MORRISON FAILS TO RULE OUT FURTHER CUTS TO AGED CARE

Scott Morrison has failed to rule out further cuts to aged care after it was revealed this morning that the Government was considering taking more money out of the aged care budget.

 

Asked directly about the report in Question Time, the Prime Minister declined to rule out cutting further funding from the care of older Australians.

 

Australians are rightly appalled by the shocking stories we’ve seen and the crisis that exists in our nation’s aged care system, particularly the standard of care being delivered in some nursing homes. 

 

It is deeply distributing the Prime Minister will not rule out further cuts, but it’s not surprising.

 

Scott Morrison as Treasurer cut $1.2 billion from aged care in his first Budget.

 

His $1.2 billion cut in the 2016 Budget came on top of the almost $500 million from aged care funding he cut in the 2015 MYEFO.

 

This money went out of the aged care Budget and didn’t come back.

 

This savage cut hit older Australians in residential aged care facilities the hardest, with a 50 per cent cut to the indexation of complex health care subsidies.

 

The Royal Commission must examine the impact of the Liberals’ years of cuts. You don’t fix aged care by cutting it.

 

To date there are more than a dozen reviews and hundreds of recommendations on these issue that have been ignored by the Government. This isn’t good enough.

 

For all the claims of a ‘baby boomer Budget’ earlier this year, Scott Morrison again cut further funding from residential aged care to try and fix the growing crisis in home care the Liberals created.

 

Scott Morrison and the Liberals cannot be trusted to ensure older Australians get the aged care services they need.