Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

():  The member for Calwell has fallen into the trap of coming into the chamber and just reading the talking points that Labor has given to him, making out as if all is well in the area of health. Well, all is not well, particularly in rural and regional Australia and especially in remote Australia. He talks about the urgent after-hours care clinics. That would be great if the urgent care clinics were distributed fairly across the nation, but, unfortunately, they are not. While the urgent care clinics are a good initiative, there are areas in need that do not have access to them. These areas in need are outside Labor seats, and the need and desire for them are just not being met.

The Labor Party talks about the decade of neglect. What Labor doesn't realise, or conveniently forgets, is that we were dealing with COVID. It was a worldwide pandemic.

I hear the minister at the table scoffing, but our response to COVID, according to the Hopkins Centre, was second in the world. We made sure that, health-wise, we provided the vaccinations which saved tens of thousands of lives. Not only that, we also provided the economic benefits to save many, many businesses from bankruptcy. That is what we did in that decade and, indeed, towards the back end of that decade.

When Labor talks about taking over in May 2022, with bulk-billing in freefall, the facts don't stack up, because under Labor bulk-billing rates have dropped 11 per cent, from 88 per cent to 77 per cent. That would be even worse in regional areas. What we heard from the health minister at one stage was, if you can't get a bulk-billing doctor, just make another appointment with another doctor who bulk-bills. The fallacy of that is that that might be all well and good in the leafy suburbs of Adelaide, but it doesn't cut the mustard in regional Australia and particularly in remote Australia, where, if you can find a doctor at all, you're doing well. You can't be fussy about whether they bulk-bill. You just need to get a doctor, particularly if you have chronic pain. It shouldn't be a truism, 'when in pain, catch the plane', in remote Australia. You should have access to a doctor right there and then. One of the worst things Labor did when it came to government was change the distribution priority areas, whereby many doctors in rural Australia literally took the plaque off their practice and moved to Newcastle or Wollongong or the Gold Coast, which, quite frankly, had plenty of doctors. I will never say 'enough doctors', because there are never enough doctors.

But what we have done and did do in regional Australia was put in the Murray-Darling Medical Schools Network. I was proud to finance and fund that as part of a coalition government. I know that, in a few short weeks, the Minister for Regional Health will open the new facility at Wagga Wagga, where I went the other day. They celebrated quite a milestone. They were a clinical school; now they've become a medical school. They have produced a number of doctors who have then stayed in regional Australia. That's the crux of the issue: staying in regional Australia to practise. They come to regional Australia, fall in love with regional Australia or fall in love with somebody in regional Australia, and then they know that there is a future for them in regional Australia.

But we know that, certainly in Senate estimates the other day, health department officials admitted that Australians are not seeing a benefit from Labor's bulk-billing health policy. They won't see this for four long years. At the same time, people are sick, and they need to get better. If they can't see a bulk-billing doctor in regional Australia, they have to pay on the nose for it. That's just the way it is. We've got a very good health system, and we should never talk it down. I'm far from doing that. But we still have many, many Australians for whom the truth, despite the Prime Minister's claim on any number of occasions that all you need is your Medicare, not your credit card, is that it's not being seen regional Australia in particular. But right across the nation, it is a fallacy. It is just not true that you can go to any doctor, produce your Medicare card and receive that service for free. That is not the case. The Prime Minister and Labor people should stop saying it. They should stop just reading their talking points that are produced for them, because what they're saying is simply not true. It's not correct. And Australians out there are reeling from the effects of poor health policies by this government.

See this speech in context