The Australian Federal Election was officially called today and last week HammondCare’s CEO Mike Baird issued a challenge to the Federal Government to match Labor’s pledge to improve aged care workforce wages.
HammondCare provides aged care in Australia. Mike Baird is the former Liberal Premier of NSW.
Mike’s involvement keeps the argument for better funding of aged care workers at the centre of the election debate, following Labor leader’s Anthony Albanese promised higher wages for aged care workers
Why does Good Grief! care? Because the good death cannot occur in a place that can’t afford to or overlooks investing in good end-of-life strategies – and not just the palliative care ones.
In a global city as rich as Sydney, in a country that has recently come fourth in the world for its standard of palliative care, there are still scandalous gaps in the delivery of the good death.
This mean that many people suffer lonely, spiritually barren and physically painful deaths. This doesn’t just happen in ‘poor’ places. Some of the humblest facilities offer profound levels of comfort and succour at death. Some of the richest, with the brightest shining candelabra, offer the most appalling.
Investing in and promoting a good end of life can only happen in aged care facilites that promote a good life, which is one of the reasons why an investment in better standards of care in aged care is so logical, and so important.
So, we celebrate Mike Baird’s contribution to keeping improved aged care at the centre of the political debate.
Thanks Kelvin Bissett of HammondCare for sharing this on LinkedIn.
Mr Baird said the wonderful, valuable work of caring for older Australians must be fairly valued.
“I would love the Federal Government to come and say: ‘No we understand, we do recognise and we do value just as the Opposition did last night’,” Mr Baird told Sky News.
“This is just the sort of boost that could help, and I think make a real difference.”
To find out more about Labor’s policies for aged care, in this election, go to:
https://www.alp.org.au/policies/aged-care
To read more on the reasons we need better aged care wages to achieve the good death, go to: