Justine Keay (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Braddon electorate, I rise today to put the Turnbull government on notice in the critical area of health care. At the 2 July election, the Braddon community overwhelmingly voted in favour of better health care. They also voted to protect Medicare from the attacks being made by the Turnbull government. On the day before the election the Prime Minister promised that no Australian would pay more to visit the doctor. This was a complete and utter lie. It has been proven to be a lie with the latest figures from the government's own health department. These figures show quarterly bulk-billing rates in Tasmania dropped in the June quarter from 76.4 per cent to 74 per cent at the end of the September quarter—the biggest fall in any state or territory in the nation.

Thousands of Tasmanians are now paying more to see the doctor, and the silence from the Prime Minister and his Tasmanian Liberal senators has been deafening. At the last election we had the three amigos who wanted to punish the community on health care. The Tasmanian community punished them because they were out of touch. And now it seems that Senator Abetz and his three other Liberal Senate stooges are no different. The Prime Minster, Senator Abetz and these three stooges need look no further than the East Devonport Medical Centre. The East Devonport Medical Centre is reducing bulk-billing to general patients. This means struggling families are faced with an out-of-pocket expense just to see their doctor as the centre winds back bulk-billing. This centre explained to their patients that the reason is 'due to increasing costs along with the federal government freezing the Medicare rebate until June 2020'. Families are being made to make the difficult choice between obtaining care for a sick family member, having that preventative health check-up or putting food on the table.

In effect, the freezing of the Medicare rebate to GPs is nothing more than a GP tax by stealth. The Prime Minister knows this. But, then again, if you are snuggled up in a harbour-side Point Piper mansion, you are probably out of touch with the needs of the average person in the north-west and the west coast of Tasmania. I can just see the Prime Minister ducking into the Double Bay Hotel for a Pimm's and lemonade, not a worry in the world, while the people in my electorate struggle to make ends meet and, thanks to the Prime Minister, are paying more just to see the doctor.

But it is just not me that says the Prime Minister is out of touch and has his priorities all wrong. In a recent letter to me from the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, they wanted to make me aware of the success of local GPs Dr Jane Cooper from Devonport and Dr Chris Hughes from Wynyard in achieving major awards in that organisation. The college also told me:

… for a state with around 600 General Practice Managers, Tasmania has been over represented in national accolades this year, and Braddon, it seems, is leading the charge.

Unfortunately, the correspondence goes on to say:

We must now turn our attention to the continuing risks facing the health of the Tasmanian people.

GPs across the country are still reeling from the open attack on general practice, the best-evidenced driver of preventative health outcomes, via the oppressive Medicare rebate freeze. The college says:

Nowhere is this being felt more acutely than in the northern suburbs of Hobart and the North West, where for the first time in memory struggling patients are being asked to pay out of pocket expenses for General Practice visits.

Another consequence of the Prime Minister's GP tax is that people are being forced to present at the emergency departments of the Mersey Community or North West Regional hospitals. This approach makes no economic sense, let alone the obvious preventative health benefits of patients firstly seeing their local GP.

On the Mersey Community Hospital, the only federally funded hospital in Australia, this week a delegation of north-west Tasmania mayors are visiting this place to try to gain some long-term certainty for that hospital. But the minister has repeatedly refused to give any certainty to the long-term funding for that hospital. We need an end to the freeze on the Medicare rebate and we need certainty for the hospital. Prime Minister, the people of my electorate will never forget if you fail them on health care.