Australia’s home-care workers are asking a simple but urgent question: with fuel prices skyrocketing, why are they still only paid 99 cents per kilometre?
The issue was put to Mark O’Brien, CEO of Prestige Inhome Care, during an interview conducted the day after the Albanese government announced a three-month halving of the fuel excise.
O’Brien’s answer was blunt.
“I almost think it’s increasingly getting out of step with reality,” he said. “When it was designed, that was in a different cost environment. Fuel’s gone up, maintenance costs have gone up, insurance costs have gone up and unfortunately we’re still seeing carers that are out of pocket. That’s really not sustainable.”
At the centre of the issue is the 99 cents per kilometre allowance itself. The rate is set under the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010, known as the SCHADS Award, which governs pay and conditions for most aged care and home-care workers across Australia.
Under the award, workers who are required to use their own vehicles for work, including travelling between clients or transporting supplies, must be reimbursed at a flat per kilometre rate. It is not a bonus or wage increase, but a reimbursement intended to cover fuel, wear and tear, maintenance and insurance.
While the rate now sits at or close to 99 cents per kilometre, it has not kept pace with the sharp rise in real-world costs. Earlier versions of the award paid significantly less, around 65 to 81 cents per kilometre in the early 2020s, when fuel prices were far lower.
At that time, average petrol prices sat at around $1.18 per litre in 2020 and $1.48 in 2021. By the time the reimbursement rate rose toward its current level in the mid-2020s, fuel had already climbed closer to $1.80 to $2.00 per litre.
Now, in March 2026, prices have surged again amid global supply pressures, sitting roughly between $2.08 and $2.38 per litre nationally, with some areas even higher and diesel exceeding $3.00 in places. That represents a rapid increase on top of already elevated costs, leaving many carers effectively subsidising their own work.
O’Brien said the mismatch between the fixed reimbursement rate and fluctuating fuel costs is placing unsustainable pressure on workers.
He pointed to ongoing advocacy by Ageing Australia for an urgent review of the reimbursement rate so it actually reflects today’s real-world driving costs.
Yesterday’s government announcement, halving the fuel excise by 26.3 cents a litre for three months and temporarily removing the heavy vehicle road user charge, was welcomed by O’Brien, but he described the relief as modest and short term at best.
“Any relief announcements are welcome,” he said. “But in real terms it feels fairly modest. For our carers that are driving all day, it might mean a few dollars saved every shift, but that’s really not enough to offset the sustained pressure that they’ve been absorbing.”
He added that while the cut may slow the strain, it is unlikely to stop carers from reducing hours or, in worst case scenarios, leaving the sector.
The 99 cents per kilometre rate sits at the heart of the problem. Unlike most industries, in-home aged care cannot simply adapt to higher fuel prices. Travel is not an optional extra, it is the core of the service model.
“This fuel issue is structural because travel is core to how we deliver our services,” O’Brien explained. “Our carers can’t work remotely or consolidate their workload into one location. By nature of their role, they’re on the road. When fuel costs rise and reimbursement doesn’t move, the model is strained, or it breaks. This is not about inconvenience. This is about whether care can be delivered at all.”
The pressure is being felt right across the country, but rural and regional areas are being hit hardest. Carers there face longer distances between clients, fewer available staff, almost no public transport options and, as widely reported, fuel stations that are running dry.
Even domestic support workers such as gardeners are feeling the flow-on effects, with rising costs for lawnmowers and leaf blowers, plus fresh uncertainty around possible restrictions on jerry cans.
Providers are doing what they can within tight margins under the new Support at Home program. Many are optimising routes and clustering appointments where possible, and some have introduced fuel vouchers or higher reimbursements. Ageing Australia continues to push for broader sector-wide solutions.
But O’Brien is clear that these measures can only go so far when the base reimbursement rate itself is outdated and tied to a cost structure that no longer reflects reality.
The consequences are already showing up in the numbers. O’Brien has seen a noticeable spike in cancelled shifts and reduced care hours.
“I’ve definitely seen a spike in cancelled hours,” he said. “Larger providers have some redundancy in the system, but I can imagine that’s really difficult for smaller providers that just can’t simply plug another carer in.”
If the situation continues, the sector fears a domino effect on the wider health system. When carers miss visits, medications can go unadministered, falls can go undetected and older people can deteriorate faster. That puts extra pressure on already stretched hospitals and emergency departments, a pattern O’Brien has previously described as the “boomerang patient”, where the same client moves repeatedly between home care and hospital.
For now, the three-month excise cut and the government’s National Fuel Security Plan offer a temporary buffer. But industry leaders say the long-term fix must include a realistic update to the per kilometre allowance so it reflects actual costs, not outdated assumptions.
Without that, Australia risks turning a fuel crisis into a full-blown aged care crisis, one that leaves vulnerable older Australians with less support at home and more pressure on the hospital system.
Keeping our regional, rural and remote areas on the map of being just as important as our metro areas is just crucial. We need to be supporting our home care workers and other service deliveries for older people in these areas. Living in the cross border area of Albury/Wodonga and a growing ageing population there is already strain on our health care service . The hospital supports a huge area and is the one stop health care service between Sydney and Melbourne . The reality is a system already under huge strain. If we loose our home care workers and other essential services in these areas we are in big strife . Planning, future planning was needed over 20yrs ago , we did not do it well or are prepared for what is happening now on the ground .