The New Aged Care Act: What's Changed and What It Means for You

The New Aged Care Act: What's Changed and What It Means for You

If you've heard there's a "new Aged Care Act" but nobody's explained what that actually changes, you're not alone. It's not one small update. It's a full replacement of the law that runs the aged care system, and it touches your rights, how support is funded, and what providers are now required to do. Here's the whole thing as one story, with links to the detail on each part.

In short: the Aged Care Act 2024 started on 1 November 2025, replacing the previous Act and the older Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission Act. It puts a legally enforceable Statement of Rights at the centre of the system, replaced Home Care Packages with the new Support at Home program, and gave the regulator stronger powers over how providers are registered and behave. None of this changes who you can choose to arrange your own in-home support with. It changes what the system now guarantees you, and what it expects from anyone providing funded care.

Why one Act, not several separate changes

It can look like a lot happened at once: a new funding program, a new assessment process, a new rights document, a new regulator. It did happen at once, because it's all one piece of legislation. The Aged Care Act 2024 replaced the Aged Care Act 1997 and the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission Act 2018 in a single reform, rather than amending the old laws piece by piece. That's worth knowing because it explains why so many things changed on the same date, 1 November 2025, instead of rolling out separately over years.

Your rights are now set out in the Act itself

The biggest structural change for consumers is the Statement of Rights, which replaced the previous Charter of Aged Care Rights on 1 November 2025. It sets out, in the Act itself, things like your right to make decisions about your own care and lifestyle, even where there's some personal risk in that decision, and your right to fair, safe and respectful treatment.

CareVicinity's Statement of Rights page reproduces the full text directly from the Act, verified against the official legislation, so you can read exactly what it says rather than a summary of it.

Funding and assessment changed too

Two other pieces of the reform affect how support is actually arranged and paid for.

Home Care Packages were replaced by Support at Home, a program with more funding classifications than the old four package levels, aimed at matching funding more closely to assessed need. If you want the fuller picture of what Support at Home actually covers, what is Support at Home? covers that directly, and Home Care Package levels explained covers exactly how the old levels map to the new classifications and what they're worth.

Getting into the system also now runs through a single assessment process via My Aged Care. What is My Aged Care, and how do you register? and preparing for your aged care assessment cover registering and getting ready for that assessment in detail.

Providers now face real, enforceable accountability

This is the part of the reform that gets talked about least, and it's arguably the part that matters most if something goes wrong. The Act introduced a Code of Conduct that sets out how registered providers, aged care workers and responsible persons must behave, things like treating people with dignity and respect, respecting a person's right to make their own decisions, and delivering services safely and competently.

Sitting behind the Code is a new provider registration system, run by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. Registration isn't a formality. It's a condition providers have to keep meeting, and the Commission can suspend, revoke, or refuse to renew a provider's registration if it isn't. Before this reform, a lot of that accountability was less directly tied to a provider's ability to keep operating at all.

Practically, this means a care recipient or family member now has a clearer, more formal avenue if a registered provider's conduct falls short, backed by a regulator with real power to act on it, not just a complaints process that ends in a written response.

What this doesn't change

It's worth being just as clear about what the reform doesn't do. It doesn't change who you're allowed to arrange in-home support with. Independent support workers you hire directly, outside a registered provider's own staff, aren't part of what this reform's provider-registration and Code of Conduct system governs in the same way a registered provider's own workforce is. This reform reshapes the funded, registered-provider side of aged care. It doesn't create or remove your ability to choose and pay an independent support worker directly for the support you want.

Do you need to do anything?

If you're already receiving Home Care Package or Support at Home services, no action is required because of this reform on its own. Your funding transitioned across automatically, and a "no worse off" rule protects what you were already assessed to pay. If you haven't started the process yet, registering with My Aged Care is still the first step, the same as it was before the reform, just running through the updated single assessment system now.

FAQ

Do I need to reapply for my Home Care Package because of this reform? No. If you already held or were approved for a Home Care Package before the changeover, your funding transitioned across automatically at an equivalent level.

Does this reform affect independent support workers I arrange myself? The Code of Conduct and provider-registration system are built around registered providers and their own workforce. It doesn't change your ability to arrange and pay an independent support worker directly for support outside that system.

Where do I go if I have a concern about a registered provider? The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission is the regulator responsible for provider conduct and registration under the new Act. My Aged Care can also point you to the right complaints pathway for your specific situation.

Is the Statement of Rights just a policy document, or is it actually enforceable? It's part of the Act itself, not a separate policy statement, which is a meaningful change from the previous Charter of Aged Care Rights. For the full wording, see CareVicinity's Statement of Rights page.

Where to go next

Understanding what changed is one thing. Arranging the support itself is the practical next step, whether that's within a Support at Home budget or arranged and paid for privately. CareVicinity is an Australia-wide marketplace where you can browse independent support workers, compare experience and rates, and choose who you want to work with directly. Care seekers pay no platform fee. CareVicinity's 12.5% platform fee applies to the support worker and is already reflected in the rate shown.

Browse independent support workers in your area, or read more about how CareVicinity works.