Nicola Roxon (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for his question. Obviously I informed the House yesterday of a changed proposal that is being put to the Senate when there is a debate on the Medicare levy surcharge. We have of course been encouraging senators to support this proposal. But I noticed that the new shadow minister for health, the member for Dickson, came out of the blocks very fast yesterday to say that this was outrageous and a proposal that he would not support.

I would like to draw the House’s attention to comments made by the new shadow minister for health in August 2006, when, as the Assistant Treasurer, Mr Dutton revealed the numbers of taxpayers who were being hit by the Medicare levy surcharge and revealed that they had doubled since the introduction of the measure in 1997. This was not a passing comment; this was a detailed answer to a question on notice. The member for Dickson, the new health spokesperson for the opposition, conceded that in 1997, when this measure was first introduced, 167,000 people were paying this tax and by 2001 198,000 people were paying this tax and by 2002 it was 235,000 people—and it was very good of the member for Dickson at the time to take the House through these numbers—next it was 282,000 and, by 2004, it was up to 362,000. As we know from other tax office figures, by 2005-06 there were 465,000 Australians paying a tax because the previous Howard government was too lazy to change the tax thresholds. So we know there is an opportunity for the member for Dickson, the new health spokesperson, and the new Leader of the Opposition to note ‘Rudd’s $1,200 health savings’ as headlined by the Daily Telegraph, which I am holding.

The opposition has a choice: do they want to support $1,200 in tax relief for many average working families or are they going to keep opposing this measure? When the new Leader of the Opposition made his first speech after having become the Leader of the Opposition, he told his first press conference:

I know what it is like to be very short of money. … I know Australians are doing it tough and some Australians, even in the years of greatest prosperity, will always do it tough.

The Leader of the Opposition has an opportunity now to provide relief to those very many families who are doing it tough. He can direct his senators in the other place to vote for this measure, and 330,000 people will immediately benefit from it. It is time for the opposition to stand up and say whether they are for tax relief or not. Is the Liberal Party any longer a party that supports tax relief or not? There will be an opportunity to vote for this in the Senate today, tomorrow or in the coming days, and the Leader of the Opposition and the new shadow minister for health and ageing can provide that relief to 330,000 people. They should do it now.

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