A medical firm that employs former Liberal health minister Michael Wooldridge as one of its key lobbyists has won contracts with the Morrison government worth $1.2 billion since March.
Among the contracts the firm, Aspen Medical, has signed with the federal government is a $15.6 million deal to provide emergency response teams to aged care facilities with a coronavirus outbreak, including St Basil’s Home for the Aged in Fawkner, which by Wednesday had at least 21 COVID-19 related deaths.
A resident is taken from St Basil's Home for the Aged in Fawkner to hospital on Friday.Credit:Justin McManus
Aspen's nursing team was sent in last month to mop up the mess at St Basil’s following an outbreak that began when an infected worker brought coronavirus into the home.
The outbreak had grown so rapidly that the Victorian Health Department blocked entry for permanent workers to the home on July 22. Aspen entered St Basil’s the following day after three other contract nursing companies failed to bring the home’s coronavirus outbreak under control.
Former Howard government health minister Michael Wooldridge.Credit:Jessica Shapiro
The company also worked on the Ruby Princess in Sydney and was sent in to deal with the aftermath of the catastrophic Newmarch House aged care coronavirus outbreak in western Sydney in April, where 19 residents died.
The death toll in aged care continues to spiral, with 125 residents in Victorian homes now dead according to the federal government, which has responsibility for managing the sector. Only 27 days have passed since the first Victorian COVID-19 death in aged care.
Aspen donated $54,000 to the Liberal Party between 2013 and 2015 and counted Mr Wooldridge among its board members until October last year.
Mr Wooldridge is still one of the company’s lobbyists, as is former Labor MP Sam Dastyari.
There is no law to prohibit former MPs from working as lobbyists in this way.
More than $1.1 billion of the contracts Aspen Medical has signed with Canberra since March have been for medical supplies, but it has also won millions of dollars of work in disease prevention control and the supply of emergency staff across Australia.
Mr Wooldridge said Aspen worked across Australia in aged care and that the firm had worked in 110 homes around Victoria. He said the company had performed well in all of them except St Basil’s, where conditions were terrible when Aspen arrived.
"Aspen has been exceptionally brilliant without exception, except at St Basil’s, so, what does that tell you?"
Mr Wooldridge said the fact he worked as a lobbyist for Aspen Medical and was also a former health minister was meaningless. "I have been out [of Parliament] for 20 years – surely after so long it’s okay?" he said, adding that he had been an adviser to the company for more than a decade.
Department of Health secretary Brendan Murphy (seated) and Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck (appearing via videoconference) at a Senate select committee hearing in Canberra this week.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
Premier Daniel Andrews has staunchly defended the decision to stand down St Basil’s existing workforce last month. "The alternative would be to have them working and infect every single person in the place," he said.
But the move meant Aspen, contracted to be the federal government’s final safety net in just such a situation, went in with almost zero knowledge of the facility and its residents.
Aspen staff found conditions so tough even their workers acquired COVID-19 infections.
Federal Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck this week told a parliamentary committee that federal health authorities had done the best they could to bring problems at St Basil’s under control.
"We had to find a new workforce, and we did that, we brought people in within 24 hours' notice," he said, also conceding that mistakes were made. "There’s no point in me trying to pretend it all went as it should have because it didn’t."
Spiro Dimitriou's 73-year-old father John had been a resident at St Basil’s, and died in hospital after acquiring a coronavirus infection.
He said the situation at St Basil’s got significantly worse in terms of communications with families once Aspen went in. "Once they took over, they may as well have worn blindfolds they were so hopeless," he said.
He also said the failure by management at St Basil’s was what had led to the federal government having to take over the site. "They might have done a bad job, but it was all the fault of St Basil’s in the first place."
Clay Lucas is a senior reporter for The Age. Clay has worked at The Age since 2005, covering urban affairs, transport, state politics, local government and workplace relations for The Age and Sunday Age.
Ben Schneiders is an investigative journalist at The Age and has reported extensively on the underpayment of wages, corruption, business, politics and the labour movement. His reporting has won a number of major honours including Walkley awards. He has been part of The Age’s investigative unit since 2015.
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMigwFodHRwczovL3d3dy50aGVhZ2UuY29tLmF1L3BvbGl0aWNzL3ZpY3RvcmlhL21lZGljYWwtZmlybS13aXRoLWV4LWhlYWx0aC1taW5pc3Rlci1hcy1sb2JieWlzdC13aW5zLTEtMmItb2Ytd29yay0yMDIwMDgwNS1wNTVpdGkuaHRtbNIBgwFodHRwczovL2FtcC50aGVhZ2UuY29tLmF1L3BvbGl0aWNzL3ZpY3RvcmlhL21lZGljYWwtZmlybS13aXRoLWV4LWhlYWx0aC1taW5pc3Rlci1hcy1sb2JieWlzdC13aW5zLTEtMmItb2Ytd29yay0yMDIwMDgwNS1wNTVpdGkuaHRtbA?oc=5
2020-08-05 08:19:00Z
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