The Australian Government is returning to the time frame of 1 July 2024, put forward by the Royal Commission, to deliver a reformed and improved in-home aged care program. This extends the date from July 2023.
No one will lose any in-home aged care services they currently have in place through the Commonwealth Home Support Programme (CHSP) or the Home Care Packages (HCP) Program.
We will develop a better in-home aged care system in consultation with older Australians and community stakeholders.
Where we’re up to
In October 2022, we published a new program for in-home aged care discussion paper on which provided an update on the design of the program and took into consideration feedback from consultations during the year.
In January 2022, we began a data migration activity to capture older people who do not have an active client record in My Aged Care but are receiving CHSP services. More information is on the In-home aged care resources page.
Upcoming events
For the first part of 2023, we will be running targeted sessions with a range of stakeholders to inform final advice to government:
The full engagement calendar includes all proposed engagement activities.
Resources
Resources on reforming in-home aged care, include:
- Service Provider guidance materials for the missing CHSP client migration activity
- The discussion paper – A new program for in-home aged care and associated documents, including a summary of the paper available in 20 languages.
- Fact sheets for older Australians and providers on preparing for the new program
- Survey results and reports
Past consultation and research activities
We carried out a range of consultation and research to inform the reform of in-home aged care. Feedback from older Australians and the aged care sector is now being reviewed by the government. Consultation included:
- A series of workshops to discuss funding models, care management arrangements, access to goods, equipment and assistive technology, and home modifications. We held these workshops with older Australians, informal carers, aged care assessors, home care service providers, health and aged care professionals and peak bodies
- A Living Lab Trial to test a new aged care assessment model. We engaged Flinders University and the Global Centre for Modern Ageing to deliver this trial which incorporates a new assessment tool and assessment process.
- A Survey of Home Care Providers and a Commonwealth Home Support Programme data study to better understand current services.
- Research testing the new home care program design with older Australians and their carers, peak body organisations and home care providers.
- Research into the assessment and classification of older Australians to inform the alignment of services to needs. This included a comparison of the needs of senior Australians in residential aged care with those receiving support through a home care package.
- A Support at Home Program overview paper was released in January 2022 which provided insight into the proposed design at that time.
- A survey on the Service List was released in April 2022, asking older Australians, their informal carers, providers and professionals what services should be included in the new home care program. Please see the full report on In-home aged care service list – Survey results report.
- A Reforming in-home aged care and regulatory update webinar was held in August 2022, to update the sector on the status of reforming in-home age care, the proposed regulatory model, and the new aged care Act.
- Short Term Restorative Care survey seeking responses from providers and care recipients.
- Weekly Q&A sessions on the discussion paper in late October and November 2022 with Industry audiences, as well as older Australian and their carers and family
- A webinar in December 2022 to provide an update on the feedback received on the discussion paper. The webinar outlined the next steps for the reforms.
How you can get involved
Enquiries on the reforms or upcoming consultations can be sent to sah.implementation@health.gov.au
To receive the latest information and learn about engagement opportunities:
- subscribe to our newsletter
- sign up through the Ageing and Aged Care Engagement Hub.