Tue Sep 2

Ageing Australians are waiting too long for home care packages. Here’s why

Written by Michael Woods, Professor of Health Economics, University of Technology Sydney

Federal Aged Care Minister Sam Rae was heavily questioned ^[1] in parliament yesterday for delaying the release of 83,000 new home care packages, from July 1 to November 1.

In March 2025, more than 289,000 older Australians had a home care package ^[2]. But more Australians are needing these services than there are places, so the wait list continues to grow.

Reacting to widespread complaints, the Senate stepped in ^[3] to conduct a short inquiry into the impact of the delay on older Australians.

Our research and submission ^[4] to the Senate inquiry show the government should immediately release the additional packages. But its not yet clear whether it will do so.

Remind me, what are home care packages?

Home care packages ^[5] are bundles of services that help older people with complex needs to live at home for longer.

There are four levels of funding, depending on need. Each package can include help with household tasks, but there is also an emphasis on personal and clinical care, including nursing, physiotherapy and other allied health care.

The 2021 Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety ^[6] recommended the government significantly increase the number of home care packages, as it was clear older people wanted to stay at home for as long as possible.

It found in-home care can prevent ^[7] the avoidable decline of older people’s health and independence, enable them to remain a part of their local community, and delay (or avoid) entry into residential aged care or hospital.

The waiting list went down. Now it’s up again

The number of people receiving a home care package increased ^[8] from 128,781 at the end of 2019 to 258,374 in June 2023. During that time the government was releasing 40,000 to 50,000 packages per quarter.

This exceeded the number of people being approved for packages. So the waiting list was declining by as much as 10,000 people per quarter, reaching a low ^[9] of 28,665 by June 2023.

Number of people with a home care package and waiting for a home care package

Number of people with a home care package and waiting for a home care package. UTS Ageing Research Collaborative ^[10]

However, from mid-2023 the government reduced the release of new packages to a little over 30,000 per quarter. Meanwhile, the number of older people being approved for a package continued to grow in line with Australia’s ageing population.

As a result, waiting lists rose strongly ^[11] each quarter and reached 87,597 by March 2025.

What was due to start in July?

With pressure mounting from the sector, the then-minister for aged care announced in November 2024 that a new Aged Care Act would start in July 2025.

It would include significant reform to in-home aged care, including a new Support at Home ^[12] program, as well as significant reforms to residential aged care facilities and how they’re funded.

As part of the reforms, the government committed to funding an additional 83,000 home care packages in 2025–26. This was a marked increase on the 24,000 in 2024–25.

The government also committed to reducing wait times to an average of three months by 2027 ^[13].

However, the start of the new Aged Care Act 2024 – and the rollout of the 83,000 additional packages – was subsequently deferred until November 1 2025. At the time, the government said ^[14] the supporting regulation was not fully ready for consideration by Parliament in time to allow older people, providers and the workforce to prepare for the changes.

What has the Senate inquiry found so far?

The Senate ^[15] inquiry investigating the impact on older Australians is due to report on September 15.

In a submission to the inquiry, the former Inspector-General of Aged Care said the care wait list continued to spiral upwards and was forecast to exceed 102,000 ^[16] by the end of October 2025.

In evidence to the inquiry on Friday, the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing confirmed that when an existing package became vacant it was re-released to a new client. However, there had been no increase in the overall number of packages since the beginning of July.

The department also advised that at the end of July 121,596 people ^[17] were waiting for an assessment and more than 87,000 have been assessed but have not received their package.

While the wait list grows, the time that older Australians are having to wait is getting longer. The department’s submission ^[18] reported that older people assessed as medium priority have an estimated wait time, across all packages, of 9–12 months.

But the government’s data refers only to the time taken between being assessed for home care and being assigned a package. Older people also have to wait another month or more, on average, between applying to be assessed and having that assessment. Then there is, on average, another month ^[19] between being assigned a package and having the first service actually delivered.

Greater transparency about how long older people actually have to wait would help hold the government to account.

There are longer-term issues yet to be addressed

The release of some of the 83,000 packages over the next two months would make a short-term dent in the current wait list, although this gain will largely disappear when some of the backlog of 120,000 people waiting to be assessed ^[20] is finally tackled.

But adding more packages doesn’t go far enough to address the long-term aged care structural issues facing older people and taxpayers.

The growing demand for in-home aged care is being driven by the influx of Baby Boomers over the next two decades (the oldest are currently aged 79) and by increases in chronic illnesses, such as those arising from greater obesity.

These drivers will place growing stress on the ability of constrained government budgets to increase the supply of services.

The availability of a skilled and committed workforce to deliver the services is yet another challenge which is economy-wide and needs to be addressed if the system is to meet the rising demands for home-based care.