Correct—off the 1.5 million pensioners that this is slated to impact. So I'm not surprised that those opposite aren't clamouring to make contributions. Those opposite have a hypermajority. They could spend a lot of time in this place extolling the virtues of this particular provision and this Private Health Insurance Amendment (Modernising the Private Health Insurance Rebate) Bill 2026, but, instead, they're hunkered down in their suites, very keen for this debate to be over and over quickly.

The bad news for those opposite, particularly those who are perhaps standing on the green carpet of the House of Representatives for the first time, in this their first term, is that, whilst this debate might soon end in this place, I can assure those opposite that we will spend a good part of the next 12 to 16 months telling older Australians about this change. What's worse for those opposite is that at some point over the next 12 months these pensioners will be introduced to this change—because it doesn't come into effect, of course, until next year. Not only will they find themselves out of pocket an additional $800 for a single and $1,600 for a couple should they wish to continue their private health insurance, which we'll talk about in a minute; they'll also be dealing with another round of cost increases from the private health insurers. And, courtesy of those opposite and their inability to manage the economy and hold on to the levers of expenditure, that, of course, will go up by a factor that's not insignificant because, as you'd be well aware, Deputy Speaker Scrymgour, inflation is out of control.

The member for Wannon put it well, because this would be mean spirited enough if all it was was an exercise in cost shifting from the private individual to the state, in the sense that, if pensioners are forced into the public health system, then that bill is picked up by state governments. But the problem here is it's not just a simple transfer, because these public health systems are under incredible pressure. The truth is that, in electorates like the one the member for Wannon so well represents and the one I represent as the member for Barker, our constituents disproportionately, unfortunately, do not have the survivability rates from serious illness that are enjoyed by people who live in metropolitan settings.

Let me paint you a picture. In my electorate, one takes out private health insurance not because one will get access to private hospital services in my regional electorate, because there aren't any, but simply so that when you make the decision, or are required or forced, to travel to Adelaide, you might be able to be in a private hospital—get there a little earlier, be serviced more quickly—not be on public health waiting lists.

For many people in my electorate, the choice between private health insurance and no private health insurance is the choice between life and death. You might say, 'The member for Barker is catastrophising,' but I'm not, because, unlike many, when individuals in my electorate are forced to travel to metropolitan settings for health treatment, they need to meet their own costs associated with these things, and, too many times, whether it comes to radiation therapy or other forms of treatment, they decide, in effect, that they're not going to have that treatment. That's why people who are diagnosed with cancer in my electorate die much sooner than those metropolitan people, sadly. It's a shocking statistic in a First World country like ours, but it is real.

Rather than wax lyrical about the pressures that are on the public health system or perhaps refer to the South Australian Minister for Health and Wellbeing, Blair Boyer, who called on this government, and indeed his colleagues in the left of the Labor Party from South Australia, to reverse this decision—rather than talk about those things, I thought I might, as the radio jocks refer to it, open the lines up. So what I've done, unfiltered, and perhaps unlike those opposite, is I have written to everyone in my electorate above the age of 65, all 23,800 people, to tell them about this situation—this impending challenge to the maintenance of their private health insurance.

What did they say in response? I thought I might share that with the House. It might be of interest. Grant responds: 'Hi there, Tony. Stay with it. My wife and myself will be hit if it goes through. Several of our elderly neighbours are thinking of ditching health cover and going on the public system. We've had private cover for as long as I've been married, and we got married in 1983.' This is no small thing—1983. They maintained private health insurance during that period and, I expect, enjoyed reasonably good health. But now, when Grant and his good wife need it the most, those opposite have decided to make it unattainable.

Valma writes: 'My only income is the age pension. I'm almost 88 and pretty fit, but I think I'm going to have to drop my private health cover.' The member for Wannon talks about who around the Expenditure Review Committee, who around cabinet, made these decisions. I'm not as generous as the member for Wannon. I think the member for Wannon is too kind when he says that people sitting around that table, perhaps in an act of negligence or oversight, didn't think of the pensioners of Australia. I think individuals opposite, sitting around those important committee tables, are a bit more deliberate about how they go about these things.