Cut the middle men out of home care

How it works today, honestly

Only a registered provider can claim Support at Home funds, and only for the categories it's registered for. If you want a worker the provider doesn't employ, the money still has to go through a provider.

10% of every client's budget is taken for care management, even when the client manages their own care. On top of that, a provider can add up to 10% overhead on what a third-party worker costs (provider payment arrangements).

The government paused its planned price caps on 20 May 2026. So providers set their own prices.

What it costs

These are median published prices for an hour of care on a weekday, fully managed, from prices providers publish on My Aged Care. They're collected by My Caring Guide, updated 23 October 2026.

Service	Median published price
Personal care	$112 an hour
General house cleaning	$109.70 an hour
Individual social support	$112 an hour
Individual social support, Sunday	$190 an hour
Group social support	$85 an hour

Personal care on a Sunday runs about 70% above the weekday price. Allied health costs more again: physio $220, occupational therapy $223.85, podiatry $214, speech pathology $230, dietitian $220 and a registered nurse $180.

That $112 is the price, not what the worker gets. The worker's pay comes out of it, along with everything the provider adds on the way through.

The proposed law change

Change the law so Support at Home funding follows the client straight to verified care workers they choose. Rewrite the rules, rather than work around them. Workers are paid properly, clients get more care for the money, the taxpayer pays less, and software does the paperwork. Qualified people keep control of care decisions.

Proposed and illustrative, not tested. Say the client is charged $75 an hour, all in. The AI service that does the paperwork and a capped admin fee come out of that, not on top of it. The worker gets the rest: about $63.75 an hour at the starting values, or $71.25 if they do the client's admin themselves. Worker insurance comes out of the AI fee, never out of the worker's pay.

The maths is simple. For the same money, $112 against $75 buys about 49% more hours of care. Five hours a week at $112 becomes about seven and a half hours at $75.

Or the government could take some of the saving. A 25% smaller budget at $75 still buys about 12% more hours than today at $112. More care, and less from the taxpayer.

Group support works the same way. Illustrative only. One worker paid $90 an hour, shared by four clients, is $22.50 each for the worker's time. Group support is good for some things, but it's not a substitute for personal care.

Travel is charged separately, on top of the $75. At the starting values that adds about $15.00 an hour, making $90.00, and the same 25% cut then buys about 7% less care than today. The $112 median may not include travel either, so that isn't a like for like comparison, but I'd rather show it than hide it. The calculator lets you see what happens in a remote town where every visit is a long drive.

Proof the care happened

If the money goes straight to workers, everyone needs to know the visit really happened. The rules already allow for it. The Support at Home program manual, section 10.5, accepts electronic sign-in, geolocation data and a QR code at the client's home as evidence of service.

Here's how I'd design it. Location is checked only during an agreed visit, never as ongoing tracking. The client, or their representative, confirms the visit. Verified visits are paid fast. People, not software, review any dispute.

GPS proves the worker was there. It doesn't prove the care was good. So client feedback and safeguarding still matter, and stay in.

AI does the paperwork, people own the care

Software handles the budgets, invoices and scheduling, and flags problems. Qualified people make the care decisions and handle anything out of the ordinary. The AI flags, people decide.

The rest of the plan

Family carers. A lot of care is already coordinated by family. If a family member does the coordinating, like I do for my mum, they should be able to take the management share that would otherwise go to a manager. Proposed variable: the 10% admin share, or the fixed weekly admin amount if that's lower, paid to the nominated family coordinator.

Ratings, both ways. Clients and workers rate each other, the way eBay and Uber work. On top of that, AI collects objective scores from attendance: check-in and check-out times, how long the visit actually ran against what was booked, and whether the worker turned up on time. If a client can't give a rating, a nominated family member or advocate can do it for them. A client can switch workers at any time without giving a reason.

Catching bad actors. AI watches for odd patterns, like visits that don't add up, claims that don't match attendance, or ratings that suddenly change, and flags them. A small independent team handles serious complaints.

Looking after workers. Worker insurance is paid from the government AI fee only, never from worker pay. The payment system withholds PAYG income tax, so workers don't get a surprise tax bill. Workers earning over a threshold get a sick and holiday fund. Proposed variable: a threshold of $400 a week, with the contribution still to be decided. Pooled super is an option.

Backup and support. A backup pool of workers on retainer covers sick days and no-shows. Family carers get respite. Each worker owns a portable record of their checks, training and ratings that goes with them from job to job.

Data. Clients own their care data. Government keeps only what payment and safety need.

Remote towns. Remote and thin markets, like Mallacoota, get a loading. A shared equipment library lends out gear. Hospital discharge and end-of-life care get a fast track.

Existing providers. They can adapt by offering optional management services, paid from the admin share. Clients who want a manager can still have one. They just aren't forced to pay for one.

Top public pay

The same rule book applies at the top. No public servant should earn more than the lowest paid federal MP. An MP's base salary is $239,270 from 1 July 2026.

Here's a sample of what's been reported. Totals include bonuses and super, and it's not a full list. Another 11 Future Fund staff were paid over $1 million.

The honest catch

This isn't simple, and I won't pretend it is. If workers are paid straight from client funding, the reform has to deal with super, insurance, leave and employment status. Sham contracting is a real risk, and so is workers being treated as employees in everything but name, without the protections. Those can't be waved away. The new law has to answer them before anything starts.

Travel is part of that. The award pays employees for travel between clients. The new rules have to say what a contractor gets. Safeguarding and quality checks need a new home once providers aren't in the middle. And someone has to run the AI service and be accountable for what the fee pays for.

These are the open questions. I'd rather list them than hide them.

1. Contractor or employee: how the new law treats workers, who pays super, leave and workers comp, and how it avoids sham contracting.
2. Travel time for contractors.
3. Whether the 10% care management deduction is abolished or replaced by the capped admin fee.
4. Who runs the government AI service and what the fee pays for.
5. Real data to replace the placeholders: worker insurance, allied health rent, equipment, admin, travel, working weeks, non-billable time, and how much AI cuts non-billable time.
6. Safeguarding and quality checks once providers are gone.
7. The sick and holiday fund: the contribution, and whether $400 a week is the right threshold.
8. How much of the AI fee goes to worker insurance, and what cover it buys.
9. Pooled super: how it would work and who runs it.
10. The remote loading, and how a thin market is defined.
11. Who sits on the independent complaints team and who appoints them.
12. How family coordinators are checked and paid, and how conflicts of interest are handled.
13. What the backup pool retainer costs.
14. The pilot: region, size, evaluator, and how results are published.

Start small: a pilot

Don't change the whole country at once. Start with a voluntary pilot in one region, for example East Gippsland, with a few hundred clients and their workers for 12 months. Measure care hours, cost, worker take-home, ratings and safety incidents. Get it independently evaluated and publish the evaluation in full, the way qducate.com publishes its results.

What you can do

GAP: what Colin wants readers to do (sign up, contact an MP, share). Add the button or form here.

In the meantime, if you've got a question or a better idea, get in touch.