EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
Statutory Rules 1986 No. 352
SUBJECT: NURSING HOMES ASSISTANCE ACT 1974
NURSING HOMES ASSISTANCE REGULATIONS (AMENDMENT)
(Issued by authority of the Minister for Community Services).
Regulations 5A and 6 of the Nursing Homes Assistance Regulations (the Regulations) were made pursuant to section 37 of the Nursing Homes Assistance Act 1974 (the Act).
Sub-section 12(1) of the Act provides that the Minister may approve an agreement between the Commonwealth and a nursing home proprietor with respect to the provision, by the Commonwealth, of financial assistance in connection with the carrying on of a nursing home or the provision of approved services in association with the carrying on of a nursing home.
Paragraph 13(1)(a) of the Act provides that any such agreement is to include a provision under which the proprietor is to charge a fee of $32 per week, or such other rate as is prescribed, for each nursing home patient, other than certain specified patients. The rate of $102.20 per week is prescribed in regulation 5A of the Regulations.
In effect, the fee prescribed in regulation 5A of the regulations is the standard financial contribution of nursing home patients towards the cost of their nursing home care. The rate currently prescribed is equivalent to 87.5% of the sum of the maximum standard rate of pension and rent assistance payable under the Social Security Act 1947.
The amount of patient contribution has been reviewed to take into account the increase in pension rates which will become effective on 25 December 1986. The rate of patient contribution will be increased to a level that will maintain the 87.5% rate.
Accordingly, the regulations amend regulation 5A to increase the rate of the prescribed fee, for the purposes of paragraph 13(1)(a), from $102.20 to $106.05 per week.
Paragraph 13(1)(d) of the Act provides for the prescription of the fees to be charged to nursing home patients in nursing homes approved under the Act where the patient has received, has established a right to receive, or may be entitled to receive, a payment by way of compensation or damages under a law of a State or Territory in respect of the nursing home care to which the fees relate.
Regulation 6 of the Regulations prescribes fees for the purposes of paragraph 13(1)(d).
These fees have been set at a rate equivalent to the sum of the fee prescribed under paragraph 13(1)(a) of the Act, the weekly equivalent of the amount of Commonwealth nursing home benefit prescribed in sub-regulation 28A(2) of the National Health Regulations and, in the case of extensive care patients, $42.00. With the proposed increases in the fee prescribed under paragraph 13(1)(a), corresponding increases will be made to the weekly fees prescribed under paragraph 13(1)(d) of the Act.
Accordingly, the regulations will amend regulation 6 to increase each of the fees prescribed by $3.85 per week.
The regulations will come into operation on 25 December 1986 which is the date the increase in pension rates occurs.