Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Leichhardt for his question. Last year the Prime Minister announced a $1.9 billion mental health initiative, by far the biggest initiative ever announced in this area. He did so in part because of the convinced advocacy of the member for Leichhardt. I thank him and congratulate him for the work he did.

Thanks to this initiative far more Australians are now getting the care that they need. I can inform the House that in the first four months of the operation of this initiative Medicare supported more than 130,000 mental health care plans prepared by GPs. Under Medicare, there were more than 40,000 consultations with clinical psychologists and more than 100,000 consultations with psychologists and other health professionals. I can also inform the House that there are now nearly 1,400 clinical psychologists and more than 7,000 psychologists who are registered to provide services under Medicare thanks to this mental health initiative. Yet again we have more services from the Howard government. Yet again we have more proof that the Howard government is the best friend that Medicare has ever had.

I have been asked about alternative policies. Since 3 May last year the Australian Labor Party has officially been a policy free zone on health. There is a very good rule when you are talking about the Australian Labor Party: do not believe what they say, believe what they do. So I was researching this whole question of Labor policy on mental health. I discovered that, after the Leader of the Opposition had been the de facto Premier of Queensland for four years, Queensland had the worst mental health system of any state in the Commonwealth of Australia. The then Human Rights Commissioner said in 1993:

There is no question that there are very serious problems in Queensland, including a pathetic lack of services for young people.

That is the Human Rights Commissioner of the regime under the de facto Premier. The following year a research paper prepared for Schizophrenia Australia said:

People who suffer mental illness in Queensland should move interstate because of the woeful health services ...

It was possible to move interstate when the Leader of the Opposition was the de facto Premier of Queensland. It will not be possible to go overseas if he ever gets to be the Prime Minister of this country. If you could not trust the Leader of the Opposition to advise on good health services in Queensland, you can never trust him to run good services. I think there is a clear message here: don’t let Kevin Rudd wreck Medicare like he wrecked Queensland’s health services.

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