Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Environment and Heritage) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I begin by acknowledging the words of the member for Greenway about the treatment of the Coptic Christians in Egypt. In my view, she is utterly correct that there have been human rights abuses and that there are still significant restrictions on freedom of worship, so I simply want to acknowledge that and say that while Egypt has removed a dictator it is still not yet a democracy and there is a long path along which it must travel.

I want to address more specifically two items relating to the improvement of health care in Australia. The first involves Phillip Island within my electorate of Flinders and the recent Gippsland South Coast Health Services Plan, which was carried out by the previous state government and not released by that government. That plan found what everybody on the island knows. Firstly, the current arrangements for emergency after-hours medical care on Phillip Island fall well short of what are needed. Secondly, the Bass Coast is the fifth fastest growing area in regional Victoria and, while there are now just under 10,000 people living on Phillip Island, that is set to grow to just under 12,000 people over the next 15 years. With the closure of Warley Hospital, medical care on the island has gone backwards. That is a view I have had since just after the last federal election, when the current government let Warley Hospital go. It failed to stand up and implement the plan which had been agreed upon by the Howard government. There is now no emergency medical care available on the island after 10 pm. In that context, I applaud the recent announcement by the state government of an expanded, 24-hour ambulance service for Phillip Island. That was a first step. Now it is time for the federal government to support plans to give Phillip Island a hospital which is part of the broader Bass Coast health network. It should be a satellite, in my view, of the Bass Coast health network and, in particular, the Wonthaggi Hospital service. I am not prescriptive of the form in which it is to occur but I am absolutely committed to working until such time as it does occur.

I now want to turn to a broader national health issue, which is Indigenous eye health. I have the good fortune of having as a friend and mentor Professor Hugh Taylor, the Harold Mitchell Chair of Indigenous Eye Health at the Indigenous Eye Health Unit at the University of Melbourne. Through work we have done together, Professor Taylor and the Indigenous Eye Health Unit have prepared a critical plan for eradicating avoidable blindness in Indigenous Australians by 2020. The plan will prevent about 3½ thousand people becoming blind from cataracts and another 3,000 becoming blind from diabetes each year. Six and a half thousand people who potentially could avoid blindness each year—that would be a deep and powerful human impact of deep and powerful benefit to Indigenous Australia, and it is a deep and powerful commitment that this parliament can and should make. It is one to which I am committed, and I will work for bipartisan support for the Indigenous eye health plan.

In addition to the 6½ thousand souls who could avoid blindness each year, there are another 16,000 or so who would be able to obtain the glasses they need to see clearly. So we would be reducing dramatically the number of people with poor vision. We cannot solve everything, but through a concerted plan for eradicating avoidable blindness in Indigenous Australians by 2020 we can make a dramatic difference in quality of life, in community facility and in reducing disadvantage in Indigenous Australia.

This plan I endorse, this plan I support and this plan I will back until such time as it is implemented. I do not care whether it is the current government or the next government that does it; I do care that the plan to eradicate avoidable blindness in Indigenous Australians occurs. It has been a year in the making and since I first spoke with Professor Taylor. I congratulate Professor Taylor. There is now an affordable plan to eradicate avoidable blindness in Indigenous Australians by 2020.