There is no sector without sustainable growth – provider peak body Ageing Australia weighs in to government with recommendations ahead of budget

Growing aged care demand has not been lost on providers in the aged care sector. As Australia’s boomer demographic ages into the finite aged care spaces and resources, within a system that has already seen considerable strain, the tipping point of provider worry has moved to frank clarity and recommendations. Ahead of the May federal budget, aged care providers, through their peak body, have moved from the voice-call for change to the proverbial trumpet. “Action is needed now”, Ageing Australia CEO Tom Symondson says. From the nation’s leaders and heads of providers, there is no more time for treading water. If the system is to have any chance of meeting the waves of need to come, leaders encourage that reform must recognise insights from those who are doing the work of care daily. The peak body’s key recommendations cover specific funding and workforce updates, with Support at Home, and bed build supports strongly present.

Immediacy

Echoing what providers have been vocalising for some time, the peak body has publicly doubled down on its messaging, the nation needs to immediately expand its capability to meet residential aged care demand. While the cohort of Australia’s seniors entering into aged care has been well known, experts, advocates and many provider leadership have consistently gone one step further. If residential aged care is to have a chance to catch up, aged care support at home must be robust, accessible and sustainable.

Ageing Australia has now firmly stepped into the space of championing what their members have been noting, while November’s reform was the first step towards change, reform is needed to translate it into effective and positively impactful waters, for care at home and within facilities.

Ageing Australia CEO, Tom Symondson says, “action is needed now, with the number of Australians aged over 70 set to hit 2.3 million by 2044.” The numbers are stark, advocates and leaders assert that as a nation, the infrastructure of buildings, and even more so, schemes, must be able to bear up under the numbers that the nation will have, not the numbers it wants.

With the announcement of its recommendations, the peak body is clear, the time for change is now, with May’s budget.

Support at home

Signalling support for members financial viability to provide services and the overarching sentiment that in order to keep seniors out of RAC and hospitals, support at home has to work, the peak body has leaned in.

Provider executives across the country have shared publicly their concern that policy is not aligning with macro strategy. Where leadership voices have been constrained to organisation media channels, the sentiment has overtly reached the peak body.

“Helping older Australians stay in their own homes benefits individuals, their families and reduces demand on our health and aged care systems. Without rapid access to home care, too many people end up in hospital unnecessarily or on residential aged care waiting lists, when they could be living in their own home”, Symondson shares on behalf of the peak body’s members.

In that exact vein, to marry scheme policy to real-world impact, Ageing Australia have scaled up their language when it comes to Support at Home package wait-times, the state of the damage at hand and the sheer lack of packages available.

Symondson shares, “the most immediate step the Government can take to relieve pressure on the aged care system is to increase the number of Support at Home packages.  At last count, more than 100,000 older Australians were waiting for a package and another 100,000 waiting just to be assessed, so the issue is fast approaching a national emergency.”

Continuing he highlights a key worry for those who have been trying to navigate aged care for their loved ones, there simply seems to not be enough packages on offer to meet need, “last year, the Government announced the release of 83,000 new packages for 2025-26.  Sadly, that’s proving to be nowhere near enough, given the surge in demand.”

In terms of wait-times, Symondson directs an assessment of the rollout of the SaH scheme to be derived from what the Royal Commission established, “the Productivity Commission revealed the median time between an older person being approved for a package and receiving care doubled from 4 months to 8 months, with many still waiting more than a year. We need to urgently bring the wait times down.”

“The Royal Commission said nobody should wait more than a month, and we are a very long way from that.”

Support at home recommendations

Solidifying the confusion and frustration with the rollout of the scheme, Ageing Australia’s recommendations six to eight tackle Support at Home challenges.

They have called for a price cap delay, to at least 1 January 2027. Their rational surrounds needing further data from Support at Home activity, “so pricing accurately reflects delivery costs. The current deadline of 1 July 2026 will mean using outdated and inaccurate data, which risks homecare providers closing or reducing services.”

They have also called for an “increase the care management cap for Support at Home to ensure older people receive the care and coordination support they need. The decision to reduce the cap to 10% of a person’s package mean those with complex needs cannot get the support they need.”

And touching on a scheme that has made it into Senate hearings recently, the Commonwealth Home Support Programme (CHSP), the peak body has officially added its voice to calling for a funding boost to this scheme, and by extension, its protection.

They ask for an “increase of funding for CHSP services so providers can continue delivering the support older people rely on before CHSP becomes part of Support at Home.”

Residential aged care builds

The stoush in September between federal and state health ministers laid bare the tension points of who is to take responsibility for bed build rates. Lobbies of blame and feet-dragging were seen when it came to building beds, with Canberra and the states swinging back and forth, and the sector chastised. 

However, provider leadership responded in the face of criticism by outlining the interconnected obstacles facing capital projects. From thin profit margins from supplementary price points, risk from market rate loans and staggering land and construction costs, for many the sincere desire to build was and is prohibitive by reasonable reality.

Symondson acknowledges the significant threshold needed, “we should be building 10,000 beds a year over the next two decades just to meet that demand, but sadly we’re only building a fraction of those – about 800 last year.”

And to support high-performing provider sentiment, that of a passionate desire to build, a number of recommendations follow suit.

–        “Increase the Accommodation Supplement for supported residents so residential aged care providers can keep their doors open and invest in building safe, modern homes.”

–        “Set a price floor for the Maximum Permissible Interest Rate (MPIR) of eight per cent to encourage investment in building and upgrading residential aged care homes.”

–        “A review of the Australian National Aged Care Classification (AN-ACC) funding model to more accurately align care funding with actual provider costs in support of older Australians. Current care funding is falling behind the cost of delivering that care.”

–        “Introduce a low interest loan scheme to facilitate the development and renewal of residential aged care homes. Most providers are unable to access commercial finance to build new beds.”

–        “Expand the Aged Care Capital Assistance Program (ACCAP) to support capital development in areas and communities of highest priority. This will particularly help in rural and remote areas.”

While WA and SA have led the charge in State government backed and supplied below-market loan schemes to supercharge capital projects, and bed building rates in RAC, advocates, peak bodies and provider leadership are dumbfounded that a national loan scheme has not been set up.

Far from a hand-out, provider leadership have repeatedly noted they support sustainable measures to grow provider capital projects, and low-interest loans acutely fit into this category.

Workforce shortages

Ageing Australia has also stated the integral resource that must be strengthened to mean the new beds are met with quality care, personnel.

Symondson notes, “we also need a workforce to match. By 2050, aged care will face a projected shortage of some 400,000 workers. Without urgent action, Australia will not have the workers needed to support our ageing population.”

Provider leadership have evidently been expressing deep concerns about the ability to appropriately care for the rising numbers of seniors entering the sector. This is played out in three key recommendations regarding recruitment channels. They also solidify a problem that remains to be addressed, with advocates and front-line affirming, residents already in Australia are not flocking to work in aged care.

Particularly to attract Australians to work in regional and culturally-specific areas, Ageing Australia has recommended the government to, “allocate $150 million to expand ACCAP with a dedicated aged care worker accommodation stream to help providers attract and house staff, especially in non-metropolitan and First Nations communities.”

Followed by two recommendations pursuing overseas workers, firstly to, “establish a national Essential Skills Visa to make it easier for overseas aged care and community care workers to come to Australia.”

And to, “remove Labour Market Testing for critical aged and community care roles so providers can recruit international workers more quickly.”

Strong messaging

“These proposed measures, if adopted, will support a viable and growing sector that can meet the needs of the Australian community”, Symondson shares.

The language surrounding criticism of current aged care reform, and its initial impact on the sector and the seniors at its heart, has sharpened. Peak bodies, leadership and industry experts are set to pointedly navigate perspective on the fault-lines and the course-correcting reform pivots needed.

The journey to strive for a sustainable and growing sector continues, with many eyes on May’s 2026 budget.