Catholic Health Australia (CHA) supports Labor's plan to construct an additional aged care facility in the Northern Territory after calling for greater government capital investment in the sector.
"This is a welcome announcement that will help get older Territorians out of hospital and into high-quality aged care," said CEO Jason Kara.
"After years of financial losses, the aged care sector urgently needs significant government investment to build new facilities and expand existing ones as our population ages and more people need care.
"Investment is especially vital in regional and remote areas where the number of places is already well below demand and the level of frailty is increasing faster."
CHA is urging all political parties to continue to put aged care at the forefront of their election campaigns after today's announcement, particularly to address inequities in regional, rural and remote areas.
One in three (34%) Australians over 65 live in rural and remote areas but these areas have only 21% of residential aged care and 15% of home care. Current government capital funding only covers one eighth of investment demand.
CHA has called on the next government to increase the Aged Care Capital Assistance Program by at least $297.63 million per year to $540 million per year to support a sustainable aged care sector in regional, rural and remote areas.
In addition to capital investment, CHA is calling on the government to adjust the way certain rural and remote areas are classified under the Modified Monash Model, which determines their funding.
"The current system unfairly treats certain rural areas such as mining towns as lower-cost regional areas when in reality, the cost of housing, staffing, and basic services is on par with some of the most remote parts of the country," Mr Kara said.
"The NDIS has mechanisms to accommodate these outliers, and aged care also needs these to ensure older people in regional, rural and remote communities have the same choice, access, and quality of care as everyone else."
