00:01Our job is to speak up for vulnerable older Australians and their families and the reality
00:07is that these cuts could have a devastating impact on the aged care workforce. Anglicare
00:15for example operates 47 aged care homes across the eastern seaboard of Australia and about
00:206,000 of our workforce are visa holders and these are people who care for our vulnerable
00:26parents and grandparents and the question for the coalition is who's going to look after
00:32these people, these Australians who have helped build this country if we're not going to allow
00:37people on visas to hold these jobs. And you say it could have that effect, could or would?
00:43Well that's a matter for the coalition to explain its policy position but frankly I've explained
00:50the scale of the workforce, about two-thirds of our workforce are visa holders and that would be
00:566,000. And that would be replicated right across the aged care sector and much of this is because
01:01many of these people on student visas or other temporary visas come from cultures across the
01:06Indo-Pacific where caring for older people is considered a privilege. So they're wonderful
01:10carers and the experience of our older Australians and their families is that these workers are a
01:17great part of our community and our workforce and we're concerned that if these people aren't able to
01:24come into country and take these jobs who will? What about the coalition saying it would increase
01:29the share of skilled migrants? Does that offer you, and health is identified among those, does that offer
01:36you any hope? Well that's great for health but we're talking here about aged care specifically and
01:41many of our workers actually are on all sorts of different visas so not necessarily employee sponsored visas.
01:47Including bridging visas? Including bridging visas, including student visas and ultimately this is a huge
01:54part of our workforce. So a big question we have and we're very happy to work with the coalition on
02:00coming
02:00up with solutions but if we're going to have such a huge impact on the number of foreign workers able
02:08to
02:08work in this country that impact will be felt keenly by the aged care sector.
