A new report by CompliSpace reveals that almost 20 percent of the residential aged care workforce are set to quit in the next 12 months.

According to the 2021 A Perfect Storm: What’s Driving Australia’s Aged Care Staffing Crisis report, poor pay, stress and excessive paperwork are the top three reasons why Australia is on the verge of an aged care staffing crisis. Over the coming weeks, Aged Care Essentials will delve further into the key findings of the report to better understand the challenges contributing to the looming crisis. Meanwhile, here’s a summary of what providers need to know.

About the Report

The A Perfect Storm: What’s Driving Australia’s Aged Care Staffing Crisis report is based on the findings from a survey issued by CompliSpace on 23 June 2021 and closed on 14 July 2021. There were 1,011 survey respondents, all of whom work in the Aged Care industry.

The survey asked aged care workers about their intentions to stay in the industry, their experiences with the Aged Care Quality Standards and COVID-19 regulation and their attitudes to recent regulatory measures such as compulsory vaccinations.

Key findings

Mass Exodus

65% of workers (about 180,000 people) intend to leave the residential aged care industry within the next five years. This includes:

• 40% (110,000 workers) plan to leave the industry in the next three years
• 17% (47,000 workers) plan to leave the industry in the next 12 months.

The situation is most acute among aged care workers at the start of their careers. Almost half (48.3%) of all aged care workers with less than one year’s experience plan to quit by 2024, raising questions about where the pipeline of new workers will be.

However, once established in aged care, workers tend to want to stay, with almost 40% of those with three to five years’ experience planning on staying for more than five years. This suggests that career pathways, once established, have a stabilising effect on the workforce.

Top Reasons for Leaving

• 62% rank “remuneration” in their top three reasons for leaving the industry.
• 58% rank “stress”.
• 40% rank “too much paperwork”.

Top Reasons for Staying

• 71% rank “Relationships with residents and families” in their top three reasons for staying in the industry.
• 66% rank “Job satisfaction and fulfilment”.
• 62% rank “Relationships with co-workers”.

State by State Comparison

Western Australia and Queensland face the greatest challenges retaining entry-level aged care workers, posing significant questions for those states in the years ahead.

A majority of first-year aged care workers in Western Australia (53.8%) and Queensland (54.2%) plan on leaving the sector by 2024, while the turnover is expected to be lower in the big aged care states of New South Wales (42.9%) and Victoria (33.2%).

At the other end of the scale, nationally, two in five (39.2%) experienced workers with more than a decade’s experience plan on exiting within three years. These are the mentors of the industry.

Attitudes to Key Regulatory Measures

• 52% of aged care workers believe the Australian Government’s response to the Royal Commission’s recommendations “does not go far enough”, while 19% say it is “about right” and 12% think it “goes too far”.
• 66% of aged care workers support mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations for aged care workers.
• 52% are in favour of aged care workers being restricted to working in one facility.