Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

Can I just address a few contributions. I turn firstly to the member for Solomon, a champion of local sporting groups and a great grassroots local member who has provided enormous support to a number of groups, particularly those involved in participation of Indigenous youth in sport, AFL in particular. I have visited with the member for Solomon to have a look at some of those programs. I commend her for that. I thank her very much for the work that she does and the inspiration that she provided to the government's decision to invest $100 million into schools to give access to about 850,000 children in just over 5,500 schools across the country to increased participation and the opportunities that sport presents. Whether or not people go on with sport is not necessarily an issue. Yes, there is a significant health dividend for people who move away from a sedentary lifestyle and into active participatory involvement in organised sport or community sport. That is a significant investment that the Commonwealth has made, and I thank her very much for her question in relation to that.

I want to address the issue raised by the member for Throsby, who I note, if I am quoting accurately, said in an article in the last couple of days, 'There's no point building more primary health facilities in rural communities.' What the government has done is promise $52½ million over the course of the next four years to provide a minimum of 175 infrastructure grants for existing general practices in rural and remote settings.

That goes to one of the points the member for Lyne was making before in relation to support that we can provide to rural practices. This is a flagship program, because it does stand in contrast to the GP superclinic program, where the previous government wasted $650 million by putting it into practices that were competing with existing general practices—in rural communities and in marginal seats otherwise. The GP superclinic program presided over by Labor, during the worst period of government since Federation, was not about putting extra resources and clinics into areas of need; it was all about putting them into marginal seats. They were competing with existing practices, which is why the program fell over—and it is why some have not even been started, even after the Labor Party was swept from power in September of last year. So we took a decision that, yes, we should invest into expanding general practice, particularly in rural and regional communities, because we want to see extra training facilitated in those practices. So how the member for Throsby, as the assistant shadow minister for health, who is supposed to have some interest in rural matters, could suggest that we should not be investing any money into these rural communities, is something he will need to explain to the sector. That is a significant investment that we are making and I am very proud of it.

In relation to a couple of the issues raised by the member for Ballarat, the Medical Research Future Fund—yes, it is visionary. Why Labor wanted to rip $400 million out of medical research in 2011 is beyond me. When you talk to young researchers around the country who want certainty around their future and around the way in which they can be employed in labs, institutes and universities across the country, it is absolutely breathtaking for the Labor Party to stand up here and suggest that they somehow support the program when they don't. They don't. They had six years to demonstrate that they could build a capital protected future fund. They didn't do it. They didn't do it. They proposed to rip money out in 2011. With those young researchers, we fought against the then government and we stared those cuts down. I am very proud of that outcome and I am very proud of the fact that we have been able to increase the money into medical research. And we will do it once this bill passes in relation to the Medical Research Future Fund because we are determined to see the future health needs of this country on a sustainable path, and that is something the government will deliver.

The member for Ballarat also asked in relation to Medicare Locals. The former Chief Medical Officer, John Horvath, undertook a review for the government and made recommendations to the government. That has been widely canvassed. In relation to the Deloittes briefing that was provided in recent days, I have not seen the detail of that. I am happy for the member for to forward the details, if she has specific issues in relation to it, but I have not seen the detail of that briefing.

The member for Lyne quite appropriately talked about superclinics and I have addressed that issue. I commend him very much for the years of service he has provided to rural practice and just draw attention to the Practice Incentive Payment for teaching, which is $238.4 million over five years, and the money otherwise that we are providing to infrastructure in rural communities in this budget.

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