Jobs at risk
SOUTH Gippsland Shire Council could make 43 jobs redundant under a proposal to no longer provide Home and Community Care (HACC) services.
The Star understands 43 jobs would end and council would pay a redundancy bill of approximately $1 million if council opts out of HACC.
At the March 28 council meeting, councillors will vote on a proposal by council officers that council withdraw from offering HACC services.
The withdrawal is conditional on council finding a suitable alternative service provider to continue to deliver services.
If a provider is found, council will recommend all HACC staff to the new provider. If not, council will remain the service provider.
HACC services are targeted at senior clients aged over 65 years and clients under 65 years with a disability.
The service provides short term restorative care or longer term services to enable clients to remain independent and at home for longer.
Such services include home care, personal care, respite and home maintenance. Council has approximately 1300 such clients.
Council has been reviewing the future of HACC services under changes to the provision of funding by State and Federal governments. These changes will see all clients eventually able to chose their own service providers.
Council’s manager community services Bart Ruyter said council was currently not profitable in the sector and would most likely be uncompetitive once all governments’ changes came into effect.
He confirmed 43 was an accurate indication of the number of the jobs to be affected.
“A number of options for aged and disability services have been explored by council and no decision has been made by council yet,” Mr Ruyter said.
Australian Services Union (ASU) branch coordinator Melissa Wainwright said the ASU believed council’s decision would result in the “cessation of a total of 43 roles across the aged and disability team”.
The union plans a meeting of member this Thursday.
“This decision has the potential to devastate both staff and residents, who rely on good quality local jobs, with well trained workers providing vital support to those most vulnerable in our community who need it,” Ms Wainwright said.
“The union is extremely disappointed with this resolution, and urges council to vote against the recommendation to withdraw from provision of services in the strongest possible terms.
“The community faces an uncertain future with poorer quality outcomes if this decision is to proceed.
“The ASU believes council is making a decision far too soon, and should at the very least, wait until 2019 when more detail about future funding arrangements addressing council’s concerns are known.”
In November 2017, council received a petition urging it to rescind its motion to consider transferring HACC services to another organisation, and to retain aged and disability staff within council.
The petition was signed by 1549 residents of the shire and beyond, and contained 23 signatures from the ASU.
Bass Coast Shire Council has not concluded its HACC review.
Lisa Barham-Lomax, acting community strengthening manager, said, “Our review will continue to be progressive, taking into account sector changes such as the roll out of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. Logistics for the Commonwealth reform has still not been announced. Based on this changing environment, a decision about the future of services will likely not be made until late 2018.”
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Posted by Tayla Kershaw on Mar 20 2018. Filed under Featured, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry
