. We really want to understand I guess how that’s going to impact the operations of an MPS and is there a better way we can do it. Because I know I’ve been fortunate enough to be part of some of these deep dive conversations that my team has been running and I think it was just clear to me that some of the struggles of people delivering things under CHSP banner and then under the MPS banner, so I think it’s worth thinking about how we can maybe – is there any streamlining that we can do in that area. Not promising it but I would really like to explore that. 

Kate Harkins:

I also think it will be really interesting to see what happens with that in the next 12 months once the referrals limit, kind of who you can access your service from and really clearly prescribe what services can be accessed under those different banners. So potentially this is something that might see a bit of improvement with the new referral system as well.

Cathy Milfull:

Thanks Kate. I agree. And for everyone don’t forget – I know there’s probably some concern about new assessment arrangements and how that might impact your community and your staff, but one of the really good things is for the first time we will be collecting really good data as to what are the home care services that older people actually really need. And that’s one of the things you might remember the Royal Commission really raised concerns about back in the day in terms of do we actually have a good awareness of what are the needs of those communities out there. So I appreciate it’s a bit of a change but that will really allow us to plan better for the future but also to feed back information to providers about what is the unmet demand out there and what are the needs of the community. So we’re hoping that will be a big step forward.

One last question I think is there Kate?

Kate Harkins:

I think we’re up to date.

Cathy Milfull:

Alyssa. Okay. Yeah. So Alyssa’s was more about the preventative health issues. All right. Well if that is everybody I might – I’ll give everyone 30 more seconds to type something. Otherwise I will probably call it there. But thank you everyone for coming along, for participating. Really great to hear your thoughts and obviously keen to keep the conversation going. And if nothing else we will see you again in another month. Thanks everyone and many thanks Kate.

Kate Harkins:

Bye everyone.

Cathy Milfull:

Thanks everyone. Bye.

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