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

It is interesting to hear the shadow Treasurer and the shadow health minister yelling out from the other side of the House, because the announced increase of 5.78 per cent that I made yesterday—an increase is never good news for families—was a smaller increase than it would have been. For all of the hollering from those opposite I do need to advise them that when their dear leader was the health minister the average increase under Mr Abbott was 6.44 per cent. I think, to be fair to the Leader of the Opposition, we should acknowledge that his average was 6.44 per cent but the average over the last five years of the coalition was 6.63 per cent. So he did have a slightly better average, but it is still significantly higher.

The truth is no-one ever wants these premiums to go up. The obligation of the government that we take far more seriously than those opposite ever did is to make sure that the increases are kept to the absolute minimum that is necessary. The approach that the Leader of the Opposition took when he was the health minister was just a simple tick and flick: they asked, he gave and the premiums went up. I did wonder whether we were being a bit unfair to the Leader of the Opposition, because he was no doubt pretty busy working out what he was going to do with several thousand golf balls that he paid $6,000 for!

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