$70m budget boost for veterans home care

Veteran home care providers will get $70.5 million to support the provision of domestic assistance and personal care services to veterans in this year’s federal budget.

The $70.5 million over four years from 2022-23 will go towards increasing the base rate fees paid to Veteran Home Care providers, budget papers released on Tuesday say.

“In this budget we provide further funding to support home care services for 37,000 vets and their services,” Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said on Tuesday night.

Apart from that, the home care sector has come out of the budget with just a modest $5.4 million for consultation of on aged care reforms, of which the new support at home program is part.

Support for collaborative models

Providers will get $6.9 million over three years from 2022-23 to support co‑operatives and other collaborative business models access the aged, disability and veterans’ care sectors.

The Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals will be funded to support the start-up and development of cooperative and mutual enterprises, and deliver business resources and professional support.

The budget also contains $215.3 million over 2 years from 2021-22 to provide bonuses of up to $800 to aged care workers in residential aged care and home care, in a measure announced earlier this year.

The government said it was announcing an additional $468.3 to bring the total response to the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety to $18.8 billion.

The continued investment maintains the rolling out of 80,000 home care packages over 2021-2023, funds 33,800 new training places for aged care workers and 8,400 new respite services. 

“We are pleased to see the Government maintain the momentum toward reforming aged care in a way that improves outcomes for older people,” COTA CEO Ian Yates said.

Aged care sector disappointed

But the aged care sector has been left bitterly disappointed, with the Australian Aged Care Collaboration saying the budget had confirmed the inadequacy of the government’s previous response to the royal commission and had left aged care workers and older Australians out in the cold.

“There is nothing in this budget to improve aged care wages. It will leave our dedicated workers on the edge of poverty and many older Australians without the services they need,” the collaboration, representing six peak bodies, said in a statement.

“There is so much more work to be done. The royal commission’s workforce recommendations are the key area of unfinished business and the government has left it that way.”