Aged Care Legislated Review – Council on the Ageing (COTA), ACT
Table of Contents
1.Tell us about you
1.1What is your full name?
1.2What stakeholder category do you most identify with?
1.3Are you providing a submission as an individual or on behalf of an organisation?
1.4Do you identify with any special needs groups?
1.5What is your organisation’s name?
1.6Which category does your organisation most identify with?
1.7Do we have your permission to publish parts of your response that are not personally identifiable?
2.Response to Criteria in the Legislation
2.1Whether unmet demand for residential and home care places has been reduced
2.2Whether the number and mix of places for residential care and home care should continue to be controlled
2.3Whether further steps could be taken to change key aged care services from a supply driven model to a consumer demand driven model
2.4The effectiveness of means testing arrangements for aged care services, including an assessment of the alignment of charges across residential care and home care services
2.5The effectiveness of arrangements for regulating prices for aged care accommodation
2.6The effectiveness of arrangements for protecting equity of access to aged care services for different population groups
2.7The effectiveness of workforce strategies in aged care services, including strategies for the education, recruitment, retention and funding of aged care workers
2.8The effectiveness of arrangements for protecting refundable deposits and accommodation bonds
2.9The effectiveness of arrangements for facilitating access to aged care services
3.Other comments
1.Tell us about you
1.1What is your full name?
-
1.2What stakeholder category do you most identify with?
Older consumers
1.3Are you providing a submission as an individual or on behalf of an organisation?
Organisation
1.4Do you identify with any special needs groups?
Nil
1.5What is your organisation’s name?
Council on the Ageing (COTA), ACT
1.6Which category does your organisation most identify with?
Advocacy organisation for older people in the ACT
1.7Do we have your permission to publish parts of your response that are not personally identifiable?
Yes, publish all parts of my response except my name and email address
Note on response to Criteria
COTA ACT notes that Mr David Tune, the independent reviewer appointed by the Minister, also chairs the Department of Health’s Aged Care Sector Committee which recently published a Strategic Roadmap for Aged Care (‘the Roadmap’). A reading of the Roadmap document has assisted the preparation of this submission.
2.Response to Criteria in the Legislation
2.1Whether unmet demand for residential and home care places has been reduced
Refers to Section 4(2)(a) in the Act
In this context, unmet demand means:
•a person who needs aged care services is unable to access the service they are eligible for
e.g. a person with an Aged Care Assessment Team / Service (ACAT or ACAS ) approval for residential care is unable to find an available place; or
•a person who needs home care services is able to access care, but not the level of care they need
e.g. the person is eligible for a level 4 package but can only access a level 2package.
Response provided:
The Department of Social Services’ Stocktake of Australian Government Subsidised Aged Care Places and Ratios as at 30 June 2015 showed the ACT ranked second last of all Australian jurisdictions using the Department’s own planning measure - funded residential care places per 1000 people aged 70 and over. Against this measure, the ACT had a ratio of 73.1. While this represented an improvement on the previous year’s ratio of 70.6, it was still well short of the national average of 81.1. The ACT’s residential care occupancy rate was 94.5%, the highest nationally.
The shortage of residential care places has had negative flow-on effects in the ACT’s public hospitals, where there is a backlog of patients awaiting discharge to residential aged care. The ACT’s public hospitals rate poorest nationally against the performance benchmark of bed days per thousand occupied by these patients – the Territory’s 2015 rating of 22 days compares with a national average of 9.
Not only are residential care place numbers limited. In the ACT, the level of accommodation deposits required represents an additional barrier to consumer entry to residential aged care(see comments against 2.5).The pricing behaviour of aged care suppliers in the ACT provides a real world commentary on some of the assumptions built into the Roadmap. See comments on 2.3 regarding the effect of uncapping prices.
In terms of Commonwealth-funded home care packages for people 70 and over, the ACT was relatively well supplied. There were 17.1 high care (level 3 and 4) packages for every 1000 Territory residents in that age group, compared with a national average of 7.7. However, according to consumers at a 2015 COTA ACT Forum on Consumer Directed Care, the cost of the new Home Care Packages is too high. This was also raised as a key issue by service providers attending the Forum, who indicated the cost of home care services was driving some consumers to residential aged care.
It should also be noted that the rate of supply for home care packages will need to increase over the next 10 years to keep pace with the growing proportion of ACT residents aged 70 and over, as the post-war generation ages.
2.2Whether the number and mix of places for residential care and home care should continue to be controlled
Refers to Section 4(2)(b) in the Act
In this context:
•the number and mix of packages and places refers to the number and location of residential aged care places and the number and level of home care packages allocated by Government; and
•controlled means the process by which the government sets the number of residential care places or home care packages available.
Response provided:
The number and location of residential aged care places, and the number and level of home care packages, could continue to be controlled and allocated by Government, and satisfy growing demand, if sufficient Federal budget funding was made available. It has been argued that this is fiscally and demographically unsustainable. Some commentators do not accept this, noting that Australia’s demographic composition is not as challenging as that of European nations or Japan, and that Australia’s total tax percentage of GDP is lower than that of comparable OECD nations.
There is scope for consumer contributions to increase, by tightening the existing means test on homeowners, to supplement Government funding. See comments under 2.4 below.
2.3Whether further steps could be taken to change key aged care services from a supply driven model to a consumer demand driven model
Refers to Section 4(2)(c) in the Act
In this context:
•a supply driven model refers to the current system where the government controls the number, funding level and location of residential aged care places and the number and level of home care packages;
•a consumer demand driven model refers to a model where once a consumer is assessed as needing care, they will receive appropriate funding, and can choose services from a provider of their choice and also choose how, where and what services will be delivered.
Response provided:
For aged care to become truly consumer demand driven, there must be a willingness on the part of multiple alternative suppliers to compete to offer services to all consumers, taking into account how much they can afford to pay. Additionally, consumers must have access to full and accurate information about the nature and quality of services offered by providers.
Any situation where the amount that some consumers can afford to pay is insufficient to attract suppliers will not properly meet the definition of a consumer-driven market. Much therefore depends on what is meant in the above note by the term ‘appropriate funding’, and here a reading of the Roadmap provides assistance.
Pricing and funding as envisaged by the Roadmap
The Roadmap intends to shift the primary responsibility for funding aged care from Government to consumers, while uncapping the prices that providers can charge. These prices will be expected to cover the development, maintenance and replacement of capital stock, paid for mostly by borrowings from the financial markets. Government will only assist in funding service providers directly where it is necessary to ensure service provision.
Government assistance to consumers will be restricted to those who meet a tightened means test, and will reflect a ‘market informed price’ considered sufficient to make service provision viable for efficient providers. The expectation is that this mix of funding will, given other features of the Roadmap proposals, stimulate competition at all levels and result in quality improvement and diversity of choice under a consumer-driven market.
While it may be the case that supply has to date been artificially restricted by the limits of Government’s willingness or capacity to fund aged care, it does not follow that supply to all consumers can be guaranteed by uncapping prices and providing efficient price funding to those without means.
Likely consequences of uncapping prices
Expectations must have regard to the likely balance of market power. Two features of the current market will not change. Firstly, consumers’ need for aged care is not discretionary – they must have the services as a necessity of life or living. Secondly, Government is obliged to see that these needs are met, but does not provide the services itself. Consequently, the current approved service providers, particularly the bigger players in the industry, wield significant market power. The market power of current big providers will increase under the Roadmap, which will raise cost barriers to the entry of new providers by requiring capital to be wholly funded by revenue, and by making product promotion more important to business survival.
In the case of home care the barriers to new entrants will not be as great, but they will still exist, since such factors as the ability to advertise effectively, recruit, train and manage staff, and equip them with transport and equipment, all involve significant start-up costs.
Thepricing behaviour of aged care suppliers in the ACT provides apointer to the likely consequences of uncapping prices. In essence, the pricing of accommodation deposits in the ACT does not reflect any measure of contributory costs, but rather a perception of the maximum that the local aged care market will bear– see further comments under 2.5 below.
Experience, as evidenced by the ACT example, shows it is likely that uncapping prices will prompt suppliers to compete to attract those who can pay the highest charges, with diminishing competition as the amount offered reduces. Given the barriers to market entry noted above, suppliers’ willingness to supply is likely to settle at a point somewhat above the efficient price of delivering quality services. Government will end up pitching its consumer assistance at a price point where the major suppliers are just willing to provide services, as well as having to provide an array of ad hoc local incentives for service delivery in rural areas.
The obvious risk to those without adequate means, primarily those who are reliant on Government assistance, is that those wealthier consumers who can afford to pay a higher price will tend to commandeer the better available resources, and a two-tier system will emerge.
COTA ACT believes that any planned movement towards a ‘consumer demand driven model’ must ensure service accessibility and quality assurance for those older consumers who have no means of support other than the age pension. These consumers will continue to represent a significant proportion of the market, given the time required to address the reality of broken work patterns and financial illiteracy in large sectors of the population.
Older consumers who are totally dependent on Government funding must be assured of access to the services that they have been assessed as needing, which must be provided to an adequate standard of quality and safety.
If prices are to be uncapped, COTA ACT considers that the process of setting an informed price could assist in holding suppliers to account for providing quality service to consumers who are totally reliant on Government assistance. But to achieve this purpose, Government would need to set prices rigorously through investigations into the efficient cost of delivering services that meet currently identified best practice, using staff with appropriate skills and training. Providers charging these prices, or higher, would then be fully accountable for delivering services to the required standard.
The importance of information in guiding consumer choice
The Roadmap sees a paramount role for aged care clients in driving service improvement by exercising their consumer sovereignty. It recognises that to play this role, these older consumers will need full information about competing available services. But there is reason to question whether the measures outlined in the Roadmap will meet the informational needs of these clients.
Clearly, aged care clients do not have the mobility of choice enjoyed by purchasers of for example, telecommunications services. Once an 85 year old moves into a residential aged care service, they are not nearly as able to move to another service provider – if they get their first choice wrong, they generally have to live with the consequences. While clients of home care services do not have the same physical constraints on changing suppliers, anxiety about changing to an unknown supplier is a significant factor. If, as the Roadmap intends, many older Australians will be drawing on their home equity to fund their aged care, the Government must ensure that they get all the information they need, and have a sufficient level of comprehension, before making their choice.
The Roadmap envisages that ‘Government will establish and maintain consumer protections (including accreditation against core standards, compliance and complaints mechanisms) and encourage quality improvement by registration category. This includes mandating consumer involvement in the quality assurance process across end-to-end aged care; and ensuring reporting against standards is transparent and publicly available.’ The Roadmap also states that ‘differentiated performance information on a single set of core standards and quality indicators will be published on the service finder in My Aged Care’
These are fine intentions, but they will not be served by the Roadmap’s proposal that Government should consider the private sourcing of accreditation services. This seems to us to open the door to a form of industry self-regulation. While industry ‘in-house’ accreditation bodies certainly have a part to play in lifting standards of service, their assessment processes tend to focus on praising and publicising selected positive aspects of a service rather than being comprehensive and exacting. If entrusted with the function of assuring that care providers satisfied minimum standards of safety and quality, we believe they would tend to find excuses for service providers who fell short of meeting the standards, rather than render them liable to compliance action by Government. COTA ACT believes the accreditation function should stay with Government.
Elsewhere, the Roadmap proposes that the My Aged Care website be enhanced to include information from a range of different sources and envisages that ‘providers will become more sophisticated in terms of how they market the quality of services to consumers, including via My Aged Care’. These statements raise concerns about the reliability and independence of service quality information that will appear on MyAgedCare. In our view it is not appropriate for Government websites to include ‘advertorial’ content.
2.4The effectiveness of means testing arrangements for aged care services, including an assessment of the alignment of charges across residential care and home care services
Refers to Section 4(2)(d) in the Act
In this context:
•means testing arrangements means the assessment process where:
- the capacity of a person to contribute to their care or accommodation is assessed (their assessable income and assets are determined); and
- the contribution that they should make to their care or accommodation is decided (their means or income tested care fee, and any accommodation payment or contribution is determined).
Response provided:
COTA ACT is aware of the pressure on Governments worldwide to reduce budget deficits and set limits on the requirement for future generations of taxpayers to support the growing ageing population through Government-funded services.
In Australia, Government MPs and Ministers such as Josh Frydenberg have referred to the need to prevent ‘intergenerational theft’. The Department of Social Services Deputy Secretary Serena Wilson has publicly raised the view that exemption of the family home from means testing for aged benefits represents a taxpayer-funded subsidy, privileging older homeowners to bequeath their equity to family members.