5th Dec 2017, 3:52 PM – Senate Motions - Aged Care - For nationally-consistent regulation

The majority voted in favour of a motion, which called for the Government:

to take a leadership role in developing nationally-consistent regulation of retirement housing across the various tenures that provides strong protections to residents and their families

Motions like these don't have legal force (that is, they don't change the law or Government policy) but they do represent the will of the Senate and so have some influence.

Queensland One Nation Senator Fraser Anning, who joined our Senate last month, crossed the floor to vote "No" in this division. Senator Anning is a replacement for former One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts, who was found to be a dual citizen and so ineligible to sit in the Senate under the Constitution.

Motion text

That the Senate—

(a) notes the article in The Age, on 15 November 2017, regarding the residents of Berkeley Living retirement village in Victoria;

(b) acknowledges that there have been problems with the retirement villages sector for many years and that there was a parliamentary inquiry that looked at issues within the retirement villages sector in 2007;

(c) recognises that the situation of Berkeley Living residents is yet another example of how a lack of regulation and standards in this industry have allowed poor practices to flourish;

(d) notes that retirement villages were on the agenda for the meeting, on 31 August 2017, of Consumer Affairs Ministers and that it was agreed to direct the Chartered Accountants of Australia & New Zealand to undertake further investigation into the regulation of retirement villages, including identifying any regulatory gaps that allow unfair practices to occur; and

(e) urges the Federal Government to take a leadership role in developing nationally-consistent regulation of retirement housing across the various tenures that provides strong protections to residents and their families.