The aged care sector says it is disappointed, but not surprised, desperate calls for increased wages have gone unanswered in the latest federal budget.
The Australian Aged Care Collaboration (AACC), made up of six aged care peak bodies, said the budget delivered yesterday leaves workers "on the edge of poverty", and could see more older Australians neglected.
"We are disappointed," AACC representative Sean Rooney said.
"On the one hand, there are some useful measures in the budget.
A case is set to be heard by the Fair Work Commission in July, calling for pay rises of 25 per cent for more than 200,000 workers.
It is a case the government has, to date, refused to back.
Instead, the latest budget includes $49.5 million to subsidise 15,000 vocational education and training places for those already in or looking to enter the aged care workforce.
This follows an announcement earlier this year that workers would receive two bonus payments of $400 – an incentive many workers are yet to see.
But Mr Rooney said these measures won't be enough.
'More money at broken systems'
This budget comes a year after the federal government's $17.7 billion aged care reform package, announced in response to the final report of the aged care royal commission.
It promised a raft of measures, including an additional 80,000 home care packages over five years and $3.9 billion to increase frontline care.
Dr Belinda Cash is a lecturer in social work and gerontology – the study of old age – at Charles Sturt University.
She said after last year's cash splash, it did not come as a surprise that aged care was not the main focus in the 2022-23 budget.
But she feared it was just throwing "more money at broken systems".
Calls to lift profile of aged care work
Shepparton Villages is just one Australian aged care provider processing what the latest budget will mean at a local level.
Throughout the pandemic, the residential facility, which cares for more than 300 people in the Goulburn Valley region, has been in crisis mode.
Already suffering severe staffing shortages, it fears more workers will flee if wages do not improve.
"I really want to see us become an employer of choice for people with the right values and the right skills, and that those people are properly remunerated for what they do."
But Ms Jamison said there were some silver linings to the latest budget.
"It was great to see the fuel excise cut. For our staff who have to travel distances to come to work, it's going to help them considerably," she said.
"And also, the tax cut will help workers who are low to middle income earners."
Home care waitlists blow out
There are also concerns the new budget does not address exploding demand for home care packages, with 68,000 older Australians currently languishing on the waitlist.
Independent Federal Member for Indi Helen Haines says in her region, there was a 35 per cent increase in the number of people waiting for a package in the last quarter of 2021.
“A key recommendation [from the aged care royal commission] was for the federal government to clear the home care package waitlist by the end of 2021," she said.
She said the number of people on the waitlist was a "disgrace", with some waiting more than a year.
“The royal commission’s recommendation was that a maximum wait time should be one month, and indeed that’s something that I want to see put into legislation," Dr Haines said.
“We need to make sure that the older people in our community have the care that they deserve.
