Submission to Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission on Cost Recovery Consultation Paper

From 1 July this year, most of the obligations under the new aged care regulatory system, including the strengthened Quality Standards, will fall on registered aged care providers. Allied health providers will generally be deemed to be associated providers and will not normally be required to register. AHPA supports this approach because our professionals are already regulated outside the aged care system.

However, there will be some Support at Home scenarios where the allied health professional or business is the sole provider, or where in the future consumers are permitted to engage more than one aged care provider. In these cases if the allied health provider is to receive Government funding they must register as an aged care provider. In those circumstances AHPA advocates for a light touch approach to aged care registration which recognises pre-existing regulation and associated costs for allied health professionals.

Although most allied health providers will not have to register, it is also important for costing and pricing to consider that our professionals will still bear an indirect burden via administration and reporting required by registered aged care providers who provide allied health services via subcontractors or agency brokerage. 

AHPA is also very concerned that registered home aged care providers in Category 4 of the proposed regulatory system will only be subject to the clinical governance element of Quality Standard 5, not the whole clinical standard that applies to residential care. This is problematic because it means that other aspects of the Standard, such as multidisciplinary team care, will not be applied to the provision of allied health to older people living at home.