The Greens response
Queensland Greens feedback on aged care issues.
| Issue | Party response |
|---|---|
| Providing the right balance of skills and nursing hours so that nursing and care staff can provide quality care for every resident |
The Australian Greens believe that an effective healthcare system relies on a skilled and well-resourced workforce. A smart country like Australia should be training more health professionals. The Greens have championed the need for increases in student places, be they in the medical, dental or nursing schools. The Greens want to see proper planning for Australia's health workforce. We are concerned that little or no national coordination or leadership, which has created a desperate shortage of appropriately skilled and qualified health practitioners, has hampered this. The Greens’ Health policy explicitly calls for an increase in student places in medical, dental and nursing schools, and allied health courses, to address the shortage of health professionals. We believe it is important that we see improvements in facilities to ensure high-¬quality teaching and mentorship programs. We recognise the importance of clinical placements for nurses and midwives and will work with stakeholders, including the ANF, to ensure the education and training systems for nurses and midwives meet necessary requirements and provide opportunities for practical experience. |
| Ensuring fair pay for aged care nurses and care staff who are paid up to $300 per week less than nurses in the other sectors. |
The Greens are extremely concerned about the ongoing viability and sustainability of the aged care sector, the inadequate wages and conditions of aged care workers and nursing staff, and the emerging challenge of securing the skilled and dedicated carers needed to care for an ageing population. The Greens would close the wages gap by establishing an independent statutory authority to benchmark the true cost of providing care and oversee aged care funding reform. We firmly believe that aged care workers should receive the recognition and support they deserve for the important caring role they provide, and believe that the aged care funding formula needs to be reformed to ensure that aged care workers are paid fairly and equitably. We see this as a crucial element of a suite of reforms, which also include a comprehensive workforce strategy. |
| Recognising the professional skill of Assistants in Nursing and care staff through a national licensing system. |
The Greens are the only party to date who have a detailed vision statement on aged care reform. We released a comprehensive discussion paper on aged care reform in May, which we have circulated widely to all of the key stakeholders in the aged care industry, seeking feedback on the ideas it proposes as a basis for formulating a comprehensive policy on aged care reform which will be released in August. The discussion paper can be found at www.greensmps.org.au/agedcare The response to date from elderly Australians and their families, consumer advocates, carers, aged care providers and care staff has been very positive and greatly appreciated. We have sent the discussion paper to the ANF and are still awaiting a response. |
| Guaranteeing that taxpayer funding is used for nursing care for each resident. | The Greens would ensure provision of high quality care by benchmarking the true cost of care and delivering funding reform so that that the aged care funding instrument of the future would guarantee care quality through the allocation of an appropriate mix of qualified staff. We would improve the transparency of aged care funding and depoliticising it by handing responsibility to an independent statutory authority. |
Candidate responses
David Keogh (Bowman)
| Issue | Candidate response |
|---|---|
| Providing the right balance of skills and nursing hours so that nursing and care staff can provide quality care for every resident |
Agree, there is currently too much pressure on aged care nurses to reduce direct resident care. This is counter productive and leads to fatigue, burn out and a poor standard of care to the resident. |
| Ensuring fair pay for aged care nurses and care staff who are paid up to $300 per week less than nurses in the other sectors. |
Nurses are generally poorly paid in relative terms to other professionals. There needs to be a progressive increase in nurses’ pay especially in aged care to attract more people into the roles. |
| Recognising the professional skill of Assistants in Nursing and care staff through a national licensing system. |
Agree providing there is a universal training and accreditation scheme. |
| Guaranteeing that taxpayer funding is used for nursing care for each resident. | Aged care funding is totally inadequate and is not addressed by the two main parties. The sector is close to being unviable and a radical redistribution of funding is required to address the ever increasing funding gap. The Greens support the redistribution of government funding to address this serious issue. |
Sandra Bayley (Ryan)
| Issue | Candidate response |
|---|---|
| Providing the right balance of skills and nursing hours so that nursing and care staff can provide quality care for every resident |
Both skill base and care staff must fit the requirements of the patient load. It is not acceptable to cut costs in staffing by rostering staff who do not have the nursing skill required for the patients for whom they are responsible. |
| Ensuring fair pay for aged care nurses and care staff who are paid up to $300 per week less than nurses in the other sectors. |
The pay discrepancy implies aged care nursing is of a lesser value. The aged deserve the same quality of care as any other patient and nursing staff should be acknowledged for providing this care for the elders of our society. |
| Recognising the professional skill of Assistants in Nursing and care staff through a national licensing system. |
The health system could not function without nursing assistants. They deserve formal recognition for their own security of place in the workforce and to assist in any interstate mobility they might wish to pursue. |
| Guaranteeing that taxpayer funding is used for nursing care for each resident. | Equality of care regardless of the financial or other capacity of the residents is fundamental to health care rights in Australia. |
Anna Bridle (Wright)
| Issue | Candidate response |
|---|---|
| Providing the right balance of skills and nursing hours so that nursing and care staff can provide quality care for every resident |
Same as party response. |
| Ensuring fair pay for aged care nurses and care staff who are paid up to $300 per week less than nurses in the other sectors. |
With elderly relatives in aged care I see how valuable the work is that the nurses do and I fully agree they should receive fair pay and not have to work two or more jobs to earn a living, as so often seems the case. |
| Recognising the professional skill of Assistants in Nursing and care staff through a national licensing system. |
This seems to be the way all health professionals are moving. It seems to be a way to protect the rights of professionals as well as ensure proper care for the recipients and their needs. |
| Guaranteeing that taxpayer funding is used for nursing care for each resident. | Same as party response. |
