industry & reform
alone generated $17.4 billion of revenue,
which represents nearly 1 per cent of gross
domestic product. That money’s going
somewhere, and I can tell you that money
is not going into care.
We could say that maybe some of
the issues we’re seeing in the aged care
sector are a result of not attracting
the best people to nursing or to care
in general because of the perceived
low pay.
That is true, and I think the negative
perception of aged care as a workplace
is multifactorial. I think low wages is one
of the things. As I said, I think this would
also relate to the childcare industry, but in
combination with low wages and short
staffing, the aged care industry is always a
stressed and panicky place.
It’s a bit like being on Survivor, where
you actually run out of good manners.
I’ve worked in TAFE for 15 years and TAFE
was well funded, it was well structured, it
was very pleasant, a nice clean place to
work. You didn’t have that sense of anxiety
and rushing that you get in residential
aged care.
The whole emotional tempo in
residential aged care facilities is what’s
responsible for making it visually
and experientially for workers a very
unattractive place to work.
When I was working in TAFE, I was
training aged care workers for 15 years,
so I knew that cohort of workers
extremely well. When I worked directly
with them for six years in residential aged
care, and after that in home care, one
thing I noticed about these workers as a
whole was that they were not there for
the money.
They were there because they cared.
They were there because they were
people who genuinely wanted to make
a difference to people’s lives. They could
have made far more money working at
Coles or Woolies, or doing cleaning – they
could have got $35 an hour – but they
weren’t there for the money.
But the experiences that they had
in there meant that at the end of their
work day, they continually felt unsatisfied.
They hadn’t achieved what they needed
to do, and they hadn’t been able to spend
the time with the residents.
When I was teaching at TAFE, we
focused on personal sense of care, but
by the time they got into the industry,
it wasn’t possible.
Staffing payment and ratios is a matter
of debate among academics and
politicians, but we know without a doubt
that there is a gender pay gap. Could the
overwhelmingly female workforce of
aged care and nursing be the key reason
staff are underpaid?
That is actually a really interesting point
you raise there, and it’s a big part of it.
I’d also done some interesting research
when I was preparing for this talk around
that very thing. Some of the research
I read was talking a little bit about
how overwhelmingly female workers,
particularly in healthcare, fear that financial
incentives will lead to a loss of truly caring
motivations, as though love and money
can’t go together.
The research further found that these
workers are far more likely to mobilise
themselves industrially around quality
of care issues than pay issues, and this
goes very much to the way that aged
care workers identify themselves. I think
it’s another reason for the low pay in
aged care work, because employers are
aware of this sense among the workers,
and which employer would not want to
take advantage of and capitalise on this
perception?
We have a sector that’s under fire, that’s
trying to make changes while still trying
to be financially viable. What do we do
to fix this?
The first thing we need to do is fix the
ratios. Fixing the ratios means that we at
least could come within striking distance
of being able to provide genuinely
dignified care.
Workers don’t feel pride in work when
they know they cannot reach the goals that
they aspire to, but we do need to have staff
to resident ratios mandated.
It’s a bit like we don’t have plastic
bags in supermarkets. I didn’t bring my
own bags: they forced me to bring them.
People won’t do anything until you
force them.
These need to be mandated in law, and
of course there needs to be scrutiny of
the way that particularly private providers
are using their profits. What are they using
them for? Are they using them to improve
care and wages, or are they using them to
put up another chandelier?
This is where some of the oversight
needs to happen, to start directing some
of those wages towards the workers and
putting on more workers. In all honesty,
these workers, they will work for the
wages they’re given, but they need to
know they’re working in a big enough
team to provide the care that they aspire
to give. ■
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