Aged Care Insite Issue 111 | Feb-March 2019 | Seite 21

industry & reform
“In 2019, we look forward to using our
unique position and voice to advocate
for people of all ages with all forms of
dementia on behalf of our community,
especially as the Royal Commission into
Aged Care progresses.”
On top of this, McCabe points to
the implementation of a new five-year
strategic plan as a priority, and focuses
on timely diagnosis and support, quality
care and tackling the discrimination many
people with a diagnosis of dementia
experience every day.
“One of the issues that we face here in
Australia is that aged care is a little bit of a
poor second cousin,” laments Aged Care
Guild chief executive, Matt Richter.
“The success is that now we have a
real national focus on aged care, and
for people that’s challenging because
it is coming through the life of a royal
commission, but it’s a critical step and
a positive thing,” he adds.
Looking forward to 2019, Richter
and the guild are working on greater
transparency within the industry, but
he believes last year’s announcement of
new aged care quality standards is the big
story for this year.
“I think they are the most important
thing happening in aged care right
now,” he says. “They represent a real
fundamental, landmark shift in culture and
mentality that will be required of everyone
to deliver on. And it goes a long way to
putting elderly Australians at the centre
of care.”
The minister for senior Australians and
aged care, Ken Wyatt, believes that in spite
of the issues we have seen, the sector had
some successes last year.
“I think the sector has had a good year
in the sense of coming together and
looking at the workforce needs for the
next 30 years,” he says.
“The work that I commissioned John
Pollaers to do with the sector has come
back now with a recognition by the
industry that they have not planned for a
workforce that they will need as more and
more Australians age.”
The establishment of the Aged Services
Industry Reference Committee – a body
that works with all the state and territory
schools authorities and the Australian
schools authority to ensure they start
to factor in the age care industry – is
another plus, and the additional funding
from the budget and MYEFO, according
to Wyatt, “means that government is
seriously thinking about the needs of
older Australians in terms of better
access to care, better quality of care and
better ageing under More Choices for a
Longer Life”.
As for the royal commission, Wyatt sees
it as the start of a conversation in Australia.
“The royal commission has been framed
in a way that is not about the punitive
element of the royal commission’s work,”
he explains.
“It is about looking to a future of
structural reform, but in the process
what I hope happens is that people will
talk more and more about ageing, more
about the sense of living longer, but more
importantly, about planning better than
we [currently] do.” ■
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