Matt Smith (Leichhardt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the National Health Amendment (Cheaper Medicines) Bill 2025, also known as the cheaper medicines bill. Let me take you back to 2004. Unlike the member for Hunter, my beard was there, though less grey and still remarkably patchy. I had more bounce, my favourite song was 'From the Sea' by Eskimo Joe and, at the time, I was still playing basketball in the NBL. I would ask the people of Australia not to hold this against me, but I was playing for the New Zealand Breakers. If it makes you feel any better, we won significantly less than we lost.

The other important thing about 2004, though, was that it was the last time PBS medicines cost no more than $25. Under this bill, the maximum cost of medicines on the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme goes down from $31.60 to $25. When these changes come into effect on 1 July 2026, we will be delivering on a key commitment made at the last election. I can tell you this will be welcomed by many locals in my electorate and right across the country. When I was on the doors, at the markets or just talking to people in the streets, there were always people coming up to me to talk about how hard the cost of living was and how that impacted their health. To the many locals in my electorate concerned about the cost of living, let me say this: we hear you. I hear you. The Anthony Albanese Labor government hears you and responds.

This is why the government has been working hard to address some of the key challenges facing Australian households. We've already legislated tax cuts for all Australian taxpayers. We've delivered cheaper child care. We've brought in more funding for GP bulk-billing. We've provided help to people to pay their energy bills, and work is well underway to help more Australians buy or rent their own home. We've overseen raises to the minimum wage for workers across the country. We're protecting flexible working arrangements and penalty rates. In the last sitting, we passed a 20 per cent cut to HECS, a change that, I will remind everyone, the Liberals didn't feel the need to vote for. There's also work underway to support more cheap and clean energy. There's a commitment to punish supermarkets who are price gouging. Delivering cheaper medicines is one part of this larger push from our Labor government to help make the cost of living manageable.

It is also a change that will make a lot of difference to the lives of people who are reliant on medicines. This is what the bill will mean. There will be a 20 per cent cut in the maximum cost of PBS medicines, which will save Australians over $200 million per year. Four out of five PBS medicines will become cheaper because of our government's $689 million investment. Pensioners and concession card holders will continue to benefit from the freeze to the cost of their PBS medicines, with the cost frozen at its current level of $7.70 until 2030. That's the cost-of-living support Australians expect and deserve. It's the Australian idea of the fair go, allowing people to live with dignity and not be afraid of the fixed cost in their lives that medication can represent.

This bill builds on the important work the Anthony Albanese Labor government has already done to make medicines cheaper—that's right; we have form. In July 2022, we announced more free and cheaper medicines sooner, with a 25 per cent reduction in the number of scripts a concessional patient must fill before the PBS safety net kicks in. In January 2023, we announced the largest cut to the cost of medicines in the history of the PBS, with the maximum cost of general scripts falling from $42.50 to $30. From September 2023, we started delivering 60-day prescriptions, saving both time and money for millions of Australians with ongoing health conditions. Most recently we announced the freezing of the cost of PBS medicines, with co-payments not rising with inflation for all Australians for the first time in 25 years. In my electorate of Leichhardt alone, this has meant that people, as of 31 July 2025, have saved over $8.8 million under our cheaper medicine policies. That is the nitty-gritty of the numbers. They make the policy. I don't live in a policy; I live in Leichhardt, and there are real-world applications to this.

Think about that for a moment—$8.8 million. That is money back in people's pockets, money that people can spend to take their family to the movies or to make sure that their kids' Christmas is a little better, not dealing with that stress. They don't have to be afraid if something happens to the car or the hot water system blows up or, in the case of Cairns, the air conditioner goes on the fritz, which is much more serious! It's reducing stress in life. As we know, if your health is poor and money is tight, it can make recovery harder. This bill helps address that. It's assisting people living in remote places like my electorate only having to travel once every 60 days into town, rather than a monthly pick-up, for their prescriptions—saving time and money and keeping people at home longer.

Spend any time in any remote community and people will tell you they live in the best place on earth. This gives people more time where they want to be. It's new medicines on the PBS and a focus on women's health, an area that has been ignored for far too long. It is giving women the care they need and deserve. New contraceptive pills have hit the PBS. So have treatments for perimenopause, giving women an ongoing conversation regarding menopause and HRT and allowing further understanding of issues such as endo.

People with complex and chronic conditions will be supported by the PBS safety net kicking in sooner. This will provide peace of mind that the bills won't keep piling up in what can be a very, very trying time. We have made investments in primary health care, including community controlled entities, which deliver culturally appropriate care—because we know that primary health care is the guardrail at the top of the cliff, not the ambulance waiting for you at the bottom. This now includes a commitment to mobile cancer screening on the cape and a focus on work preventing FASD. People's dignity is at the forefront of every decision made. People don't want to feel punished for having a health condition, because you should never have to choose between your meds and a meal. These are the real-world outcomes that are benefiting people right now—benefiting them physically, emotionally and financially.

It's work like this that shows why Australians trust Labor to make Medicare stronger. Labor built Medicare, Labor protects Medicare and, now, Labor is expanding Medicare, with $8.5 billion committed to ensure more bulk-billing, cheaper medicines, hospitals funding and urgent care clinics right across the country, including a new one for my area in the northern part of Cairns. There's better access to health care for women, those from the LGBTIQA+ community, people living in regional, rural and remote communities and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It's better health care. This is what Labor governments mean. This is what they've always meant. It's who we are. It's also what we continue to fight for.

Let us not forget the alternative, though. There is a reason the public don't believe the Liberal and National parties when they say they support Medicare. It might be that there have been massive funding cuts to hospitals under previous Liberal-National governments. It might be that previous LNP governments in Queensland decimated the public service, including front-line health workers. It might be that every time we have a Liberal-National government they always have the same fever dream and seek to privatise Medicare. Leaving the Liberal and National parties in charge of Medicare is akin to leaving Jason Voorhees in charge of summer camp. Just like Jason, the Liberal and National parties are quiet, but give them a chance and they will cut and slash everything they can. In both cases I very much doubt that the Australian public wants to clean up the mess left behind. The Liberal and National parties have shown time and time again that Medicare and our health services are not something that they are willing to support or value. As Maya Angelou told us, 'When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.' Australians aren't fools. They know the Liberal and National parties are not focused on their health.

I couldn't believe during the campaign how many people came up to me worried about what might happen if the Liberal and National parties won and what they might do to Medicare. If you are in an emergency, you want a well-funded and high-quality health system. If you have a chronic condition, you want primary health care when you need it. If you are comparing the pair, there really is no choice. Only a Labor government will make Medicare stronger and health care more affordable.

Like I said before, there are a lot of ways we are doing this and will continue to do this, be it the urgent care clinics, which have been a roaring success, or more funding for bulk-billing, more support for the LGBTIQA+ community to allow them access to health care or making sure culturally appropriate care is available to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. All of these things and so much more will build up a better healthcare system and a stronger Medicare.

This bill is to deliver more cheaper medicines and, really, it's just the important next step. Cheaper medicines are good for your hip pocket and good for your health, and your health is the most valuable thing you will ever have. The PBS has always sought to ensure the medicine you need is available at the price you can afford, and now this bill ensures that ideal moving forward, that that quintessentially Australian ideal of the fair go continues. This bill is critical to helping deliver cheaper medicines and more cost-of-living support for Australians. This bill will ensure that people are able to maintain dignity and that they never have to choose between meds and a meal. I commend this bill to the House.

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