This landmark 2019 submission will address the many ways in which the rights of older persons are not upheld across NSW. The failure to uphold and protect the rights of older persons is the primary cause of substandard care, particularly in many residential care settings but also in care services delivered in-home. SRS has heard stories from thousands of older people whose human rights have been ignored or violated, sometimes to the point where criminal laws have been violated by staff, by other Residential Aged Care Facility (RACF) residents, or by the older person’s own family.
Seniors Rights Service will present evidence of fundamental imbalances of power between the aged care system and older persons that must be addressed. These imbalances are evident in Institutional systems and practices that consistently work against individual choice and control (e.g. routines, rosters, provider centred risk management systems etc.). In other circumstances, the power imbalance is expressed through unfair contracts, or in the failure of society to extend the protections of the law to older people. These imbalances are perpetuated by inadequate access to rights information for older people and their families, and inadequate aged care staff training about the rights of older people (as enshrined in the Charter of Aged Care Rights, but also in the law generally).
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