Personal Alert Systems Rebate Scheme

The Hon. F. PANGALLO (15:03): What will happen to those who cannot afford the $50 gap? Will it make their system non-functional? Will they still be able to use it or not? Could they basically be cut off?

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK (Minister for Human Services) (15:04): That is something that they would need to speak to their supplier about. My understanding is that this scheme has provided an up-front payment of a $380 subsidy and the ongoing monitoring fees, and has not been reviewed in a long time. If you look at the website you will see that for a number of the providers, magically, their systems cost a very similar amount up front and the monitoring fee is close to that $250 mark.

As I said in my original answer, we have certainly been advised that one of the services has already reduced their monitoring fee. There are also a whole range of other similar services which don't rely on this particular technology. So we think that the lack of reviewing of the scheme means that there's probably some much better services that are available that people are already accessing through My Aged Care, or that they may have also signed up to personally, and that potentially for this scheme, while it is incredibly useful for people, there are improvements that can be made.