Elder Abuse in NSW

It is clear to the committee that the time has come for the NSW Government to embrace a comprehensive, coordinated and ambitious approach to preventing and addressing elder abuse, captured in the eleven recommendations set out in this report. This comprehensive approach must engage the entire community with a clear focus on prevention, and must include key legislative reforms. It must be informed by a human rights framework affirming older people’s autonomy and self determination, and boost training for service providers to identify and respond to abuse. It must include an enhanced role for the NSW Elder Abuse Helpline and Resource Unit, and embrace an active commitment to developing the evidence base, in order to furnish better policy and service responses into the future. The committee appreciates that building this approach will necessarily take time and careful planning. Given the evidence that elder abuse is a significant and growing problem, the government must make elder abuse an immediate focus for action, so that the ambitious approach that we envisage is fully functioning by 2020.