Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I am not aware of the comments that the senator referred to at the end of her question, so I cannot respond directly to those. I am assuming that the senator is referring to changes to the bulk-billing incentive payment for pathology and diagnostic imagining. I think it is very important for the Senate to note that since 2009 half a billion dollars, around $500 million, has been spent on this particular program; indeed, $99 million in the last year. The purpose of the payment was to increase bulk-billing rates—that was the purpose of the payment for those who were not aware. What we have seen, as I said, is $99 million just in the last year and roughly the same amount each and every year since 2009, and the bulk-billing rate has gone from 86.3 per cent to 87.6 per cent over that period of time. It has increased by 1.3 per cent. So the purpose of the funding through this program, to increase the rate, simply has not had the desired effect that was the intention of the funding to be paid in the first instance. Let me also be very clear: rebates have not changed for people undertaking these items. The incentives were being paid directly to the pathologists, to the diagnostic imagers—