Australian Government Delays New Aged Care Act Until November 2025

In a shock decision by the Australian government, the implementation of the new Aged Care Act has been delayed until 1^st November 2025. With only 1 month until the original 1^st July deadline, and details of many of the reforms still not available to providers, the Minister for Health and Ageing Mark Butler and Minister for Aged Care and Seniors Sam Rae have formally announced that the deadline will be delayed until 1^st November 2025.

The duo has taken the decision to give aged care providers more time to prepare for the changes which will require major updates to their systems and processes. They shared this joint statement:

“We have received advice from the sector and experts that more time will improve the delivery of these reforms and minimise disruption.”

“Following careful consideration, the Government will recommend to the Governor-General, Her Excellency the Honourable Sam Mostyn AC, that she proclaim the commencement of the new Aged Care Act to be 1 November 2025.”

“This will allow more time for aged care providers to prepare their clients, support their workers and get their systems ready for the changes.”

“It will also give us more time to finalise key operational and digital processes, and for Parliament to consider supporting legislation that will enable the new Act to operate effectively.” 

This delayed deadline will be welcome news for aged care providers who are in the process of amending their operations to align with the new reforms outlined in the new Aged Care Act.

To align their systems and processes with the changes coming in November 2025, aged care providers will need to ensure they have formal processes and procedures defined in the following areas:

Business Continuity and Emergency Preparedness: Aged care providers will need to have a business continuity plan that is updated regularly and tested against different scenarios and vulnerabilities.  They will also need to have emergency preparedness and response plans to ensure they are ready in a crisis.

Governance: Aged care providers will need to implement governance procedures backed up with effective controls to safeguard patient care and ensure accountability and compliance. They will need governance procedures and systems to support informed decision-making for patients and their families. They must also have robust recruitment strategies to ensure they have enough staff to tend to patients at all times.

Compliance: Aged care providers will need robust compliance processes to prove that they are operating in line with aged care regulatory requirements and the new Aged Care Act. They will also need systems in place to log the results of self-assessments and audits to ensure they are capturing the findings and resolving issues.

Incident Management: Aged care providers will need effective incident reporting and incident management processes to escalate and resolve incidents promptly and to align their processes with the serious incident response scheme (SIRS).

Operational Transparency: Aged care providers must establish transparent reporting mechanisms for financial and operational performance.

Feedback and Complaints: Aged care providers must set up systems to collect feedback and complaints from staff, families, and patients and act to resolve issues.

Whistleblowing and Disclosures: Aged care providers must have a formal way for staff to disclose potential wrongdoings and whistle blow, preferably via an anonymous online portal or a whistleblowing hotline. This empowers staff to speak up and ensures potential issues are addressed.

Documenting Patient Care: Aged care providers must have a formal process to document the care that patients receive to ensure they are tended to often enough, fed, bathed, and that medication is administered. This evidence can be used when investigating potential cases of neglect.

Cyber Risk Management: Aged care providers hold vast amounts of personal data, some of it very sensitive relating to medical conditions and personal circumstances. Therefore, they must have robust measures in place to detect and control cyber and IT risk and resolve IT related incidents.

With all of these areas to consider and implement processes for, it is no wonder that the Australian government has delayed the deadline to give aged care providers more time to implement systems and adjust their processes.

Camms is supporting aged care providers across Australia to align their processes with the amended Aged Care Act. Our software can be configured to meet the specific needs of the aged care sector offering best practice capabilities for risk management, incident reporting, governance and controls, patient care documentation, feedback and complaints, whistleblowing and disclosures, business continuity, and IT and cyber risk management. Our platform can automate your spreadsheet-based processes and bring them into a software platform with online forms, automated process workflows and instant reporting outputs. Staff can easily understand their upcoming actions and tasks and log their actions, providing full visibility for managers and documenting proof of compliance with the Aged Care Act.

Reach out to us for a demo today or find out more about how to align your processes and systems with the Aged Care Act in our white paper and blog.