Sarah Holland-Batt
Acting
Biography
Sarah Holland-Batt is an award-winning poet, editor and critic, and an Associate Professor at QUT. Her most recent book, The Hazards, won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Poetry. Her writing has been recognised with numerous honours and awards, including Yaddo and MacDowell fellowships in the United States, the Australia Council B.R. Whiting Literature Residency in Rome, and a Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship. She recently appeared as a witness at the Brisbane hearings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, where she testified about the abusive treatment and neglect her father has experienced in his aged care facility. Her testimony focussed on the facility’s response to a whistle-blower who came forward detailing deliberate victimisation of her father, and the handling of her formal complaint by the regulator, the Aged Care Complaints Commission (ACCC).
Known For
Hosted by Hamish Macdonald, Q&A puts punters, pollies and pundits together in the studio to thrash out the hot issues of the week. It's about democracy in action - the audience gets to ask the questions.
Q&A
When director Sue Thomson’s 89-year-old mum, Margaret, begins to need additional help with day-to-day life, they face a decision that most families will encounter: whether to consider a residential aged-care facility; and, if so, how to find a suitable one amid a sector with a reputation for neglect and mistreatment. Margaret’s story becomes a springboard for an investigation of the political history of aged care in Australia, marred by a 40-year bipartisan privatisation agenda. As we hear from advocates, journalists and senior citizens who have experienced the system, a group of schoolkids discuss the situation we’ve reached with aged care and where we need to go from here – and of what they, and we, can expect in the future.