Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The expansion of suicide prevention programs commences on 1 July 2006 and will get $62.4 million over five years. That is the end of the package. I am happy to answer some of the other questions that the member for Lalor asked.

In terms of the MBS items, which relate to the substantial change to the way we are structuring Medicare, I think it is a very welcome change to allow psychiatrists to access the Medicare Benefits Schedule. It has certainly been very well received by the psychology organisations that I have had discussions with and by psychologists generally who have talked to me. It is the substantial item in the package—it is $538 million—and I think it will make a substantial difference in access to psychiatrists, GPs and psychologists, as psychiatrists are able not to clear their books but to ensure that patients who are better seen by psychologists can do so effectively—and have the financial access that the member for Lalor also craves—and therefore allow psychiatrists to see the patients who really need to be seeing psychiatrists, rather than those patients who do not need to see psychiatrists but sometimes are.

The member for Lalor asked if a GP or psychiatrist referral will be required to see a psychologist. The answer to that question is yes. Psychologists will only be able to access the Medicare Benefits Schedule on referral from a GP or a psychiatrist. Psychologists who will be able to be referred to will be a certain category of psychologists. Not every psychologist in Australia will be able to receive a referral from a GP or a psychiatrist; they will have to meet certain criteria. We are working through those criteria at the moment with the stakeholders, obviously, to ensure that those people who see psychologists under this Medicare Benefits Schedule item are ones who have practical clinical experience rather than every psychologist who currently has qualifications, of which there are many, many thousands, not all of whom—in fact, less than half of whom—would have clinical experience in recent history. So we want to make sure that those— (Time expired)

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