Ms HALL (12:53 PM) —I do not think any issue causes more angst within our community than that of ensuring that older Australians, those frail older Australians, have adequate care in their final years. The Aged Care Amendment Bill 2000 is reactive legislation. It seeks to amend the Aged Care Act by introducing two minor technical amendments to address flaws and inadequacies in the original legislation—amendments that many of the speakers before me have detailed. But, really, these amendments do not address the problems that are causing widespread anxiety within our community. They do not go to the core of the problems and the concerns that are gnawing at the hearts of frail older Australians and their families. It is amendments of that kind that should be being introduced here today to amend that original legislation that has failed all older Australians.

The concerns that I have revolve around the shortage of nursing home beds in many regions—particularly in my own region of Shortland, the circumstances of which I will detail in a moment—which has led to growing waiting lists or waiting times for beds; the lack of surprise inspections to monitor care standards (and that has been demonstrated very visually in this parliament over some time); the bungled implementation of accreditation, which has left many residents and providers uncertain about the future of the operation of nursing homes; and ineffective sanctions, which allow substandard nursing homes to continue to operate. How will these amendments change those things? I cannot see how they will. I am also concerned about the systematic failure of the Aged Care Complaints Resolution Scheme, which has been identified in the recent Commonwealth Ombudsman's report, and the government's refusal to implement the recommendations of its own independent inquiry into nursing home funding. I submitted a question on notice to the Minister for Aged Care. As part of her answer to that question, she said:

This is the Productivity Commission's report. She continued:

That was back on 11 May. She continued:

The report was handed to the Treasurer in January, it took until May before being released and here we are now, in the middle of October, and still no action. That is just not good enough—not good enough at all. The important thing is that it is the elderly, those frail aged Australians, and their families who are being hurt by the government's inaction.

The Shortland electorate, the electorate that I represent in this parliament, includes the northern part of the Central Coast and the southern part of the Hunter and Lake Macquarie area. In Shortland we are experiencing an aged care crisis—and neither the Minister for Aged Care nor the Prime Minister care. I will just give a few demographic details on Shortland. Nationally, 8.3 per cent of the population is aged over 70 years, whilst in the Shortland electorate the figure is 10.8 per cent. Shortland's population is ranked as being the 15th oldest, based on the 1996 census figures. The percentage of people over the age of 70 will increase over the years, as our population ages. So it will not get better; it can get only worse.

In the Shortland electorate, there are 12 nursing homes with 586 beds and 16,716 people aged over 65. That gives a nursing home bed to person ratio of 5:28. Nationally, there are 1,490 nursing homes with 139,200 beds and 2,150,828 people over the age of 65. That gives a bed to person ratio of 4:15. Considering that over 10 per cent of the population in the Shortland electorate is over 70 years, wouldn't you agree that the number of beds that we have is very inadequate?

The number of days that people have to wait for a bed—that is, the waiting time—has increased from 46 to 79 days. In 1997-98, it was 46 days in regional and rural Australia. Those were figures given at the Senate estimates. In the Hunter, we currently have a waiting time of 79 days, and that has gone up from 46 days. My question is: what figures will we have in the year 1999-2000? I can see it only getting worse, and the government is doing nothing to improve it. Not one of the amendments in this bill addresses that issue.

Not only does chronic shortage cause great anxiety in elderly Australians and their families; it also impacts on our hospitals system. Whilst we have people waiting for beds in nursing homes taking up hospital beds, the waiting time for the people who need those hospital beds is increased. This blows out the waiting times and waiting lists for elective surgery and, as well as that, it causes great distress to the families and relatives of the elderly Australians who are being put in cold storage while awaiting nursing home beds.

The care that elderly Australians who need nursing home beds are given in public hospitals is not the care that they need. They need to have a safe, secure environment where they are familiar with their surroundings. They do not need to be part of a hospital regime. It is just not good enough. The other aspect of people having to wait so long for nursing home beds is that, in my area, families are often threatened that if they do not take the first bed that becomes available they will be forced to go to Sydney. They have a total lack of control over what is happening in their lives—and this is one of the most difficult times of life for older people and their families. This is causing so much distress within our community, so I really feel that the government has to reassess the amendments that it has moved and come back with some other amendments that will really address the issues that are tearing at the hearts of Australians.

I would now like to move to the issue of quality of care and the government's failure to address the problems being experienced in this area. When the health care complaints unit, the minister or whoever finds out that there is a problem, they are notified of the problem, yet fail to impose sanctions that ensure that the problems are addressed immediately and that the actions taken are not merely window dressing.

I would like to talk a little bit about one of my constituents whom I have been working with for six to nine months. He came to see me in tears. His wife had had a stroke and had spent some time in Rankin Park hospital, where she was cared for and made dramatic improvements. Then she went to a local nursing home. I will not name the nursing home. I feel that maybe things have improved, because I have not received as many complaints about this nursing home over the last month or so. The toileting arrangements were inadequate; she was left for hours. She was covered in faeces. She was given the wrong type of food. She had a problem swallowing and she was given meat to chew. Her husband was constantly taking food in to her because the food was inadequate. There was no physiotherapy provided to her. To improve her physical condition it was very important that there be a physio present and that she have the right sort of treatment. When people she did not know came in, she would be saying, `Don't hit me, please. Please, don't hit me.' She had bruised arms showing fingerprint marks. She had a brace that should have been on her hand to improve its function, but that was not applied. There were numerous other problems.

I referred the matter to the health care complaints commission. Initially I did it anonymously because the gentleman in question was worried about the treatment that his wife would have in this nursing home. But after a couple of weeks she was moved to another home, where, I might add, he is very pleased with the care that she is being given. So it is not that he is particularly fussy.

The response from the first nursing home was that they had given education to the staff in October—and I might indicate the gentleman came to see me in March—and that they had had an audit of their continence program and decided that maybe the two-hourly regime that they had all of their patients on was not adequate. They reviewed it and changed it. Then we wrote again and we gave the complaints resolution commission the name of the gentleman and a mediation meeting was organised. They met with the son of the owner of the nursing home and they went through all the issues. At the end of it, I was advised that the gentleman in question was satisfied with the results.

Members may imagine my surprise when I received a letter from him stating how inaccurate the report of the meeting was and how the mediation meeting had failed to meet his needs. He stated that the audit was taken in January. His wife was admitted in February. Even when she left there, nothing had changed. He had made a written complaint about one of the staff members and it was lost. Then they found it. First of all, he was told that that staff member had been sacked. Then he was told that the complaint had been lost. Finally, he was told on that day at the mediation that the person had been counselled and was doing very well.

Throughout every issue that was identified at that mediation interview there were inconsistencies. So I thought, `What do you do? You send it to the Minister for Aged Care.' So on 19 July I wrote to the minister and received a response on 8 August saying that the minister had referred my letter to the department for investigation. It was now being examined and I would get a response from the minister. Here we are, 11 October. The original letter went off on 18 July, and I have still not received a response. I do not think that this is good enough. This is hardly a proactive response. It is hardly dealing with the matter as a matter of urgency. Obviously, if it takes that long for the minister or for the department to put sanctions in place, it is not working.

I would like to come quickly to the issue of funding. The government's aged care reforms make a joke of the word `reform', because in actual fact they are ripping funds out of the nursing home system. If the current policies continue over the next seven years, an average 60-bed nursing home will have to reduce its staff by one person a year. That equates to poorer care for those people who are living in nursing homes. The issue of funding is so great that I have heard of one nursing home within my electorate of Shortland where there is a directive that patients not be given oxygen unless the doctor is present to give it to them. If you need oxygen, you need it quickly. But it is locked in the cupboard and the only way that the cupboard can be opened and oxygen given to the patient is if the doctor is there, and that could be too late.

I am quite concerned that the government, while it is defunding nursing homes, is `funding' the telephone card excesses of the Minister for Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business which have cost the Australian people $50,000. The minister for workplace relations thought nothing of turning dogs on maritime workers. The Minister for Aged Care is now snatching money away from frail, aged Australians. Australian taxpayers, through the Commonwealth, contribute $40,000 a year for a nursing home bed—less than the minister for workplace relations's phone card account. Surely if the government can allocate funds to such excesses, it can show the same level of concern for the people waiting for nursing home beds in the Shortland electorate and other electorates throughout Australia. It is imperative that the Prime Minister show concern for all Australians, particularly older Australians who need the government to amend its flawed Aged Care Act. We need more money for nursing homes; we need more money to be available to help those people.

The dogs are barking. They are demanding that the government put more money into nursing homes, that it at least address the issues raised by the Productivity Commission report. The people of Australia will turn the dogs on the government, just like the minister for workplace relations turned them on maritime workers, unless the government acts now.