Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

We saw it again on display in this question time. We know what the Prime Minister really thinks about this GP tax and what his plans really are for Medicare. He has said that he is committed to it. The new Minister for Health committed to a value signal, a price signal, on Medicare. The Prime Minister remains committed to the destruction of Medicare. Over the past 18 months he has committed to his GP tax at least 53 times. He has defended it as good and decent policy and necessary for saving the health of this nation. So the weasel words we are starting to hear from this Prime Minister, which he is using today, to say that he has shelved his GP tax today have, of course, only one aim in mind, and that is keeping his leadership on life support. Be in no doubt: that is the only reason. This Prime Minister is not proceeding with the $5 GP tax, not because he cares about Medicare, not because he cares about the health of this nation; it is because he cares about the health of his numbers in the next Liberal party room split. That is what this is all about.

Be in no doubt: this government is not standing up for Medicare. It is not abolishing the GP tax because it believes that it is the right thing to do by patients. It is doing so because there is no way that Labor would allow this destruction of Medicare to get through the Senate, so it knows it cannot get the policy through. And it has been at war with doctor organisations and with patient groups across the country, and that remains so today. The government and those backbenchers who are going back to their electorates today are kidding themselves.

What happened today is that the health minister got rolled. The health minister got rolled in cabinet and has been unable to deliver to the doctors at all. She got rolled and was not able to deliver to the doctors. She has had to ring them and say: 'I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The cabinet didn't actually do what I wanted.' That is what she has had to do today, which shows just how ineffective this health minister is in standing up against the Prime Minister, whose agenda is to get rid of Medicare, a universal health insurance scheme which we all pay into according to our means and draw down on according to our healthcare needs. If this minister thinks that she is going to be able to keep bulk-billing rates at the rate they are currently, with the policy she has just announced, a $1.3 billion continued cut to primary care, she is kidding herself. If she thinks bulk-billing rates are going to stay exactly the same and that it is going to be a system for people who are vulnerable, not just concession card holders—because there are people who fall $1 short of becoming eligible for concessional cards who have chronic disease conditions, who are trying to keep in marginal jobs, trying to keep an income, who will be affected by the policy this government has announced—she is kidding herself. If you think bulk-billing rates are going to stay at 82.3 per cent—and bulk-billing is important in making sure we constrain costs in Medicare—then you are kidding yourself. The Prime Minister, when he was health minister, presided over a collapse in bulk-billing rates. The only reason the Prime Minister, as health minister, had to do something about it was because Labor ran a very strong and effective campaign, and he was forced to do so. The then Prime Minister John Howard came in and put in place bulk-billing incentives.

We are going to see again, under this government's policies, a collapse in bulk-billing. It is happening already today. GP surgeries across the country—I have visited many, many of them—are already today changing their billing practices, not just for general patients but for concessional patients as well. They are saying that the government has sent them a very clear signal that it does not value general practice. It does not value our primary care system, because if it valued our primary care system it would not have tried to cut $3.5 billion out of it and to transfer every one of those costs onto patients.

The only reason the government has been forced to back down on one element of its GP tax is because Labor has stood up against it, and because the Prime Minister is trying to salvage his job. He knows that this policy does not have popular support. It does not have doctors' support. And, now, it does not have the support of his backbench, because they have realised the damage it has been doing in their electorates to their own jobs and to their own votes. The damage that it will do to the healthcare system does not seem to have entered this government's mind one iota.

We have seen from this government several iterations of this GP tax. First we had the $7 GP tax. Then we had the policy that would have seen $20 ripped off doctors and passed onto patients—a $20 GP tax. Then we had the $5 GP tax and the four-year freeze to indexation, which the government is now continuing. This amounts to cuts to Medicare by stealth, now. The government is presiding over the destruction of our universal health insurance scheme. And be in no doubt: today that absolutely continues.

The Prime Minister, on no fewer than 53 occasions, said that he thinks it is an absolute priority for health policy. In fact this is the only health policy the government has. I admit the new health minister has only been in this job for six weeks now—or a little bit more than that. She has been brought in to try and salvage a bit of the mess that has occurred. I get that she is new to health policy. And I get that suddenly she is finding herself in a space that is really complex.

But they had six years in opposition. The came to government with no plan for health policy. How embarrassing! After 18 months in government members of the government are now saying, 'We're going to consult about health policy.' What were you doing in opposition for six years? What were you doing then, and what have you been doing for the last 18 months in government? For those 18 months in government you have been at war with doctors, trying to absolutely smash Medicare. The government continues to do that, not understanding the complexities of what they have done.

Let's have a look at what they have done across the entire health system. There have been major cuts, with $57 billion in cuts to public hospitals. Those cuts are already starting to hit in every public hospital in this country. There has been $300 million taken out of preventative health. Over $600 million has been taken out of dental health. And there has been an attack on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, transferring costs onto patients by increasing the PBS co-payment. That, again, is something we are standing against in the Senate.

What you have seen from this government is an attack across the entire health system. They have targeted $3.5 billion worth of cuts to primary care and to general practice but they have also cut billions of dollars across health. Now sitting on the table they have to find $800 million. There has been speculation in the newspapers today that they will be finding that out of the public hospital system. There is that $800 million, and a $1.3 billion cut still sitting there on the table.

Be in no doubt: what this about today is the Prime Minister trying to shore up his job. It is not at all about the health of this nation. We know that the Prime Minister has said on several occasions—53 of them—that this toxic GP tax is good policy. The health minister again today has said that the GP tax is good health policy. Be in no doubt: the government do not actually want to change this GP tax, and there is only one reason they are here today. If they had been able to get this through the Senate it would be in place today. Be in no doubt: this is exactly what this government wanted to do.

We know that this government has not learnt a single thing from its attacks on primary care. They still believe in the GP tax. Ridiculously, the Minister for Health is now calling it a 'value signal'. I can tell you this much: you do not value general practice by cutting $3.5 billion out of it. What sort of value signal do you think that sends to every single GP in the nation? I am sure the minister has been hearing it every time she sits down in a GP surgery across the country. In many of those small kitchens in GP surgeries they will be telling you, pretty loud and clear, that they have never been so angry at a government policy, and never so angry at a government.

The GP tax has been wrong. Why has it taken until today for the government to acknowledge it? It has been eight or 10 months since the budget. They have taken this long, because this is all about the Prime Minister's job. Be in no doubt: when the New South Wales election is over and the heat is off them in New South Wales, when the Prime Minister has maybe managed to shore up some of his numbers in this place—maybe he will manage; maybe he will not—he will do this again. There is no doubt. This attack on Medicare is in the DNA of the Liberal and National parties and they should own it every single day.

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