Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome a question from the Leader of the Opposition based on his new-found commitment to taxation rigour and properly funded and costed policies. As I said last week when I launched the National Health and Hospitals Network, our proposal falls entirely within the funding parameters put down in the current budget. It is a fully costed and provided-for plan. That is the first thing.

The second thing is that, as the Leader of the Opposition will know full well, in terms of the future transfer of taxation burden what we have said is that the GST—one-third of it, approximately—should be instead dedicated to a new National Hospitals Fund—that is, one which is able to get behind the future growth of our health and hospital system and those doctors and nurses who need that support.

The third thing I would say on the future of local hospital networks is this, and again I go back to the example of Port Macquarie. In Port Macquarie, what they said to me on the ground is that the current area system in which they are located is simply too big. What they want is something which deals with a local community of interest, involving one large hospital and a varying number of smaller hospitals within that community of interest—in his particular area, from memory, one at Wauchope and the other one being at—

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