Ben Morton (Tangney, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister and Cabinet) Share this | Hansard source

This bill amends the Health Insurance Act 1973 to make minor changes to the Australian government administrative processes related to Medicare. These changes do not affect the existing arrangements for patients or health professionals. The bill removes the annual sunset period for the regulations that prescribe the table of medical diagnostic imaging and pathology services covered by the Medicare Benefits Schedule. This removes a requirement for the Medicare regulations to be remade each year so patients can continue to be eligible to receive benefits through Medicare. This change will reduce unnecessary administrative work and mitigate the risk that an error during the remake process could affect patient entitlements to benefits under Medicare. The bill also removes a number of provisions in the Health Insurance Act 1973 that are no longer required, as they do not reflect current administrative practices. This includes removing references to the establishment and operation of the inactive Medicare Benefits Advisory Committee, removing calculations relating to Medicare benefits that are no longer used and removing references to historic requirements for optometrists to reflect modern administrative requirements. I thank members for their contributions to the debate on this bill.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

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