Aged care royal commission has had a third of the coverage of banks' bad behaviour. It doesn't add up

Updated

"A sad and shocking system that diminishes Australia as a nation".

"Inhumane, abusive and unjustified".

"Cruel and discriminating".

After 10 months of hearings and investigations into aged care, Commissioners Lynelle Briggs and the late Richard Tracy listed the most shocking findings in their interim report on Thursday: death from septicaemia from untreated wounds; residents left in urine or faeces; dreadful food; a high incidence of assaults by staff and residents; common use of physical restraints and overprescribing of drugs to sedate residents.

"It is shameful that such a list can be produced in 21st century Australia," they wrote.

Are you worried about aged care in Australia? The aged care royal commission continues and so does our investigation. Let us know if you have a story or issue you'd like the ABC to look into. Email aged.care@abc.net.au to tell us your story.

They are words that are ready-made front-page headlines. These are pronouncements that TV news and current affairs live for.

This is a report for journalists to pore over, to provide analysis and follow-ups with personal stories of the thousands of victims of this system.

But while some editors did splash with it for Friday's newspapers, by lunchtime it had disappeared off news websites almost entirely.

Comparing the media coverage of the aged care and banking royal commissions shows a stark imbalance.

Analysis by Streem real-time media monitoring shows the banking royal commission received more than triple the amount of media coverage from its establishment to the release of its interim report. And that's despite the aged care hearings running for 100 more days than the banking inquiry up to publication of the interim report.

Where the banking royal commission had a team of finance reporters from every news organisation who hung on every word and scoured every submission for fresh angles, the media room for this inquiry holds a few dogged "social affairs" reporters.

It's taxpayer's money

The theory in media circles is that the banking royal commission was big news because "everyone has a bank account". There seems to be no corresponding extrapolation for aged care — "everyone grows old".

More truthful perhaps would be an admission that aged care isn't "sexy": it's thought not to sell papers or attract younger readers online.

But this ignores the crucial role the media plays in political and social outcomes. So when almost $20 billion goes into aged care each year, isn't that worth similar journalistic scrutiny to the banks?

As the interim report says: "The aged care sector prides itself in being an 'industry' and it behaves like one. This masks the fact that 80 per cent of its funding comes directly from Government coffers."

Yet when the new Minister for Aged Care, Richard Colbeck, fronted up to face the media last Thursday afternoon, there was just a handful of reporters in the room.

Others probably watched via videolink, but that means they missed the opportunity to grill the minister.

What we need to see reform

The question is — does the lack of interest from our national media simply reflect society's own disengagement? Or has the media underestimated the public's appetite for this subject? Judging by the positive feedback received to the ABC's aged care investigation, the latter appears to be more likely.

If the final recommendations and reform of the sector is going to go ahead, it's crucial that the media understands how the sector has failed — and explain it to the public.

The interim report provides the most comprehensive assessment yet. It is written in simple language and readily accessible.

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It makes sense for media organisations to devote resources and people who understand, can explain and analyse the most important aspects of the royal commission.

More importantly though, editors should decide to follow these stories just as they did with the royal commission into child sexual abuse and the banks.

If the Government is to make the changes Australia so sorely needs, it will only be public pressure that will ensure it happens.

And without a knowledgeable media asking questions and putting pressure on the aged care "industry" and Government, there is a great risk that the system will fail our elderly — and us — again.

Anne Connolly is the investigative reporter of the Four Corners program "Who Cares?".

Topics: royal-commissions, aged-care, carers, health, older-people, health-policy, australia, canberra-2600, melbourne-3000, sydney-2000

First posted