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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 10 Hansard (23 September) . . Page.. 3158 ..
MR KAINE (continuing):
it appears that the majority of the participants on the trial will be aged
people. Home and community care funding of $300,000 was allocated in 1996-97
to support the initial phase of that coordinated care trial in the ACT, and the
purpose of that trial is to improve coordination and enhance health outcomes
for those involved in the trial.
In 1996-97 total funds available for the ACT home and community care program exceeded $9m. In 1997-98 the funding has been increased by just over $1m to $10.012m - an increase of over 10 per cent, which I believe is evidence of our commitment. HACC initiatives in 1996-97 included funding of $87,000 to expand the role of the Health Complaints Commissioner to enable investigation of complaints concerning providers of services to the aged and the disabled; funding of $100,000 to expand management services for high need clients; funding of $267,959 to expand the range of in-home support services available through the HACC program; funding of $25,000 to review special care transport services and the ACT taxi subsidy scheme; and funding of $30,000 to develop a quality assurance framework for the HACC program in the ACT.
The Government has focused its attention on the safety and wellbeing of the frail aged and members of our community who live alone. We funded the Australian Red Cross for about $100,000 to establish a personal alert system which is available on loan to eligible households at a nominal rental. This system of voice activated personal alarms provides very accessible contact 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. We have provided funding of $6,000 for heating for a senior citizens club centre, and we have provided $3,000 to print a directory of services for aged people to facilitate access to all of the services that are available to them.
The Government is also aware that appropriate services need to be developed for potentially marginalised groups within the elderly community, particularly the elderly of culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Mindful of this, the Government provided for the following services in the last HACC funding allocation: The Australian-Finnish rest home has received HACC funding of $12,000 to complete the support services for older frail people from the Finnish community; the Canberra Institute of Technology has received funding for an ethnic liaison officer who will consult with all HACC services to determine the number of non-English-speaking clients accessing services; and the Migrant Resource Centre has received HACC funding to work with agencies implementing access and equity guidelines and protocols which will, of course, apply to ageing people.
Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, members will be aware that a convalescent ward is to be established by this coming Christmas-New Year period at the Canberra Hospital to improve post-operative care and discharge planning. A significant number of the patients of this ward are expected to be older people. The refurbished aged care unit at the Canberra Hospital has been upgraded, at a cost of $1.32m, to a 22-bed ward which has an innovative design capable of delivering state-of-the-art acute medical care for the elderly, geriatric rehabilitation, and a unit specifically designed for the management of dementia and difficult behaviour in the elderly.
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