The Senate Community Affairs Committee has just recommended that CHSP remain a separate block-funded program and not be folded into Support at Home. The proposal to transition the program into Support at Home was always a bad idea and the committee now agrees.
The recommendation was unanimous, including Labor Senators.
The Senate has cut through the fog
For years, the future of CHSP sat in one of those Canberra fogs. Everyone knew the decision mattered, but nobody seemed ready to make it. Ministers came and went while providers were left with the impossible task of trying to plan with uncertainty.
Now the Senate has cut through that. A unanimous committee recommendation, supported across party lines, makes CHSP much harder for the Government to continue to ignore.
CHSP is different by design
The CHSP Alliance deserves real credit for getting the issue on the political agenda. It brought together providers, researchers, consumers, unions, health professionals and community organisations around a practical argument. CHSP is not a smaller version of Support at Home, it is a different part of the system, doing a different job.
The Senate Committee understands that. It also understands that more work is needed. The report recommends implementing the Auditor-General’s findings, commissioning an independent cost-benefit analysis, beginning proper co-design and extending CHSP funding for three years beyond July 2027.
This Government has been getting so much wrong with the aged care reforms. It has not honoured the findings of its own Royal Commission and it has left many older Australians confused and distressed. Providers continue to feel the frustration of not being able to do the job they know needs doing.
The Senate has got this one right. It is possible the Government might too?