Catchpole Brent: Social Security (Long-term Residential Care) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Catchpole Brent: Social Security (Long-term Residential Care) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:622;Page:17287] 
BRENT CATCHPOLE (NZ First) 
: 
 I just want to express my disappointment at the announcement today that The Salvation Army is pulling out of providing services. The Salvation Army has done a tremendous job in providing services for aged care up until now. 
I wonder whether the Minister could take a call and clarify some concerns that I discussed with somebody yesterday. The person called me from a retirement village in Auckland and put its case to me. There are 37 residents in that retirement village and of those 37 two are in long-term residential care. The organisation claims the $636 figure for each of those two persons but the cost to the organisation is actually in the vicinity of $750. It has applied for a top-up and it receives $1 a day per person which is a long way short of the $750. 
I see that the Supplementary Order Paper does go some way in amending that and taking that $636 limit to be adjusted and decided in regulation and in regional divisions. So perhaps Auckland could be at a higher level but there is no guarantee. The Supplementary Order Paper does not guarantee that that figure of $636 will be increased in areas of high demand and high cost. It states that if any area is under that figure then the maximum amount is set at $636 and it remains at that until that particular region supersedes the $636. But nowhere does it explain whether that $636 is going to be increased other than by the consumer price index adjustments. 
The rest home was concerned that it was providing a service to those two long-term residents in its retirement village. One of them is not able to pay any additional fees but the other one does have the means to pay and is willing to pay but the village is under the apprehension that $636 or whatever the regional limit is going to be is all they can collect from that resident. Its decision has to be whether it pulls out of long-term residential care—in other words pushes its clients out of the retirement village—or reduces the services it is providing to those two individuals. The rest home’s concern is that if it has to push them out where do they go? Do they end up back in their homes with their families looking after them? 
Those two individuals do not want to be a burden on their families any further. That is why they went into a retirement village and they do not want to go back into their homes or outside of the retirement village and be looked after by their families until such time as they have to be hospitalised. That is another phase. When they go on to be hospitalised then they do require additional services and additional care. But it is during that in-between stage—when they are in long-term residential care—that those people want a reasonable level of care and service and some of them are willing to pay for that but the retirement village is uncertain as to whether it can ask them for additional funds. If it can ask them then that is fine. But what is the mechanism that allows the village to charge those clients for additional funds? I ask the Minister to take a call and explain that so I can get back to that retirement village and explain it.