Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Yesterday I wrote to him about a relatively small number of Australian children who live with a condition called inborn error of metabolism including PKU. It is a rare genetic condition that requires medically prescribed food. Will the Prime Minister reconsider his budget cut of more than $250 a month that goes to each of these 900 families?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a serious question, and it is obviously an important subject. Yes, the Howard government some years ago introduced a program to help people with a condition inborn error of metabolism. Since that program was introduced in, I think, 2001 there have been a number of developments. First of all, there are now far more regular supermarket items, like cornflour that can replace wheat flour and rice milk that can replace dairy milk, for people managing protein disorders. The Minister for Health said the other day:

Foods for people managing protein metabolic disorder are now more readily available and cheaper than when the programme began …

The other new development is that, over the years, there have been a number of new medicines introduced onto the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme that assist with the specific nutritional requirements for people with protein disorders. So my understanding is that the program itself cost something like $19 million or $20 million. New medicines costing far more than that that deal with this issue have been put onto the PBS, and that is why the government has taken the decision that it has.