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1998
THE PARLIAMENT OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF
AUSTRALIA
SENATE
AGED
CARE AMENDMENT (ACCREDITATION AGENCY) BILL 1998
EXPLANATORY
MEMORANDUM
(Circulated
by authority of the Minister for Aged Care)
the Hon. Mrs Bronwyn Bishop,
MP)
ISBN: 0642 377723
AGED CARE AMENDMENT (ACCREDITATION AGENCY) BILL 1998
OUTLINE
This Bill provides a minor amendment to the Aged Care Act 1997
which gives effect to the Government's long stated intention that the Aged Care
Standards and Accreditation Agency would charge appropriate fees for accrediting
aged care services.
FINANCIAL IMPACT
The Agency was established on a partial cost recovery basis.
The level of fee is expected to reflect the cost of the accreditation service
and be comparable with other commercial accreditation arrangements in similar
industries.
AGED CARE AMENDMENT (ACCREDITATION AGENCY) BILL 1998
REGULATION IMPACT STATEMENT
Introduction
The
Government has established the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency
(the Agency) to manage the accreditation of aged care services.
The
Agency will play a leading role in ensuring that residential aged care
facilities achieve and maintain high standards of care and accommodation. It
will do this by:
• managing the residential aged care accreditation
process;
• overseeing assessments of residential aged care services
not yet ready for accreditation;
• liaising with the Department about
poor quality services; and
• providing industry with assistance to
improve service quality through education and training, information
dissemination and identification of best practice to promote and encourage
better quality care.
The Need for the Amendment
The Agency
is being funded under Part 5.4 (Accreditation Grants) of the Aged Care Act
1997 and has a funding agreement with the Commonwealth until June 2001 when
a new agreement will be negotiated. It has always been the Government's
intention that the Agency would be able to charge fees for service to enable it
to partly fund its operations.
Currently, there is no explicit power in
the Act which enables the Accreditation Grant Principles to empower the Agency
to charge fees for the provision of its services.
The Changes and
Their Impact
This amendment to the Act adds a subsection to the
examples of matters which may be dealt with in the Accreditation Grant
Principles. This subsection provides that the Principles may deal with fees (if
any) which may be charged on behalf of the Commonwealth for services provided by
the Agency.
From January 2001 all aged care services must be accredited
in order to receive Commonwealth subsidy for the provision of aged care. The
accreditation fees should be treated consistently within the rules which apply
to other legitimate business costs for taxation purposes.
Therefore, the
impact on aged care services of paying an "accreditation" fee every one or three
years, depending on the quality of the service, will be minimal in comparison
with the financial advantages of becoming accredited.
Consultation
The Government consulted widely during the
development of the Act and the Principles and has listened to the concerns of
service providers since the implementation of the reforms. The setting up and
operation of the Agency were an outcome of this ongoing consultation
process.
Monitoring and Review of the Reforms
The
importance of ongoing review of the reforms to residential care is recognised
and the Government's commitment to monitoring the reforms will remain.
In
June 1997 the Government made a commitment to undertake an on-going review of
the aged care reform policy and its implementation. This review will be
undertaken by an independent expert advised by a working group representing
stakeholders. It will cover a two year period from the commencement of the Act
in October 1997.
The terms of reference are very broad and encompass a
diverse range of issues such as access, affordability, adequacy of funding,
quality of care, complaints mechanisms and impact on other services such as
community care.
NOTES ON AMENDMENT
This section provides the Act may be cited as the Aged Care Amendment
(Accreditation Agency) Bill 1998.
This item provides that the Act commences on the day it receives Royal
Assent.
The item provides that the Schedule takes effect as
specified.
Schedule 1
Item 1 – 80-1(2)
This
Item adds a subsection to the examples of matters which may be dealt with in the
Accreditation Grant Principles. This subsection provides that the Principles may
deal with fees (if any) which may be charged, on behalf of the Commonwealth, for
services provided by a body which is in receipt of an accreditation grant.
Item 2 – 80-1(2A)
The Item also provides that these
fees must be reasonably related to the cost of providing the service and must
not amount to a taxation.