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Winter 2003

HACSU launches Statewide Aged Care Campaign

The campaign is aimed at getting every aged care employer in Tasmania signed up to a staffing levels agreement based on a specific staffing formula.

HACSU wants to make sure there is minimum, safe staffing levels and better quality of care in private sector aged care facilities in Tasmania.

HACSU also wants all employers to agree to facilitate HACSU conducting elections for employee elected OH&S representatives at all sites, and that the employer pays to have those representatives attend Unions Tasmania OH&S training.

Further, HACSU will be conducting an education campaign amongst aged care staff to reduce the amount of unpaid overtime.

One of the key tools in achieving this will be to establish a HACSU Worksite Committee in each aged care facility within a 12- month period.

The HACSU campaign has been designed around direct feedback from aged care members, through a survey of Tasmania's aged care workers, about their working conditions.

The responses revealed that nearly 60 per cent of members believe their facility is under-staffed, 40 per cent cannot do the work they are assigned during their shifts, and nearly 20 per cent feel in danger due to a lack of safety measures.

As well, over half are working overtime, with 73% of staff saying the overtime is unpaid.

When other employees are off on sick leave or other leave, 36% say there is no backfill.

Sixty percent of staff say their responsibility has increased, and 73% say workloads have increased, with 41% saying they can't get their work done in the time allocated.

This is in stark contrast to comments from the Federal Aged Care Minister, Kevin Andrews, who says individual Homes are legally required to provide adequate staffing and any suspected breaches should be reported.

HACSU State Secretary, Chris Brown, said the aged care campaign would be one of the major union actions over the next 12 months.

Chris was highly critical of existing aged care arrangements.

"There is currently no minimum level of staffing required by Commonwealth legislation in aged care facilities in Australia," Chris said.

"The levels of nursing, personal care, domestic and allied health professional staff varies widely between facilities, impacting directly on the care of residents."

"The ratio of care staff to residents can be as high as one to 70 on some shifts."

"Residents with specialised nursing care needs must be met by ''appropriately qualified nursing staff''.

The lack of specific guidelines and the gap of up to three years between visits by inspectors means that operators can largely set their staffing levels at whatever level they want."

"The effect has been staffing levels dropping markedly since the introduction of the Commonwealth Aged Care Act 1997, which took away the connection between funding and the level of care provided in aged care facilities."

"Safe staffing ratios are the only way residents and their families can be guaranteed a certain level of care and attention both by care workers and allied health professionals such as physiotherapists, occupational therapists."

"At present there is no such guarantee."

There is now a significant amount of evidence that patient care, and in fact patient and staff safety, can be adversely affected by inadequate staff numbers.

Some employers realise the aged care industry should have minimum staffing levels.

The Uniting Church's Aged Care service in NSW said recently:

"With many proprietors driven by the financial bottom line, an industry without regulation on staff numbers and skills mix will inevitably lead to an unacceptable quality of care and quality of life standards for care recipients and dangerous, stressful working environments for staff."

"Human service provision necessitates an ethical commitment to service provision: we cannot rely on the assumption that all proprietors have the best of intentions or the skills and expertise to meet the many and varied needs of their vulnerable clients and the workforce. And we cannot rely on the market to do this."

Another of the difficulties in aged care is the lack of minimum staffing qualifications other than for Registered and Enrolled Nurses.

Care staff have widely varying expertise and qualifications.

HACSU believes all non nursing staff should have as a minimum by 2005, a level three certificate in personal care.

As part of the campaign, HACSU will also push for improvements in the safety of aged care facilities.

Employers will be asked to sign a safety charter, which will set out the rights and responsibilities of staff and management at each facility.

Workplace safety committees where they are not currently in operation will also be established.

The campaign will target employers across Tasmania, starting with homes where critical shortages of staff have been identified.

The Commonwealth Government will be called upon to reverse its opposition to minimum safe staffing ratios and amend the Aged Care Act.

A detailed aged care policy will be put forward to the next ACTU Congress, and the union is also calling on the Labor Party to adopt HACSU's minimum staffing ratios as part of its new aged care policy.