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Federal
Corporate Commonwealth Entity
Health and Aged Care

Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care

Portfolio: Health, Disability and Ageing

http://www.safetyandquality.gov.au

Annual Budget

$36M

2026-27 Budget (Budget Paper No. 4)
-1.7%vs prior year ($36M)
Total Revenue

$35M

2024-25 Total Revenue
Staff

200

Headcount (2024-25)
Major Digital Projects
20

Aged Care Transformation Program - Support at Home

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 1
DCA: Medium-High
Active

Total Budget

$705.9M

Digital Budget

$174.7M

January 2022June 2026

A new program called Support at Home brings together some in-home aged care programs from 1 November 2025. Under the Support at Home program, there will be improved access to services, products, equipment and home modifications to help older people to remain healthy, active, and socially connected to their community.

Aged Care Transformation Program – New Aged Care Act

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 1
DCA: Medium-High
Active

Total Budget

$692.8M

Digital Budget

$692.8M

July 2023June 2027

This project involves the design and delivery of the business and digital projects requirements to support the implementation and operationalisation of the Aged Care Act 2024.

Data and Regulatory Transformation (DART) Program

NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission

Tier 1
DCA: Medium
Active

Total Budget

$160.3M

Digital Budget

$85.9M

July 2024June 2028

The DART Program will transform the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission data and technology systems to support new ways of working that will sustainably address issues experienced by NDIS participants, providers and workers. The DART Program aims to establish essential, risk-based regulatory capabilities that meet the Commission’s current and future legislative obligations, safeguard participants, ensure market quality and proactively manage compliance.

Reduce Waste and Combat Fraud – Crack Down on Fraud

National Disability Insurance Agency

Tier 1
DCA: High
Active

Total Budget

$194.3M

Digital Budget

$194.3M

January 2024December 2025

The Crack Down on Fraud program will boost fraud-detecting IT systems to better protect monies allocated to Australians living with disability who are on the NDIS. The investment will complement the work of the Fraud Fusion Taskforce to respond to areas of vulnerability in NDIS systems. The program includes a number of ICT improvements that will be implemented progressively and are designed to make it easier to get it right, and harder to get it wrong for everyone engaging with the NDIS

Establishing an Australian Centre for Disease Control (CDC)

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 2
DCA: High
Active

Total Budget

$26.4M

Digital Budget

$3.6M

January 2025January 2027

This project presents a 3-pronged approach to establishing data capability for the Australian CDC. This includes: exploratory work for a national public health surveillance system; design of nationally consistent public health data, analytics and decision-support through a Public Health Data Network (Data Network); introduction of a public health data stewardship function to facilitate national coordination in public health action; and the development of in-house capabilities for advanced analytics within the Australian CDC to provide timely, accurate decision-support across CDC functions.

Next Phase of the National Disability Data Asset (NDDA)

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 2
DCA: Medium
Active

Total Budget

$87.7M

Digital Budget

$53.6M

January 2022June 2027

The project will establish an enduring NDDA of linked, de-identified data, leveraging multiple Australian, state and territory government service systems and surveys to provide insights on the outcomes of people with disability and their pathways through services.

One Stop Shop for Clinical Trials and Human Research

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 2
DCA: Medium-High
Active

Total Budget

$32.4M

Digital Budget

$17.2M

July 2024June 2029

The development of the National One Stop Shop ICT platform underpins the Australian Government’s health and medical policy reform agenda. The platform will provide a single, end-to-end workflow for the research lifecycle of first contact between a research sponsor and a research site, through pre- and post-ethical approval and authorisation processes, regulatory requirements, participant recruitment and research management, to post-research monitoring and the publication of results. The common workflow will facilitate business processes of key Commonwealth agencies, and the next generation World Health Organization (WHO) compliant clinical trials and research registry, to provide a public-facing website with simplified and enhanced search functionality for the community. The reforms are supported by commitment between all jurisdictions under the Revitalised Clinical Trials Agenda, and the Encouraging More Clinical Trials in Australia measure, and agreement on the platform solution that will streamline and harmonise administration and regulation nationally, and make it easier to find and conduct health and medical research.

Alternative Clinical Arrangements for Facilities Unable to Meet a Registered Nurse Onsite Requirement

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Closed

Total Budget

$31.2M

Digital Budget

$9.9M

December 2023May 2025

This project developed and tested a Virtual Nursing Framework in 30 residential aged care homes. Evaluation of the project will build evidence on use of virtual nursing in residential aged care settings.

Continued COVID-19 support for aged care

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Closed

Total Budget

$317.4M

Digital Budget

$6.7M

January 2024June 2024

The primary goal of this project was to continue a range of COVID-19 outbreak management supports. The digital/ICT component funding was secured to implement a new Emergency Management Portal to replace the existing COVID-19 Support Portal. Discovery and design and re-costing for the project resulted in the decision that the project was no longer value for money and it did not proceed beyond this phase.

Enhanced Regulatory Model for Vaping Products

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$433.6M

Digital Budget

$31.1M

November 2023June 2027

The project is implementing an enhanced regulatory model for vaping, to regulate the importation, domestic manufacture, supply, commercial possession and advertisement of vaping goods, including nicotine vaping products. The reforms are part of a broader effort to reduce smoking and vaping rates through stronger legislation, enforcement, education and support. The primary goal of the digital component is to uplift digital processes to support the new vaping reform legislation. The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) introduced a bespoke sponsor notification scheme to facilitate lawful access to therapeutic vapes. The project will support the digital infrastructure to enable sponsors to provide compliance declarations to the TGA in a timely manner, and enhance systems to enable staff to conduct post-market reviews and manage compliance priorities. As part of efforts to address black market vape sales, the TGA is currently investigating enhancements of existing compliance management systems and greater data sharing capacity with partner law enforcement agencies (such as Australian Border Force).

Ensuring Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety for All Australians

Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$2.5M

Digital Budget

$2.5M

February 2023December 2026

Phase 1 (completed) developed a self-service portal to enable customers of the agency’s Personal Radiation Monitoring Service to access a range of online capabilities to enhance the customer experience. Phase 2 (underway) is developing a laboratory information management system to improve internal workflow efficiency.

Establish a National Worker Registration Scheme for Aged Care

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$35.1M

Digital Budget

$17.9M

January 2021June 2028

This project is enabling the government’s commitment to establish a national worker registration scheme. The project includes delivery of an ICT solution that expands the existing National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) worker screening system to include aged care worker screening. The expanded ICT system will create a national approach to worker screening for aged care providers, with ongoing monitoring of exclusion to better protect older people.

Establish the Inspector-General of Aged Care and the Office of the Inspector-General of Aged Case as a Statutory Agency

Office of the Inspector-General of Aged Care

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$25.2M

Digital Budget

$25.2M

November 2022June 2026

This project has established the Office of the Inspector General of Aged Care (OIGAC), following a recommendation from the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety. The project includes delivery of ICT platforms and processes to ensure the OIGAC has the foundational infrastructure to support its function, with work split across 4 key workstreams: • Stream 1 Case Management • Stream 2 Shared Services • Stream 3 Website • Stream 4 Data and Analytics.

Funding Digital Capability and Sustainment of Aged Care Systems - My Health Record (MHR) Integration

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Closed

Total Budget

$21.7M

Digital Budget

$9.6M

October 2023December 2024

The investment was to finalise the delivery of an integrated solution, allowing the sharing of aged care information with the health sector via My Health Record.

Funding for the Regulation of Medicinal Cannabis - Cost Recovery Model Update and Office of Drug Control Business Transformation

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$3.5M

Digital Budget

$2.9M

July 2023August 2026

The project supports the transformation of the Office of Drug Control business processes and ICT/digital systems. Prior reliance on outdated and inefficient manual business processes impacted Australia’s legal narcotics industry. This project will implement the outcomes of a 2022 review, to modernise systems to ensure they can support the industry and compliance activity, as well as aligning with other regulators’ digital transformation systems.

Integrated Aged Care Information and Intelligence – Risk Based Targeting and Information Sharing (RBTIS)

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$37.8M

Digital Budget

$25.5M

January 2024June 2027

The department has developed a RBTIS program of work to enable the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission to better target its regulation of aged care providers (both residential aged care and home care) that are at risk of failing to provide quality care. The system achieves this by extracting different data elements from over a dozen major sources into information sharing dashboards.

Investing in a modernised My Health Record to drive a digitally connected healthcare system for all Australians

Australian Digital Health Agency

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$64.2M

Digital Budget

$64.2M

September 2023June 2026

The project will establish a new national repository service to improve the My Health Record system, aligned with the contemporary health industry data standard Health Level 7 (HL7) Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR). This will drive a digitally connected healthcare system for all Australians, and supports use of mobile apps, in line with the National Digital Health Strategy 2023–2028. The vision is to enable a contemporary capability for My Health Record, as a foundation for the healthcare modernisation journey, which will increase value to customers and healthcare providers accessing data.

Residential Aged Care – Linking Care Funding to Care Minute Delivery

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$19.6M

Digital Budget

$9M

October 2024December 2026

This project will create a financial incentive for residential aged care providers to meet their mandatory care minutes targets by linking care minutes funding to care minutes delivery from 1 October 2025 in Modified Monash 1 (MM1) areas. To deliver this project, changes are required in aged care systems owned by the department and Services Australia, to add needed calculations and data fields to existing reporting tools. Linking funding to care delivery is the most effective, equitable and efficient policy lever available to government to bring about behaviour change from providers and is estimated to deliver a cumulative increase of 265 million more care minutes by the end of the forward estimates. It also ensures that government is not funding providers for care they are not delivering.

Response to the Final Report of the Capability Review of the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission – cyber uplift

Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$69.4M

Digital Budget

$69.4M

January 2024June 2026

Cyber Uplift Phase 3 commenced in July 2025 with focus on Maturity uplift and Transition covering the following projects: 1. Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) / Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response (SOAR) / Centralised Log Ingestion (CLI) Foundations 2. Cyber Governance – Beyond Foundations 3. Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) Review and targeted uplift 4. Vulnerability Management – Beyond Foundations 5. Application Control Capability Implementation 6. Vulnerability Scanning Capability Implementation 7. Integrated Security Architecture

Setting the in Australian National Aged Care Classification (AN ACC) price for 2023–24 and ongoing residential care funding reform

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

Tier 3
Active

Total Budget

$24.3M

Digital Budget

$16.3M

June 2023February 2026

This investment will support implementation of the government’s election commitment to fund the Fair Work Commission (FWC) decision for residential care aged care workers, and the annual adjustment in AN ACC funding to account for changes in aged care costs such as inflation. Necessary adjustments to the AN ACC referral, assessment and reporting functions in addition to a new hotelling supplement are also included. Progress is monitored by the Residential Aged Care Funding Reform Program Board.

Ideas relevant to this department

8 tagged

Reform proposals on YourGov that name this department as a delivery partner — drawn from citizen voice, government strategy, research, international examples and gap analysis.

STRATEGY SUMMARY

The Commission’s purpose is to lead improvements in the safety and quality of health care so all Australians receive better care, everywhere. [CP p.5]

PURPOSE

The Commission’s purpose is to lead improvements in the safety and quality of health care so all Australians receive better care, everywhere. [CP p.5]

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.5

Strategic priorities

· 4

1

High-quality health care in an evolving environment

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.6
2

Strong outcome-focused clinical governance

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.6
3

Empowering patients, carers and communities

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.6
4

An improvement-driven workforce culture

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.6

Outcomes

· 1

Outcome 1: Improved safety and quality in health care across the health system

The Commission’s performance measures for 2025-26 to 2028-29 link to the strategic priorities of the Commission’s Strategic Plan 2025-30. [CP p.17]

KEY ACTIVITIES

  • Implement National Safety and Quality Health Service (NSQHS) Standards
  • Develop publications or other resources to provide guidance to support implementation of the NSQHS Standards
  • Examine healthcare variation and work to reduce unwarranted variation to improve quality and appropriateness of care for all Australians
  • Produce clinical care standards and other resources focusing on high-impact, high-burden and high-variation areas of clinical care
  • Review and revise previously released clinical care standards
  • Evaluate to improve stakeholders’ experience of working with the Commission

Values

· 6

impartial

committed to service

accountable

ethical

stewardship

prioritises leadership of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and communities to support culturally safe care

Performance measures

· 6

CodeMeasureTarget 2025-26Latest resultStatus

NSQHS

National Hospitals and day services are assessed against the NSQHS Standards

As per Strategic priority 1

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Health Service Safety and Quality Accreditation

Accrediting agencies are approved to assess health services to the NSQHS Standards

As per Strategic priority 2

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Partnerships

Develop 5 publications or other resources to provide guidance to support health services, health professionals and consumers to form effective partnerships

As per Strategic priority 2

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Healthcare Variation

Produce a rolling program of reports and guidance with time series data on healthcare variation in Australia

As per Strategic priority 1

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Clinical Care Standards

Produce clinical care standards and other resources focusing on high-impact, high-burden and high-variation areas of clinical care

As per Strategic priority 2

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Stakeholders’ Experience

Evaluate to improve stakeholders’ experience of working with the Commission

As per Strategic priority 3

Corporate Plan 2025-26 · p.17

Ideas distilled from this entity's strategy & evidence

· 8

Risk & Assurance

Reduce hospital-acquired infections

Implement a national surveillance program to track and reduce hospital-acquired infections.

Impact: Very High
Effort: High
Large

2024-25.pdf

Regulation & Policy

Streamline clinical governance framework

Simplify and streamline the clinical governance framework to reduce administrative burden.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Large

2025-26.pdf

Data & Performance

Improve patient safety reporting

Introduce a user-friendly online reporting system for patient safety incidents.

Impact: Medium
Effort: Low
Small

2024-25.pdf

Regulation & Policy

Adopt international healthcare standards

Adopt internationally recognized healthcare standards to enhance quality and safety.

Impact: High
Effort: High
Large

worldbank.txt

Citizen Participation

Enhance patient engagement

Launch a national campaign to engage patients in quality improvement initiatives.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Medium

2025-26.pdf

Data & Performance

Optimize data collection

Optimize data collection processes to ensure timely and accurate reporting.

Impact: Medium
Effort: Low
Small

2024-25.pdf

Procurement & Delivery

Implement digital health tools

Implement digital health tools to enhance patient care and streamline operations.

Impact: High
Effort: High
Large

deloitte.txt

Capability Building

Enhance staff training

Enhance training programs for healthcare staff to improve competency and patient outcomes.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Medium

2025-26.pdf

Risk & Assurance

Reduce hospital-acquired infections

Implement a national surveillance program to track and reduce hospital-acquired infections.

Impact: Very High
Effort: High
Large

2024-25.pdf

Regulation & Policy

Streamline clinical governance framework

Simplify and streamline the clinical governance framework to reduce administrative burden.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Large

2025-26.pdf

Data & Performance

Improve patient safety reporting

Introduce a user-friendly online reporting system for patient safety incidents.

Impact: Medium
Effort: Low
Small

2024-25.pdf

Regulation & Policy

Adopt international healthcare standards

Adopt internationally recognized healthcare standards to enhance quality and safety.

Impact: High
Effort: High
Large

worldbank.txt

Citizen Participation

Enhance patient engagement

Launch a national campaign to engage patients in quality improvement initiatives.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Medium

2025-26.pdf

Data & Performance

Optimize data collection

Optimize data collection processes to ensure timely and accurate reporting.

Impact: Medium
Effort: Low
Small

2024-25.pdf

Procurement & Delivery

Implement digital health tools

Implement digital health tools to enhance patient care and streamline operations.

Impact: High
Effort: High
Large

deloitte.txt

Capability Building

Enhance staff training

Enhance training programs for healthcare staff to improve competency and patient outcomes.

Impact: High
Effort: Medium
Medium

2025-26.pdf

Legislation administered

· 3

Act

2011

National Health Reform Act 2011

The entity formulates standards, guidelines, and indicators relating to healthcare safety and quality matters and advises Health Ministers on national clinical standards.

Instrument

2017

National Safety and Quality Health Service Standards

The entity formulates model national schemes that provide for the accreditation of organisations that provide healthcare services.

Instrument

2011

Clinical Care Standards

The entity promotes, supports, and encourages the implementation of these standards and related guidelines and indicators.

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