Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party) | Hansard source

This is a troubling double standard. You don't build in immunity provisions unless you anticipate errors. The government appears to have accepted that it is going to make inevitable errors. Rather than designing a system robust enough to prevent reputational harm to clinicians, its preference is to protect itself from legal consequences. The parliament cannot make a fully informed decision on schedule 1 until the government provides clear answers on data currency, update frequency, clinician input mechanisms and the error correction process. The coalition will press for those answers and seek amendments to address these gaps when this bill comes before the Senate.

I turn now to schedule 2, which deals with regulating premiums. The bill would require insurers to seek ministerial approval for new products and for existing products where certain changes are proposed. This extends the existing approval process to new products. The objective of addressing product phoenixing is one the coalition supports. Product phoenixing is the practice of closing an existing insurance product and reopening an essentially identical product at a higher premium, circumventing the requirement for premium change approval. It's a practice that undermines the intent of premium regulation, and it harms consumers. The coalition supports closing that loophole. However, evidence presented to the Senate committee indicated that product phoenixing primarily involves gold-tier products. These are the same people I spoke about earlier—those who are going to be paying $1,600 a year extra on their premiums if they're over 65.

The bill as drafted imposes the new approval requirement broadly across all new products, including extras policies. That is a much wider net than the problem requires. Requiring ministerial approval for every new extras policy creates red tape for insurers, with minimal consumer benefit. It risks slowing the introduction of innovative new products. The approval requirement should be targeted to the products and market behaviour actually driving the problem. Applying it broadly is ministerial overreach, and it will generate compliance costs that will ultimately be borne by consumers.

The committee also received no satisfactory answers to several critical operational questions: How many applications does the department expect to receive? Does it have the resources to process them? Will insurers face application fees and, if so, what limit will apply? What statutory timeframes will ensure decisions are made promptly and efficiently? An insurer left waiting indefinitely for approval of a new product cannot respond to the market. These are the practical questions any competent legislator would want answered before voting for a bill. The fact that many remain unanswered, despite a year of lead time, reflects poorly on the government's preparation. This legislation has all the hallmarks of a policy announced prematurely with critical detail never properly examined. Fancy that.

The bill's stated purpose is to improve choice and transparency for private health consumers. That goal requires honesty—fancy that—about the state of those consumers right now. According to the government's own most recent Medicare data, the bulk-billing rate for specialist attendances is 28.2 per cent—28.2 per cent for bulk-billing for specialist attendances—with an average out-of-pocket cost, and I don't know where these figures are coming from, of $123.48. It seems pretty generous to me. For anaesthetists, the bulk-billing rate is 8.7 per cent with an average out-of-pocket cost of $244.49. Out-of-pocket costs to see a GP have reached more than $50, the highest level on record.

Research conducted by Redbridge showed that three in 10 Australians referred to a specialist did not go because they simply couldn't afford it. Australian families have been forced to choose between seeing a doctor and paying the bills. Publishing fee information on a website, however well-designed, will not put money back into Australians pockets. It will not drive specialists to lower their fees. It may help some patients make better informed decisions, but it will not address the underlying affordability crisis.

There is also a broader issue of trust that the government appears to have overlooked. Transparency only works when consumers have confidence that the information they are receiving is complete, current and meaningful. A specialist fee published on a government website may provide part of the picture but patients are often faced with a range of costs that extend beyond a single consultation.

We're not opposing this bill. We are doing what an opposition should do. We're insisting that legislation affecting 15 million Australians and the clinicians who serve them is properly designed before it becomes law. The government has had more than a year to work out the details of this policy. The fact that so many fundamental questions remain unanswered is not good enough. The coalition will strive to make this bill better.

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