E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
ABC NEWS AFTERNOON BRIEFING
WEDNESDAY 29 JULY, 2020

SUBJECTS: Aged care COVID crisis; Parliamentary sittings; Melbourne lockdown.

PATRICIA KARVELAS, HOST: A little earlier, I was joined by Bill Shorten. And he spoke to me about the crisis unfolding in Victoria. Bill Shorten, welcome.

BILL SHORTEN, MEMBER FOR MARIBYRNONG: Good afternoon, Patricia.

KARVELAS: You've tweeted about your former neighbour, Theo Makridis, whose family waited five days to be told he passed away at St. Basil's. Take me through what happened and what that family has told you.

SHORTEN: Theo and his adult son lived two doors up from Chloe and I and the kids for 10 years, and then on Saturday, Rita, his daughter, texted me or emailed me, and said that they couldn't find their father, that he was in St. Basil’s aged care home. And for five days she couldn't get an answer about what where he was. Was he in hospital? Was he sick? What was happening to him? So I then hit the phones all day Saturday. And then unfortunately, Rita got that call, which a whole lot of people would dread, which is he'd passed away. And for five days, not knowing, not being able to comfort, not being able to have that last conversation. I mean, it got so absurdly tragic that on Sunday, a Commonwealth representative rang Theo's daughter Rita, and said he was okay, but he’d died the day before. So it's just been a horrible nightmare of poor communication in aged care.

KARVELAS: So just, you're saying to me that she was notified that her father had died and then the day after someone where, from a Commonwealth body, who actually called to say that the father was doing fine if he was dead, what went wrong there?

SHORTEN: Well, I think what happened is the Commonwealth put in people into St. Basil's on the Tuesday because the staff had to isolate, the regular staff, and the problem that's happened from that is that the communication breakdown was shocking. It's not just Theo's family, a lot of families have been saying that in those last few days, there was just no communication. I mean, I hear second hand that they were looking for Greek speakers, a lot of the elderly were Greek, they didn't have that. And I think the question which torments Theo's family and probably many others is, what was happening to his care in those days? And, yes, a Commonwealth social worker from Adelaide rang up the family on the Sunday, after Theo had passed away on the Saturday afternoon, to say he was okay. It's just madness.

KARVELAS: Yeah it’s unbelievable. There needs to be a Royal Commission into what's happening here? I know the Victorian AMA has called for a Royal Commission. Should there be one?

SHORTEN: Well, there is a Royal Commission into aged care. It's underway.

KARVELAS: But specifically into the coronavirus crisis.

SHORTEN: Well, in aged care, I think the Royal Commission into aged care is the right vehicle, and it's already in place. The problem is that COVID-19 has shown some of the fault lines in our society. It's shown what happens when we have 30 per cent of Australians employed on casual and irregular employment. It's shown that we haven't been properly funding aged care, that we haven't had proper staffing levels in aged care, that we haven't been giving it the proper love it deserves. So this virus is really, I think, highlighting underlying divisions in our society, underlying problems and what's happened with aged care, as Daniel Andrews said, he wouldn't put his mum into aged care. You know, aged care has had a bad name for a long while. There's a lot of good people in it, a lot of good people, and there are a lot of good nursing homes. But there's a very long tail. And really, when you've got to rely on low paid workers who have to shuttle like fruit pickers between different aged care facilities. Our older Australians in their final stretches of their lives deserve better than the slipshod bandaid policy we've been applying to aged care. It is a national disgrace.

KARVELAS: Has the response to this crisis in Victorian aged care been too slow? And what do you make of the response, the Federal Government's interventions and changes, the cancellation of elective surgeries now, is this now the right response?

SHORTEN: Time will tell if it's the right response. The problem is that we're on notice from the first spike in COVID-19 that aged care was particularly vulnerable. We saw what happened at Newmarch in in Sydney ,so the Federal Government has been on notice for four plus months. And I've had people telling me stories, they couldn't get the right PPE. And what worries me is not just aged care, and we've been on notice of that and only now are some of the resources going into it. But what about disability care? Disabled Australians, after people in aged care, in their congregate group homes with their reduced immunities, you know, they're the second most vulnerable group. And I can't get proper data out of the feds. What are the illness rates? The COVID rates amongst people with disabilities? And I think we need to start reporting that, as well as we need a step change in the way we treat aged care and our vulnerable people. It's underfunded, it's understaffed, and politically it's been underloved.

KARVELAS: So you think that there should be actually published data about people with disabilities as well available in relation to COVID-19?

SHORTEN: Yes, I do. I mean, we know that certain parts, demographics, of our population are more vulnerable. People in aged care, we know they're more vulnerable, but only now it seems that the Federal Government is waking up and saying it's going to do more. It's a federal responsibility, aged care. We've got a Royal Commission, so we're obviously on notice it's a problem. But then we've just had this wave of virus and disaster sweep through aged care in Victoria. And I worry about disability. I mean, they haven't got paid pandemic leave for disability care workers. The disability services are constantly ringing me, saying we need more PPE. People with disabilities have got higher immunities, especially the people in the group homes.

KARVELAS: So this pandemic leave, you think they should be extended to disability workers as well?

SHORTEN: Yeah, I do. I mean, why should a low paid worker who does valuable work have to choose between being ill or being paid? Why are we asking people to make that terrible choice?

KARVELAS: Does what we're seeing in Victoria suggest the private aged care model isn't capable of adequately responding to something as difficult as COVID-19?

SHORTEN: I think some of the not for profits and some of the for profit centres are doing a good job. I've got other ones in my electorate where they're doing a good job. But you've got to wonder, don't you, Patricia? Ever since John Howard, corporatized and, in the mid 90s, the late 90s, aged care, has the for profit intervention been a success for aged care? Are we trying as a nation to do aged care on the cheap? Are we just assuming that because people are in the last stretches of full and meaningful lives, that somehow they become second class and worth less public attention? I mean, we cry on television as we should when children get sick, but older people? What are we not doing right as a nation and as the Federal Government? Are we treating our older people as sort of out of mind, out of sight?

KARVELAS: Is it your view that because older people have been dying, that there is a sense of complacency, that people think it's the older cohort that's affected by this? Do you think that's a factor in the way some people behave?

SHORTEN: I think most Victorians and most Australians, one of the reasons why they're willing to take on some of the economic hardship, the social distancing of the lockdowns is because we really care and love our older people. When I wear this mask, when I go into the shops and all of that, I do it not because I think I'll get sick, but we've got to show respect to vulnerable people to show that we're all taking precautions to make sure that they don't get infected. But there is a portion of our population who shrug their shoulders and kick the stone in front of their boot and say, well, they're old, they're going to die of something anyway. You know, what's the problem? I don't share that view. And I think most Australians realise that older people are people's mothers and fathers and grandparents. You judge a society by how you treat your most vulnerable, not how you treat your most well off.

KARVELAS: A parliamentary working group is examining when parliament will be able to sit again, including lots of different options. I know there's been criticism of the fact that parliament’s, well the next couple of weeks, have been called off. How should it proceed, in your view?

SHORTEN: I get that the Prime Minister was acting on medical advice, but I think it's a really bad look for parliament to be cancelled. We've asked millions of our fellow Australians to work remotely where they can. A whole lot of business models, a whole lot of the way that people do their jobs is changing. Yet somehow I think a lot of Australians could look at parliament and politicians and say, well, it's a bit hypocritical. We've all had to make our changes. Did you guys think that there's only one way you can do business. There should always be a physical component of parliament. There should always be the quorums. You're going to need people there. But why we can't have a virtual component to provide opportunities for those who can't attend the parliament to still participate in the parliament, shouldn't be beyond the wit and wisdom of this nation. I mean, the Poms are doing it, the English, the Welsh, in Brazil and in Spain they've come up with methods whereby not just during the virus, but where you might have a woman politician who's got particular caring responsibilities. It doesn't just have to be a woman, but that was the example that I've read. Well, they let them participate virtually. I mean, I think the way we structure our parliament, I've always been a traditionalist. Everyone there and all of that. I think it is now time that we need to re-evaluate how we can have a virtual component within the parliament. We should get with the times and start practising what we're preaching. We're telling everyone else to work.

KARVELAS: How much would that also help Victorian MP’s? Particularly Victorian MP’s that are now having their kids at home for the learning at home model, they're in lockdown. It doesn't seem convenient to be going to Canberra

SHORTEN: We've got to do the home schooling and you know, full, admission here, Chloe, my wife is doing most of the home schooling, but it's really difficult to ask a politician who's got a family of school age, you've got to do that and you've got to go to the parliament and you'd leave the other partner doing all the work. To me, it discriminates against women, this debate about not having a virtual component. Women in our society do the preponderance of the home caring and child raising. And yet we've got structures in our parliament which effectively discriminate against women participating in the parliament because they're also left doing all the other work.

KARVELAS: Before I let you go, you are in the Melbourne lockdown, as am I. What kind of effect do you think it's having on Melbourne and the mood and psyche of the city? It seems to me that there is a sort of sense of gloom in Melbourne.

SHORTEN: Yeah, obviously it's worse for people who've got loved ones who are very sick. It's hardest for our frontline healthcare workers. They are exhausted. They are tired. They've been doing this for not days or weeks, but months. It's hard on our small businesses. I really feel for retail and hospitality. But generally, you know, the second time round, we've had to go through lockdown and my staff has been locked down a week longer, even the rest of Melbourne. It is hard. It's a bit depressing. I feel for our kids, I've got a daughter in Year 12. She deserves to have a school formal, she performs in the in the school musical. And Year 12’s meant to be a great year. It's the culmination of 13 years of schooling, it's been hard for the kids and the young ones can't get out and see their friends. So I think it is having a deadening, depressing effect on Melbourne. You know, everyone's doing it a bit tough. Some obviously, though, are doing it a lot harder than me. But it is generally, I think, having a downward impact on people's morale.

KARVELAS: Yeah, I think that's right. Bill Shorten, thanks for coming on.

SHORTEN: Lovely to talk to you PK.

ENDS