Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Health. Why did the minister yesterday claim that the granting of an MRI Medicare licence to Sound Radiology was 'done through an independent process' when, in fact, they were signed off by him in his ministerial office?

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is not an accurate representation of what I said. As I confirmed in the House, final decisions were made by—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just pause for a second. The minister is being completely relevant but I'm struggling to hear him. The member for Ballarat is preventing me hearing the Minister for Health. I think the member for McMahon wants to listen to the answer and I need to, so if she can stop interjecting that would assist everyone.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Final decisions were made by the minister, as they were made by the member for Sydney sitting right next to him.

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

But you claimed it was an independent process!

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, there are two parts to this. As I said yesterday—no—

Opposition members interjecting—

Each application was assessed by the department against the mandatory and substantive criteria outlined in the ITA documentation, and all MRI licences allocated under the expansion round met the department's criteria. And, as I said in the House yesterday, the final decisions were signed off by the minister. This is very interesting—absolutely. This is very interesting, because I've been doing a little bit of research into historic processes in this space, and—

An honourable member interjecting—

I was hoping he might intervene! This morning the Leader of the Opposition gave an interview in South Australia, where he referred to what the Labor Party did. He made four errors in one minute, in one answer on this. Apart from misrepresenting what we said yesterday, he said that Labor went through a process and these matters were determined as they were. But, in fact, we have gone back, and we know from the ANAO report that they were determined by the minister. He also said: 'People weren't making a profit by definition of an MRI machine in a hospital. Labor awarded these licences to public hospitals.'

I go to the member for Sydney's media release of 1 November 2012. The member for Sydney announced 11 licences in South Australia. I will list some of them: Dr Jones and Partners, Tennyson Centre; Adelaide Diagnostic Imaging, Adelaide area; Adelaide Diagnostic Imaging, Woodville; Dr Jones and Partners, South Terrace; one in North Terrace, in Adelaide; Benson Radiology, Salisbury; and Benson Radiology, North Adelaide. All of these show that what the Leader of the Opposition said this morning on this was absolute bunkum. He said that the difference is that Labor awarded these licences to public hospitals that went through processes, so people weren't making a profit by definition. That may be why the ANAO looked at what Labor did and slammed the member for Sydney to not only—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Minister for Health will pause. The member for Ballarat will leave under 94(a).

The member for Ballarat then left the chamber.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Indeed, the ANAO's overall conclusion was:

As a consequence, the cost impact of MRI expansion has been significantly greater than advised to government, with long‐term implications for the Commonwealth Budget.

Labor never could manage health, and they've been caught out— (Time expired)