Project approach

The Care Together Program supports the establishment of new co-operatives and mutuals that provide sustainable workforce solutions in areas where current approaches are not working. To achieve this, it is identifying and supporting the growth of new and existing social care co-operatives and mutuals in priority areas, as well as existing organisations looking to convert to a co-operative or mutual model. Care Together embeds co-operative values and principles into each project to demonstrate how a diversity of ownership in care services can deliver improved outcomes for workers, consumers and communities.

An additional project of the Care Together Program is a flagship digital innovation project to enable small and medium sized co-operatives to be networked and provide back-office services.

Possible projects could include:

• Supporting place-based integrated social care services in regional, rural or remote locations
• Enabling more new worker co-ops to form in social care
• Empowering consumers of social care through a buyer’s co-op
• Developing innovative co-operatively owned housing and support options in aged care, building on the SILC model in disability care
• Empowering Indigenous communities to support culturally appropriate home care and social co-ops that are Indigenous-owned
• Building secondary co-ops that network smaller co-ops with shared business services
• Establishing place-based, multi-disciplinary health and social care teams that are co-operatively owned