Federal Member for Newcastle, Sharon Claydon has addressed parliament about a looming crisis in the aged care industry which will affect Hunter residents.
100,000 older Australians are waiting to access home care packages they've already been approved for, including 80,000 with high care needs or dementia.
NSW has the longest waiting list in the country, which is only set to get worse in the future.
Sharon Claydon said it's despicable one Novocastrian man was forced to call her office to discuss the issue after receiving no response from the government.
"My office is getting harrowing calls about the implications of these waiting lists," she said, "I've had one gentleman contact me who was just at his wit's end.
"He'd done everything he could," Ms Claydon continued, "after waiting a year for a high-level care package to become available for his 90-year-old mother - he had nowhere else to turn to."
The MP said the Novocastrian man's story was just one of many families struggling to look after their elderly members.
"The government needs to understand the very real human consequences of their inaction...they've been marked down as a 'fail, fail, fail' in my view," she said.
Ms Claydon spoke on the issue in parliament yesterday, and was surprised to see no government ministers listed to address the matter during proceedings.
However, the Minister for Aged Care, Ken Wyatt, happened to be in chambers at the time and responded to Ms Claydon's address.
"Regretfully, the Minister's response was that it's a complex issue," the MP explained, "...well that is your job. That's your portfolio...you've sat on the news of waiting list times for aged-care in-home packages for 12 months.
"Only now have you bothered to share that news with the public."
Sharon Claydon said the government's response to the 100,000 people waiting was to release 6000 additional places.
"That's not even a drop in the ocean," Ms Claydon affirmed.
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| The Member for Newcastle in her address to parliament yesterday. |
