Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Bowman for bringing this motion, as I always enjoy the opportunity to talk about health care and what our government is doing for this very important Australian institution called Medicare.

I've been working in health care now for half a century—in fact, over half a century. Health care is changing in Australia, as it has done over the many decades I've been working in the industry. It is changing. To deal with those changes we need proper policy, and policy takes time to develop. Health care is changing from transactional visits funded through Medicare to managing chronic illness. We know that many people in Australia suffer from chronic illness. Their needs take time to deal with, and many people now find it difficult to see a GP after many years of neglecting GP numbers and GP renumeration. This government is making the changes necessary to improve that.

I recently visited Wagga to open the new Wagga clinical school for the University of New South Wales. At this facility, medical students will be able to complete all of their training in Wagga, without having to go to the city. That's an initiative of the federal government. We'll train over a hundred local Wagga students to become doctors. They are therefore much more likely to stay in the local area, providing health care in Wagga and surrounds, than if they trained in the city.

We have similar institutions in Albury-Wodonga, on the North Coast, in Bathurst and in Orange, which are run by various universities, all funded by the federal government. We are about to announce an increased number of university placements for doctors to train in their local areas, which will make a huge difference around Australia. We still import around 40 per cent of our doctors into Australia from other countries. We need to train more of our own to stay in the areas where they train.

I firmly believe that people living in rural and regional areas deserve the same quality of health care that people living in our cities get, but that requires funding, and this government is determined to do that. The investment of $8.5 billion in delivering bulk-billing incentives will deliver more than 18 million GP bulk-billed visits every year nationwide. It is important to know that interactions in the health system run into the many tens of millions every year, so of course there's always going to be some problem if a tiny percentage aren't satisfied with their care. But, overall, this government is working hard to make sure Australians get the best in 21st-century healthcare, which they deserve. There are problems—of course there are. I'd be the first to admit that. There is the cost of specialist care. Access to specialists can be very difficult. There are now waits to see paediatricians, my own profession, in rural areas measured in years, not weeks or months, which means a lot of the effectiveness of that care is abrogated because of the long wait. We are working hard to change that.

We are looking at ways of getting more services to rural and regional areas. We're looking at getting more services to high-risk groups such as Indigenous populations, such as those with culturally and linguistically diverse populations, but it requires long-term thinking and long-term health planning, and that's what this government is doing through one of the best health ministers we've had in my time on this planet. Mark Butler is an excellent minister, and he is doing a remarkable job across a huge, broad portfolio.

Recently I visited the bulk-billing urgent care clinic at Campbelltown. I spoke with Dr Jovad Ahmed, a very experienced doctor who has worked there for a long period of time and worked in the area for a long time. For Dr Ahmed, our bulk-billing incentives have meant that he will be able to bulk-bill all his patients, they will be able to get GP care without long waiting times, and he will be able to ensure his patients can access the information, treatments and health care that they deserve and need to remain healthy.

I respect the member for Bowman for his political views, the opposite of mine, but I can assure him that GPs on the front line have welcomed our bulk-billing incentives. They will make a major difference to health care. They are part of the solution that this government is working hard on to make sure Australians continue to get the 21st-century care that they deserve. Medicare is a great institution. This side of politics has always supported it and will continue to do so.

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