ACAA calls for pay parity with hospital system
Aged Care Association Australia (ACAA) appeared before the Senate Enquiry into aged care last week and called on the Government to accept that aged care providers cannot pay their staff at a level that reflects the same rates of pay that the same staff are receiving in the public hospital system.
“It is interesting that state and territory governments obviously place much greater value on their staff than the Federal Government; at least that can be the only conclusion if you compare the wage rates between the two systems,” said Rod Young, ACAA chief executive officer.
Mr Young said, “the Productivity Commission’s Report 2007 on Aged Care had accepted an industry estimate that to pay aged care staff at a rate comparable to public hospital staff would take a one off injection of $450m plus an annual top up of $100m,” said Rod Young.
“The industry averages 70% of income on salaries and wages with that percentage being relatively constant over the last decade,” said Mr Young.
“Basically, whatever money the Government has given us over the years we have continued to apply roughly 70% of that income to salaries and wages,” Mr Young said.
“Average Government subsidy is only $108.00 per day from which providers already pay approximately $71.00 in salaries and wages. It does not leave a lot of money for food, electricity, medications, linen and a whole host of other essentials of daily life,” Mr Young said.
