MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE

Mr CONAGHAN (Cowper) (16:06): I know the topic today is Labor's failure to govern for older Australians, but, given the snowball effect of announcements over the last six months, it seems more appropriate to say that Labor seems intent on punishing our older Australians. Under the changes in the FY27 budget announcement, older Australians will now be forced to pay up to $1,600 more for their private health insurance per year, which is going to put significant pressure on their household budgets, particularly those of retirees on limited or fixed incomes.

Since the day of that disastrous policy announcement, my office has been literally inundated with pleas from directly affected constituents asking for my help. In my electorate of Cowper, over 26,000 residents will be negatively impacted. In many cases, these people are already sacrificing other essentials in order to afford the health cover they vitally need.

They are choosing between eating three meals a day or having their cover. While we live in a region rich with natural beauty, that wealth does not extend to the average weekly household income, with a significant number in my electorate relying on pensions. Regional Australians are acutely aware of the shortcomings and extended waitlists seen in our public hospitals, so these considered, older Australians have taken the necessary steps not only to safeguard their own health and wellbeing but responsibly take the pressure off the public health system.

Labor's reward for that careful planning is another bill to their ever-increasing cost-of-living pressures. This is the age group in our community that can least generate additional income. It's not like they can go to Coles and stack shelves at night-time to make ends meet.

Moving the goalposts in these circumstances, at their stage of life, is cruel and unusual punishment. This Labor government needs to listen to the real issues facing older Australians, and not just those in metropolitan areas. I suppose this lack of acknowledgement and practical care was foreshadowed months ago when the ill-considered unconsulted changes were introduced to the aged-care home-care packages in November.

Those flick-of-a-pen changes have now been in effect for over six months, with the snowball now a full-blown avalanche. To date, we've seen a few press releases touting new processes or a small number of packages being released, but, cruelly, every announcement and adaptation being made has ultimately left older Australians increasingly vulnerable. The number of requests for urgent assistance through my office has increased 10-fold in recent months.

The issues range from inhumane wait times for a home-care package assessment and newly implemented algorithms arbitrarily stripping some recipients of basic essential supports without warning to a significant escalation of service costs. They are some of the common issues. The compounding effects of every new hurdle are leaving many elderly Cowper constituents in significant distress and providers at their wits' end.

To hear from local providers that they had clients in palliative care who were forced to go on a waitlist and subsequently passed away before receiving any level of support isn't just heartbreaking; it's indefensible. And it is demoralising for the providers who are genuinely there to do the best they can for their clients. As Ben Kleeman from UPA Aged Care Solutions in Port Macquarie, in my electorate, told me last month, 'We want to help.

We have capacity. We have been through reforms before, but right now we are disempowered from providing care.' In the last few months, I've reached out to advocates asking for their input, and the picture they paint is one of negligence through government ignorance. I'm asking for their input, and I want to share that input on a bipartisan nature.

I will give it to those opposite, and we will see what happens.