David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

We do not hate workers! We support workers all over the place. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme: 652 approvals versus 331. Do you know who did 652? Was it them? No! It was the Minister for Health, who spoke here earlier. The ministry of health has approved 652 new drugs since the coalition was put in charge of administering the health system—$1.3 billion in the last round and $3 billion over 18 months. We have new drugs for melanoma, cystic fibrosis, pancreatic cancer, eye disease, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, various forms of rare kidney disease and kidney cancer and breast cancer. We have done this because we have managed the budget well.

There are over 5½ thousand items on the Medicare Benefits Schedule. We are criticised for damaging that system. But people seem to have very short memories on the other side, including the member for Sydney, the previous health minister. I think most of Australia was not listening and had given up on the Labor Party before the last election. In the last budget that the Labor Party brought down for health—they criticised us for freezing the indexation—the member for Sydney froze it! It was not us. That in itself was $667 billion out of health. The dental scheme has come up for criticism. I just looked at the budget papers before I came in here.

The payments for the national partnership on health with the states amounts to $155 million, and the child dental benefit takes it up to over $200 million. Access to drugs involves the community pharmacy agreement, which the minister and the ministry has just completed with the guild. The pharmaceutical industry continues to negotiate and there will be, hopefully, a complete resolution of the funding arrangements.

Whether you look at one pillar or all of them, the facts are— (Time expired)

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