Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to follow a very good speech by my colleague and friend the member for Bradfield on a very important topic—namely, the Private Health Insurance Amendment (Lifetime Health Cover Loading and Other Measures) Bill 2012 and the Private Health Insurance Legislation Amendment (Base Premium) Bill 2013. Both bills have come before this House because this government has a budget crisis—indeed, a budget emergency. They are approaching $300 billion of debt and have overseen the five largest budget deficits in Australia's history. So they are having to embark on broken promises and to claw back money from those Australians who have taken the decision themselves, based on personal responsibility and their freedom to choose, to undertake private health insurance. As a result, all premiums for all Australians who undertake private health cover will go up. Not only will a private health insurance rebate no longer cover the loading component of lifetime health cover but it will also see premiums for those currently receiving the rebate go up. This will hit many people in my electorate of Kooyong.

Based on figures provided by Private Healthcare Australia, the percentage of voters in my electorate with private health insurance is 84.5 per cent. That is over 105,000 persons in my electorate, including 25,000 singles. That is a lot of people in my electorate and that is repeated across the country, because more than 12 million Australians have taken out private health cover.

It is a deep shame that the Labor Party has undertaken these measures, because not only did they promise before previous elections that they would never touch private health insurance but the measures will increase the cost of living for all Australians and will increase the burden on our public hospitals, which are already suffering from Labor government cuts. We on this side of the House have a different philosophy to those on the other side. Politics is not just about management but it is actually about ideas. On our side of the House we believe in an individual's freedom to choose. We believe in an individual taking personal responsibility for their decisions. In fact, in a speech in Camberwell Town Hall back in 1946, the founder of the Liberal Party and a previous member for Kooyong, Sir Robert Menzies, delivered an important speech that kick-started the federal election campaign. In that speech he said:

We need to return to politics as a clash of principles and to get away from the notion that it is a clash only of warring personalities.

There is no more important issue than the private health sector, the private education sector and an individual's freedom to choose. That is why we on this side of the House will always defend the private health sector and allow an individual the right to choose.

In Australia, nearly 12½ million Australians have made the decision to take out private health insurance. This increased substantially during the time of the Howard government—indeed, it increased 75 per cent from just over six million Australians to 10.7 million Australians. That was a result of inspired policies that the Howard government undertook: the Medicare levy surcharge, in 1997; the 30 per cent rebate, in 1999; the lifetime health cover policy, in 2000. As a result, we now have a flourishing private health sector which is under threat from Labor's cuts.

Nearly 600 private hospitals in Australia provide nearly 40 per cent of the services to those who go to hospital. Nearly two out of every three elective surgeries are conducted within private hospitals. Private hospitals play an important role in our community in alleviating the burden on the public system. The Howard government not only had a very proud record of increasing its support for the private health system but also supported the public system. Spending on public hospitals increased 110 per cent between 1996 and 2007, the period when John Howard was in office. Let me repeat these facts: we increased the number of people on private health insurance by 75 per cent and at the same time we increased the amount spent on public hospitals by 110 per cent. Contrast this with Labor's record, where in MYEFO last year they ripped more than $1 billion out of Australia's public hospital system. In my state of Victoria some of that money was ripped out retrospectively. We saw that when beds were closed and elective surgery was cancelled. Then the Minister for Health, Tanya Plibersek, did a public backflip because she saw the pain this was creating for thousands of Victorians. We know that this government has introduced the means test to private health insurance, which companies like Deloitte had estimated would cause more than 500,000 Australians to drop out of private health insurance or diminish their levels of cover.

We have not seen the full impact of the means-testing of the rebate, because more than $1 billion was spent in Australians prepaying for their private health insurance. This is a very important fact. They prepaid for 12 months or more, and as a consequence we have not seen flow-through of the impact of the higher premiums that have already resulted and will result from the government's means-testing of the private health insurance rebate.

There is one significant mistaken belief that those on the other side of the House have about private health insurance. It is part of their class warfare. They think that every Australian who has private health insurance is a rich Australian. I tell you that they are not rich. In fact, they are aspirational and take responsibility for their own health care, just as many of them take responsibility for the education of their children. But you are attacking them with your means-testing of the rebate and with your new measures affecting the loading and so forth under these bills.

There are over 5½ million Australians with an annual household income under $50,000 who have private health insurance, and nearly 3½ million Australians who have less than $35,000 as their annual household income who have private health insurance. These people are not rich but have taken the conscious decision to take out private health care because they want to make that choice for themselves and their families.

We have learnt in the last five years what a bad government can do to damage the Australian economy. The Australian people have learnt never to trust the words of another Labor government, and they will find this out on 14 September. But what we are debating now about private health insurance brings into focus the commitments by senior members of those opposite to retain the private health insurance rebate in its form. The current Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, when she was shadow minister for health back in 2004, said:

I grow tired of saying this—Labor is committed to the 30 per cent private health insurance rebate.

Well, we now know that that is not true. Then Julia Gillard, in a letter to the editor of The Weekend Australian on 15 October 2005, said:

For all Australians who wanted to have private health insurance, the private health insurance rebate would have remained under a Labor government. I gave an iron-clad guarantee of that during the election.

The difference between Tony "rock solid, iron-clad" Abbott and me is that when I make an "iron-clad commitment", I actually intend on keeping it.

That is laughable. That is absolutely laughable, because the now Prime Minister was comparing herself to the now Leader of the Opposition, saying that you cannot believe him but you can believe her. We have seen not only with the carbon tax but now with private health insurance that the government's word cannot be taken at face value. Nicola Roxon, the shadow minister for health, who became the Minister for Health and Ageing, said this on 23 September 2007 on Meet the Press:

We've committed to it.

Namely, the private health insurance rebate. She said:

We've committed to the 30%. We've committed to the 35% and 40% for older Australians. It's similar to the safety net. We know that many people rely heavily on the assistance that is now provided and would not be able to have private health insurance if that rebate wasn't paid. And lifetime health cover and others that go with it, we are committed to those. We understand that Australia now has a mixed health system, both private and public, and we need them both to be strong in order for the community to be able to get the services.

Well, I'll be damned. That was the former minister for health committing to the private health insurance rebate as we introduced it.

Now we have had backflip after backflip, not only cutting more than a billion dollars out of the public health system but ripping money out of the private system, when we know that the private system is responsible for dealing with 40 per cent of the patients in Australia and two out of every three elective surgery operations. That is the role of the private healthcare system, and this government is ripping the guts out of it. Nicola Roxon, in a media release on 26 September 2007, said:

On many occasions for many months, Federal Labor has made it crystal clear that we are committed to retaining all of the existing Private Health Insurance rebates …

We know that is not true. And Kevin Rudd in 2008, as Prime Minister, in a press conference, said:

The Private Health Insurance Rebate policy remains unchanged and will remain unchanged.

This is laughable. This is laughable because this government has destroyed our private health system, has cut our public health funding, has not kept its promises on the Medicare Chronic Dental Disease Scheme, has slowed down our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and the subsidies that are provided under that and has increased the number of bureaucracies—at last count, nearly 12 in the health sector alone, costing more than a billion dollars—and now we have the private health insurance debacle.

I call it a debacle because this government promised time and time again—from Kevin Rudd to Nicola Roxon to today's Prime Minister, Julia Gillard—to keep the private health insurance rebate as it was. These bills, which this government has brought before the parliament in a rushed manner, without proper consultation and deliberation, are going to lead to a substantial increase in premiums—up to 27 per cent—for more than 1 million Australians. It is going to lead to 12 different price mechanisms for private health insurance. It is going to increase complexity.

I finish where I started. For the coalition, Liberals and Nationals, this is not just a debate about the services that are provided to ordinary Australians; it is also a debate about the philosophy of our party. It is a debate about why we are in this place to start with and about what differentiates our side from theirs. The late, great Margaret Thatcher, whom we recently lost, talked about private health insurance. She said:

I, along with something like 5 million other people, insure to enable me to go to hospital on the day I want, at the time I want, and with a doctor I want. For me, that is absolutely vital

… … …

Like most people, I pay my dues to the National Health Service; I do not add to the queue, and if I said, 'Look, because I cannot come when you want me, I must come when I want to' you would accuse me of jumping the queue. I exercise my right as a free citizen to spend my own money in my own way, so that I can go in on the day, at the time, with the doctor I choose and get out fast.

We will always support the private health system because we believe that it allows an individual to have the right to choose in a society which stands, as we will always stand, for individual freedom.

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