Securely store all your digital assets with Phantom Wallet Extension. Easily manage and access your cryptocurrencies, tokens, and NFTs in one convenient and secure location. Phantom Wallet Extension | Phantom Wallet Extension
The impetus for this online survey was threefold and came from increased reports of significant levels of distress on social media and aged care forums, following:
the “updated guidelines”and “inclusions and exclusions FAQs” for providers in 2023.
the stricter and one-size-fits-all approach by the Quality and Safety Commissioner late in 2023, and
the rushed publication of the Exposure draft Bill for a new Aged Care Act in late December 2023.
A majority of HCP recipients and carers surveyed (n=142) were significantly distressed by these policy changes. This level of distress persists today.
Alarming and severe levels of distress among HCP recipients and carers should be treated as a warning sign for government, medical and health professionals to act and address the emotional toll of these changes on older Australians.
53% of recipients and carers reported “Very High” levels of psychological distress on the K10.
“Very High” levels of distress on the K10 should flag the need for further assessment and the presence of suicidal ideation. (Rainbow et al., 2023).
Factors such as burdensomeness, financial wellbeing and belonging, compound this “Very High” risk.
Carers needs are often overlooked. Given that over 80% of recipients reported the presence of features of clinical depression on the K10,the significant personal and emotional cost to carers is reflected in 80% reporting features of clinical depression.
82% of recipients and carers rated their quality of life as “the worst possible outcome”, with no recipients and 4% of carers rating their quality of life as “the best possible outcome”.
These results are alarming for older Australians and their carers living at home and receiving HCP funding.
Much of this psychological distress and poor quality of life is a consequence of government policy that has introduced harsh funding guidelines, strict and discriminatory surveillance by the Safety Commissioner and a perceived loss of autonomy and control in the lives of older Australians.
Given that the aim of Support at Home funding is to keep older people at home longer, rather than enter a residential aged care facility, the results of this survey shows that in terms of very high psychological distress and poor quality of life, the government is undermining its stated aim.
Most HCP recipients and carers are aware of the need for financial compliance, accountability and fiscal responsibility when receiving taxpayer-generated funding. The majority of older people receiving HCPs want to stay at home and they generally behave with restraint and good sense in regard to the spending of those funds. However, a marketized and profit-driven aged care sector has been handed a policy regime where providers are declining requests for services more often and inconsistently, and thus retaining more funds to invest for profits. Together with a Safety Commissioner who applies a strict, ageist and mandatory one-size-fits-all approach to regulation, increasingly makes it more difficult each day for older people to stay at home and not enter residential aged care.
Examples of reports on social media and forums of the impact of these changes included:
"I am a full-time carer for my elderly mother who has dementia and is paralysed from a stroke. She requires daily laxatives, suppositories and enemas, which I administer. The provider has told me that, under the new guidelines, these bowel-movement inducers are not covered from her HCP. This is on top of a sequence of other exclusions over the past year. Why, Minister Wells, has your government adopted such a paternalistic attitude to aged care? What if it was your mother?"
"After 20 years of taking magnesium supplements for my cardiac health, I stopped because I can’t afford to buy them. I ended up in hospital with a pulse of 40 and so tired! The minute I got to hospital, staff inserted an IV line with a dose of magnesium. It took 25 minutes for me to say that I was ready to go home! It was like a miracle. My cardiologist agrees that for me and my strange heart issues, magnesium is critical. But even with his support I won’t be able to get around this exclusion. For me this is a life threatening situation and I’m really upset and worried about it."
"I am a 64 y/o fulltime carer of my 96 y/o mother. I have been lucky to have found some great support staff through my mother’s Self-Managed HCP which have helped me clean the house, maintain the lawn, prepare some meals for my mother and do some minor plumbing. But I have lost them all over the last couple of months because of the excessive compliance demands and regulation by the government. I fear that I will now be forced to go for a Full-Managed HCP, but I have been there before and all it means is zero control or say, unreliable staff, extremely excessive fees and ongoing stress. Why can’t I choose the staff I need without all this government interference? I am a very committed and capable carer. I need to be supported, not treated like I am incompetent."
"I am a carer for my father-in-law. He has multiple amputations on his feet. He melted the skin off his foot from being next to a heater trying to keep warm (he couldn’t feel the burning). He spent months in and out of hospital recovering, then months in a wheelchair. We were funded for an air conditioner, but the exclusions cruelled that. I can’t guarantee that it won’t happen for him again."
Recommendations: Encourage more not-for-profit organisations to become involved in the aged care sector. These organisations, such as cooperatives, generally have a values-based, humanitarian approach to aged care rather than seeing older people as commodities from which to drive profits. As well, local government has relinquished its role in aged care, yet maintains its organisational structures to service regional, rural and remote areas and should be considered as an option for those residents.
If the government has a duty-of care towards all of its citizens, and has assumed that duty for older Australians, we believe that it needs to act now to remedy the distressing set of circumstances that has created this alarming level of distress. We recommend that the government urgently:
Provide a counselling helpline, independently funded and run by an independent organisation that has the capacity and training in counselling to understand and act on the stories of older people in distress, e.g. Lifeline, Beyond Blue, etc. We believe that neither COTA nor OPAN have the skill set for this or are appropriate organisations to offer this service.
Adopt a more flexible and individualised approach to the spending of HCP funds for those living at home, such as allowing precedents to be set for the purchase of medically supported services from funds in exceptional circumstances.These precedents are to be published on a publicly accessible website, with explanatory information and searchable metadata for universal reference.
Also, as occurs in the commercial world, a discretional allowance would address many of the challenges for governance. A set,non-accumulative discretional monthly allowance would empower individuals to use this support on services that would address their individual and unique needs.
Offer the choice to opt out of mandatory surveillance (a dignity of risk approach) for those recipients and carers who have the cognitive capacity to protect themselves against elder abuse and choose to do so. Many older people who self-manage a HCP have been doing that all of their lives and want to continue to do so.
Include specific references to consumer-directed-care as the model underpinning self-management of Support at Home funding (Laragy & Vasiliadis, 2020; 2022).
Encourage more involvement of not-for-profit values-based service providers, such as cooperative organisations, to play a role in aged care, particularly for those who live in regional and remote areas.
Encourage more involvement of local government in aged care, with its potential links to Primary Health Care Networks, to better serve the physical and mental health of older Australians receiving HCPs.
As the saying goes, the true measure of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable. The important question for government is: will it measure up to this challenge while ensuring self-determination and autonomy for older Australians receiving a HCP and their carers?Regardless of the answer, the “Very High” levels of reported distress and poor quality of life in this survey, indicates that the clock is ticking, and a proactive approach is needed urgently. Brian Corless, March 2024.
The impetus for this online survey was threefold and came from increased reports of significant levels of distress on social media and aged care forums, following:
the “updated guidelines”and “inclusions and exclusions FAQs” for providers in 2023.
the stricter and one-size-fits-all approach by the Quality and Safety Commissioner late in 2023, and
the rushed publication of the Exposure draft Bill for a new Aged Care Act in late December 2023.
A majority of HCP recipients and carers surveyed (n=142) were significantly distressed by these policy changes. This level of distress persists today.
Alarming and severe levels of distress among HCP recipients and carers should be treated as a warning sign for government, medical and health professionals to act and address the emotional toll of these changes on older Australians.
53% of recipients and carers reported “Very High” levels of psychological distress on the K10.
“Very High” levels of distress on the K10 should flag the need for further assessment and the presence of suicidal ideation. (Rainbow et al., 2023).
Factors such as burdensomeness, financial wellbeing and belonging, compound this “Very High” risk.
Carers needs are often overlooked. Given that over 80% of recipients reported the presence of features of clinical depression on the K10,the significant personal and emotional cost to carers is reflected in 80% reporting features of clinical depression.
82% of recipients and carers rated their quality of life as “the worst possible outcome”, with no recipients and 4% of carers rating their quality of life as “the best possible outcome”.
These results are alarming for older Australians and their carers living at home and receiving HCP funding.
Much of this psychological distress and poor quality of life is a consequence of government policy that has introduced harsh funding guidelines, strict and discriminatory surveillance by the Safety Commissioner and a perceived loss of autonomy and control in the lives of older Australians.
Given that the aim of Support at Home funding is to keep older people at home longer, rather than enter a residential aged care facility, the results of this survey shows that in terms of very high psychological distress and poor quality of life, the government is undermining its stated aim.
Most HCP recipients and carers are aware of the need for financial compliance, accountability and fiscal responsibility when receiving taxpayer-generated funding. The majority of older people receiving HCPs want to stay at home and they generally behave with restraint and good sense in regard to the spending of those funds. However, a marketized and profit-driven aged care sector has been handed a policy regime where providers are declining requests for services more often and inconsistently, and thus retaining more funds to invest for profits. Together with a Safety Commissioner who applies a strict, ageist and mandatory one-size-fits-all approach to regulation, increasingly makes it more difficult each day for older people to stay at home and not enter residential aged care.
Examples of reports on social media and forums of the impact of these changes included:
"I am a full-time carer for my elderly mother who has dementia and is paralysed from a stroke. She requires daily laxatives, suppositories and enemas, which I administer. The provider has told me that, under the new guidelines, these bowel-movement inducers are not covered from her HCP. This is on top of a sequence of other exclusions over the past year. Why, Minister Wells, has your government adopted such a paternalistic attitude to aged care? What if it was your mother?"
"After 20 years of taking magnesium supplements for my cardiac health, I stopped because I can’t afford to buy them. I ended up in hospital with a pulse of 40 and so tired! The minute I got to hospital, staff inserted an IV line with a dose of magnesium. It took 25 minutes for me to say that I was ready to go home! It was like a miracle. My cardiologist agrees that for me and my strange heart issues, magnesium is critical. But even with his support I won’t be able to get around this exclusion. For me this is a life threatening situation and I’m really upset and worried about it."
"I am a 64 y/o fulltime carer of my 96 y/o mother. I have been lucky to have found some great support staff through my mother’s Self-Managed HCP which have helped me clean the house, maintain the lawn, prepare some meals for my mother and do some minor plumbing. But I have lost them all over the last couple of months because of the excessive compliance demands and regulation by the government. I fear that I will now be forced to go for a Full-Managed HCP, but I have been there before and all it means is zero control or say, unreliable staff, extremely excessive fees and ongoing stress. Why can’t I choose the staff I need without all this government interference? I am a very committed and capable carer. I need to be supported, not treated like I am incompetent."
"I am a carer for my father-in-law. He has multiple amputations on his feet. He melted the skin off his foot from being next to a heater trying to keep warm (he couldn’t feel the burning). He spent months in and out of hospital recovering, then months in a wheelchair. We were funded for an air conditioner, but the exclusions cruelled that. I can’t guarantee that it won’t happen for him again."
Recommendations: Encourage more not-for-profit organisations to become involved in the aged care sector. These organisations, such as cooperatives, generally have a values-based, humanitarian approach to aged care rather than seeing older people as commodities from which to drive profits. As well, local government has relinquished its role in aged care, yet maintains its organisational structures to service regional, rural and remote areas and should be considered as an option for those residents.
If the government has a duty-of care towards all of its citizens, and has assumed that duty for older Australians, we believe that it needs to act now to remedy the distressing set of circumstances that has created this alarming level of distress. We recommend that the government urgently:
Provide a counselling helpline, independently funded and run by an independent organisation that has the capacity and training in counselling to understand and act on the stories of older people in distress, e.g. Lifeline, Beyond Blue, etc. We believe that neither COTA nor OPAN have the skill set for this or are appropriate organisations to offer this service.
Adopt a more flexible and individualised approach to the spending of HCP funds for those living at home, such as allowing precedents to be set for the purchase of medically supported services from funds in exceptional circumstances.These precedents are to be published on a publicly accessible website, with explanatory information and searchable metadata for universal reference.
Also, as occurs in the commercial world, a discretional allowance would address many of the challenges for governance. A set,non-accumulative discretional monthly allowance would empower individuals to use this support on services that would address their individual and unique needs.
Offer the choice to opt out of mandatory surveillance (a dignity of risk approach) for those recipients and carers who have the cognitive capacity to protect themselves against elder abuse and choose to do so. Many older people who self-manage a HCP have been doing that all of their lives and want to continue to do so.
Include specific references to consumer-directed-care as the model underpinning self-management of Support at Home funding (Laragy & Vasiliadis, 2020; 2022).
Encourage more involvement of not-for-profit values-based service providers, such as cooperative organisations, to play a role in aged care, particularly for those who live in regional and remote areas.
Encourage more involvement of local government in aged care, with its potential links to Primary Health Care Networks, to better serve the physical and mental health of older Australians receiving HCPs.
As the saying goes, the true measure of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable. The important question for government is: will it measure up to this challenge while ensuring self-determination and autonomy for older Australians receiving a HCP and their carers?Regardless of the answer, the “Very High” levels of reported distress and poor quality of life in this survey, indicates that the clock is ticking, and a proactive approach is needed urgently. Brian Corless, March 2024.
I have a question regarding an consent order that has been made.
"The childrens time during school terms pursuant to paragraph (4) is suspended
during all school holiday periods and shall resume at the commencement of the new school
term in the same pattern that would have been in place had there been no holidays."
(Paragraph 4, if required, the children live with the Father during school terms as follows:
(a) commencing 19 August 2021, each alternate week from the conclusion of school (or
4pm on a day the children do not attend school) on Thursday until the conclusion of
school (or 4pm on a day the children do not attend school) on Tuesday.)
For the past 7 years my former partner and I have understood it to mean that if;
Parent 1 has the children on the last weekend of a school term the the rotation is suspended for the 3 weekends of the holidays and Parent 2 has the children on the first weekend of the following term.
My former partner has now just informed me that we have been doing it all wrong and that the rotation keeps going through the 3 weekends of the school term, therefore giving parent 1 both the last weekend of a school term and due to the rotation continuing, the same parent would get the first weekend in the following term.
Can someone please help me understand
Regards
Vanda
It reads as if she has given notice to her client and no longer wants to represent her. I would never have thought a lawyer would give up on a paying client.
We are still going through the Federal Circuit Court in regards to my time with the children with a conciliation conference scheduled for two weeks time.
Is this normally the case? Or would have my former partner notified her solicitor that their services were no longer required?
A baby with Down syndrome at the centre of an international surrogacy dispute was held by the Family Court of Western Australia not to have been abandoned in Thailand by his Australian parents.
This case involved twin children, Gammy, and his sister, Pipah, born in Thailand to a surrogate mother (“the surrogate”) using a Western Australian man’s sperm (“the father”) and an anonymous donor’s eggs. The father returned to Australia with Pipah, but not Gammy. It was claimed by the surrogate that the father had abandoned Gammy in Thailand because Gammy had Down Syndrome. The surrogate issued proceedings in Western Australia seeking the return to her of Pipah to live with her. The father opposed the Application and wanted Pipah to stay living with him. The father had previous convictions going back to 1999 for child sex offences.
Then feel free to comment on the Court's conclusion, the media's representation, and the legal, ethical and future consequences of artificial reproductive technology as it applies to family law.
Hi All,
New to the forum. Hope this is the right place to ask.
My court orders state that if,
"The parties live within 10 kilometres of each other" "the parties shall implement a school term arrangement whereby the children will spend 6 nights per fortnight in the fathers care, at times to be agreed."
My question is, is the "kilometres" measured in line of sight or in travelling kilometres in the eyes of the court? and where could I find the answer within the Victorian family law circuit resources?
I would like advice on the best way forward with my case.
My older kid (now adult) is totally alienated. While it was developing I wanted my older kid to see a psychologist about it but the ex refused, I took it to Court and the Family Report Writer (FRW) said there was no alienation and recommended against it, so it didn't happen and later the older kid became totally alienated.
Now the FRW is recommending that I be prevented from taking my younger kid to a psychologist if I see alienation developing with my younger kid - no explanation given.
The FRW acknowledges that my relationship with the older kid is destroyed but doesn't comment how, or how to protect the younger kid from the same thing, in fact seems to be recommending the same recipe that allowed the older kid to become alienated.
I think I need an alienation expert to advise the Court (the FRW is a social worker).
What is the best way to do this?
- ask for a second family report (I hear this can be hard to get ordered, and time may be a problem)
- have an expert (who hasn't interviewed anyone) appear as a witness at the trial to answer questions from both sides?
- have an expert look over affidavits and write a report?
- any other ideas?
One thing that I always recommend to clients preparing for a court battle is to prepare a timeline. Eventually a shortened version of it will be needed prior to final hearing, but you can save a lot of time and money by getting one going as soon as your matter is filed - if not sooner. The less time your solicitor has to spend sorting evidence to make a coherent story the less it will cost.
The more organized your information is the less time you need to waste hunting it out time and again when you're thinking through the million and one things you need to work out to make your case. It also lessens your stress, because you have a sense of being more in control of your case, and the long-term effects of stress can leave you in a distressed state of mind that could be used against you by your ex (or Child Safety, if that's the reason you're on this site).
If you are reading this you must have at least some access to a computer. It is worth learning how to use a simple spreadsheet. If you don't have Excel, Openoffice does the same thing, just for free. In the first row of column A type in 'Date.' Beside that in Column B type 'event.' Then in Column C type 'Witnesses.' Column D is 'Evidence.'
Right-click the 'A' at the top of the first column, to highlight the entire column. The left-click to get a menu of formatting options, and 'format cells' date, selecting dd/mm/yy as the format.
Now go back to the beginning - when did you meet your ex? 1/1/1995? Put in the data:
A B C D
Date Event Witness Evidence
1/1/95 Met ex. Her sister. SMS next day.
You're good to go. As you think of and locate evidence you can add it in. You can also learn to sort by date so that things added later get to the right row. If there are physical pieces of evidence you can put them in a manila folder in a box, in date order, and then your spreadsheet is an index to whatever you have to work with. If you want to get fancy, if you have events on two rows, and think of something that happened between those two dates, a right click on the automatically-generated row number will get a menu where you can 'insert row,' and then a blank row will appear that you can use, in the correct spot.
Of course, if there are more pieces of evidence, you can add them to column E, F, G, etc. If there are pieces of evidence that you know exist but need to find, it's a good idea to right-click the cell, 'format cells' and go to 'Background.' Change the background to red or green or some colour that will remind you when you look at the sheet to hunt for that vital piece of evidence!
There is a huge range of things that could be evidence. Receipts and SMS's of course, possible voice recordings, CCTV (always worth checking out!) or other things.
You might think more things are important that your solicitor does, but I always suggest that you err on the side of including things if you think that Evidence X proves Point Y. The final version that can be printed out (Columns A and B only) for the Court will always be shorter than what you've created. But better to have your fingers on things that might prove useful than simply leave them out then have to chase things at the last minute!
Weeding through evidence you will find that a few SMS messages are very important, and most are not. But sometimes a receipt showing you were at Canberra McDonalds on the morning of 25/9/12, when you are accused of being in Melbourne at about that time 'stalking' your ex, might just be lifesaving. Keeping it safe could make a huge difference to your matter. Documents that are obviously very important should be scanned and stored in a safe online account with a secure password that your ex won't be able to guess. Ideally, though for Court purposes, a JP-certified true copy will carry more weight on the day if required. A fireproof document safe is a good idea generally even if you're not involved in these proceedings, so if the importance of this point is clear, let this motivate you to get one!
JP-certified copies of things can include screenshots of facebook exchanges. A screenshot is one thing, a screenshot printed out and certified by a JP who has sighted the original page is conclusive. Once again, fireproof document safe! Once your ex realises you have social media evidence, expect to be blocked and the page taken down. This realisation may occur well before you file your affidavit with the screenshot.
If you are really not computer literate, I have seen people manage their cases equally successfully with a simple box of recipe cards, which you can still buy. All that is needed is to keep it chronological, so it corresponds with the manila folders in your box!
So start the process yesterday, and start clearning more space in your brain for the clear thinking you need to do without the clutter of worrying about whether you've got everything and where it is!
![[Image: mqdefault.jpg]](https://img.youtube.com/vi/7yx9C5E3_Co/mqdefault.jpg)
A baby with Down syndrome at the centre of an international surrogacy dispute was held by the Family Court of Western Australia not to have been abandoned in Thailand by his Australian parents.