Day 1 – Monday 29 July

Day one of the Mildura hearings began with five witnesses giving direct evidence about their experience providing care to family members. Elaine Marree Gregory and Dorothy (Dot) Holt provided care to their elderly mothers and spoke of their struggle to maintain carer responsibilities with work and other family commitments without additional support. Rosemary Jean Cameron then described her experience caring for her husband who suffered from Lewy Body dementia and the lack of information she could access regarding her husband’s condition and how best to care for him. Joan Barbara Rosenthal was the fourth witness for the day, speaking about the benefits of the Level 4 Home Care Package her husband receives. Barbara Jean McPhee AM then outlined her struggle to find adequate respite care for her mother before the final two witnesses, Shontia Michelle Saluja-Honeysett, Vice Chair of the Victorian Committee for Aboriginal Aged Care and Disability and Lynette Joyce Bishop, Chair of the Victorian Committee for Aboriginal Aged Care and Disability; described their work as Aboriginal Access and Support Officers who help Aboriginal elders navigate the aged care system.

Day 2 – Tuesday 30 July

The second day of the Mildura hearings continued to hear evidence regarding support services to informal carers. The day began with Bonney Heather Dietrich, Mildura Carer Blueprint Project Co-ordinator at Carers Victoria and Donald Geoffrey Laity of the Mildura Carers Hub, giving evidence together regarding the issue of isolation, both socially and from support services, in remote areas as well as detailing the struggle to find funding for the Carers Hub. Nicole Louise Dunn then spoke of her experience providing care to her grandmother and the struggles she encountered seeking financial and care assistance from government agencies. Catherine Thomson, a Research Fellow at the UNSW’s Social Policy Research Centre then gave evidence regarding the welfare of carers and emphasised that the needs of the carer are just as important as the needs of those being cared for. The final three witnesses gave evidence together, Dr Meredith Dell Gresham, Senior Consultant to Dementia Centre at HammondCare and Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at UNSW, Dr Lyn Phillipson, NHMRC-ARC Dementia Fellow, WHO-IFA Age Friendly Mentor and Dr Suzanne Hodgkin, Deputy Director of the John Richards Centre for Rural Ageing Research. The panel outlined the aged care system’s failure to recognise ‘hidden carers’ and the need for aged care services to be brought under the one umbrella and regulated by one institution in a co-ordinated fashion.

Day 3 – Wednesday 31 July

The final day of the Mildura hearings opened with direct evidence given by Kay Gray who spoke of her experience as a carer for her husband and her difficulties adjusting to respite facilities. Danijela Hlis then described how she cared for her elderly Slovenian mother who had moved to Australia to be cared for by their children. Darren Leigh Midgley, CEO of Chaffey Aged Care, Jennifer Garonne, CEO of Princes Court Homes, Xenofon (Fonda) Voukelatos, General Manager for Strategy and Business Development at Uniting Aged Care and Maree Woodhouse, Director of Clinical Services, at Wimmera Health Care Group gave evidence about the important community service that respite care provides. The panel highlighted the opportunity that respite affords in educating people who inevitably become more dependent on the aged care system about what aged care services they can access. Nigel Murray, Assistant Secretary of In Home Aged Care at the Commonwealth Department of Health, Fiona Kathryn Buffinton, First Assistant Secretary at Home Aged Care in the Commonwealth Department of Health and George Sotiropoulos, Group Manager Disability for the Employment and Carers Group at the Commonwealth Department of Social Services were the last to give evidence, and spoke of the importance of increasing awareness of the supports available to informal carers. Counsel Assisting concluded the hearing by summarising the evidence that had been given during the Mildura hearing and expressed concerns that the evidence suggested serious shortcomings in the practical effect of Government policies.

The Royal Commission will resume in Brisbane on 5 August 2019 and will inquire into the regulation of aged care, with a focus on quality and safety and how aspects of the current regulatory system operate.