When the Anthony Albanese government’s new Aged Care Act 2024 came into force last November, it was promoted as the sector’s most significant reform in a generation.

Aged care minister Mark Butler announced it as a “new era of aged care”, built around dignity, choice and person-centred care. The law was Labor’s response to the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, whose findings exposed a system characterised by neglect, underfunding and poor accountability.

At the heart of the reforms was a promise that the elderly would be treated as rights’ holders, rather than passive recipients of increasingly hard to find care. The new Support at Home Program (replacing Home Care Packages) intended to help people remain in their homes longer, while exercising greater control over the services they received.

Seven months later what has emerged is an all-too-familiar story: Ambitious public policy promises colliding with the realities of privatisation, workforce shortages, algorithmic decision-making and chronic under investment.  

As with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), the consequences of outsourcing aged care to a privatised market are becoming apparent.

Doctors, advocates and older Australians have raised alarm over the new Integrated Assessment Tool, which uses algorithmic processes to determine support needs. Critics say it is generating unsafe assessments and denying adequate funding to people with complex health conditions.

Despite Robodebt and the fallout from automating NDIS assessments, federal Labor is proceeding with the plan, displaying a political arrogance that comes from a second-term government with no real........

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