Mr HUNT (Flinders—Minister for Health and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service and Cabinet) (15:37): I want to thank the royal commissioners for their work, and there's more to be done. I know that today's report was not the report of the commission but a report to the commission. So far, the commissioners have made two reports. The government has accepted all of the recommendations from the first report and accepted all of the recommendations from the second report. Indeed, we responded on the afternoon of 1 October, when the most recent report was related, and accepted all six elements, for the record of the House. It is very important. The first recommendation of the commission, that the government would provide a final report by 1 December, we've accepted. That's underway. On the second recommendation, the government has announced two packages to provide additional funding for staffing, with regard to visitation for aged care, and we're actually implementing $245 million of funding to support providers with COVID-19 related costs—full acceptance of the second recommendation is already underway, which the opposition unfortunately is not aware of or didn't acknowledge today. In addition to that, the government accepts the third recommendation, in relation to the mental health of residents of aged-care facilities, and we will be implementing that. I've already been engaged deeply in the planning of that with the Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians and with the department. We are within 19 days of the recommendations being made. The recommendations have been accepted, with four out of the six already having been significantly implemented and all six to be implemented. Ms Collins interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Llew O'Brien ): The member for Flinders—sorry, the member for Franklin. Sorry, Minister, an error on my part. The member for Franklin, please. Mr HUNT: In addition to that, in relation to the fourth recommendation, the government has accepted that and will provide a revised seventh stage of our national aged-care COVID plan in response. An honourable member interjecting— Mr HUNT: That's correct, and I'm very happy, and we'll be going through the six previous stages. In addition— An honourable member interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The minister can continue. Mr HUNT: In addition to that, in relation to the fifth recommendation, the government has accepted that, as with others, in full. Funding of $245 million is being paid to providers through October 2020—already underway; already being delivered—and that will mandate that aged-care providers have trained infection-control officers, as detailed in the recommendation, on top of all of the other elements. Then there's the final recommendation: accepted, in full. And the government has been working with state and territory governments to implement a decision of national cabinet of 21 August to put in place additional face-to-face infection-control training and establish joint approaches—already underway. That's very important. So I thank the commissioners for their work today and I look forward to their further work. Let me look more generally at two things: further actions taken by the government with regard to aged care and further actions taken in relation to COVID preparation. In relation to aged care, I think it is important to set out the facts here. We have come from $13 billion in 2012-13, under the previous government, to, in this budget, $24 billion, $25 billion, $26 billion, $27 billion. Those figures matter. In particular, as part of that, what we've seen is a dramatic increase in home-care places. Home-care places have gone from 60,000 places in the last year, under the previous government, and $1.15 billion, to 185,000 places—a tripling of places, this year, under the current government. I've heard them, on occasion, say, 'Oh, they're just going up in relation to population.' In fact, we've had a 28 per cent increase in over-70s since the previous government was in government; we've had a 200 per cent increase in home-care places, or a tripling, and a 300 per cent increase in home-care funding, or a quadrupling. So funding has grown at 10 times the rate of population of over-70s in that time. So that's against their benchmark of their year. If funding had grown in line with population, it would have grown at 28 per cent; instead, funding has grown at 300 per cent, or 10 times, and therefore it has grown at a dramatically faster rate, and we have seen a dramatically higher increase in services per capita than was the case under the previous government. I think that's important. It should also be noted that, on two occasions in the last year, the alternative government has had the opportunity to make some contribution. They went into the election and they had zero dollars— Ms Collins interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Franklin. Mr HUNT: zero dollars in their alternative budget, at a time of $387 billion for home-care places—zero. And then only two weeks ago they provided an alternative budget. This is very important: right now, in this moment, in an alternative budget—and knowing everything that they knew, at a time when we have put in over 70,000 home-care places—they added zero. They found money for other things. They found nothing—nothing; zero; nada—for home-care places. And that's twice in a year. Having said that, we'll then look at what we've done specifically in relation to support for COVID. It is very important here to understand how Australia compares with the rest of the world. We have had deep tragedy in Australia— Ms Collins interjecting— The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Franklin— Mr HUNT: and it is very important— The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order. The minister will just pause and take his seat for a moment. The member for Franklin has brought this matter of public importance forward. Whilst the statement in itself is here to be debated, the subject matter is extremely important to all of our constituents. The constant interjections by members is not doing this debate any good service at all. So can everyone please be in order, and the minister will continue. Mr HUNT: Most significantly, what we've seen, as the Medical Journal of Australia has shown, is that even though no country is immune, and Australia has had real and significant suffering following the tragedy of community outbreak in Victoria, which translated, sadly, to the loss of life in Victoria, we see that in Italy, the loss of life of elderly residents is 600 per cent of that in Australia per one million population, with regard to care residents. In France, it's 800 per cent. In the USA, it's 900 per cent. In the UK, it's 1,500 per cent of what it is in Australia. In Belgium, it's 1,600 per cent. All of these things are fundamental and show what has happened in Australia by comparison. As the Medical Journal of Australia said, our actions have saved 16,000 lives, on their estimate, by comparison with the United Kingdom. How has that come about? What are the things that have occurred? I think it is important to acknowledge what the commissioner said today, 'I have, however, detected over the last year—calling up counsel—a growing determination among officials and in the government to fix the problems of the aged-care system and to pursue a genuine reform agenda.' That's because this was our commission and this is our passion, and that's why this year we've invested over $1.6 billion in our COVID aged-care response plan. That began with the first step in January, where we acted immediately in relation to COVID, and moving through the second stage with the plan that was put in place for the national COVID response in February, the national aged-care COVID CDNA plan in March, the update to that which followed subsequently in relation to workforce and PPE support across March and April, the revised national plan and guidelines, again, through March, April and May, and then in June there were the revised national plan and guidelines—again, taking on board the lessons learned. These are the things that have allowed Australia to save lives and protect lives. We want to acknowledge the hardship. We want to acknowledge, as we said from the outset, that if there's community transmission on an epidemic scale, no-one is immune. But what our aged-care workers, our carers, our health officials and the Victorian Aged Care Response Centre have done is to save lives, to protect lives and to make a difference—as acknowledged by the Medical Journal of Australia. When we look around the world at those catastrophic outcomes in other countries, we know that each life lost in Australia has been an agonising loss for the individuals and for the families, but that the work of Australia—the government, the states, the individuals involved, and, above all else, our carers—has saved lives and protected lives on a grand scale. For that, I thank all involved.