I move:

That so much of standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the Member for Wannon moving the following motion immediately:

That this House requires that the question on the second reading of the Private Health Insurance Amendment (Modernising the Private Health Insurance Rebate) Bill 2026 not be put until such time as every Government Member has spoken during the second reading debate.

It is absolutely critical that every single member of the government speaks on this piece of legislation. Just to give you a sense of why it's so important we hear from them, 1.2 million pensioners are going to see their private health insurance go through the roof as a result of this bill. We want to make sure that every single member of the government knows this and is happy to publicly support it. I'll tell you what happened when the health ministers from around the nation—state and territory—got with the federal health minister: they slammed him. Every single one of them said: 'How in good conscience can you do this to pensioners? How in good conscience can you do this to the public health system?' Guess what this does—it cost-shifts from the Commonwealth to the states and territories, and their public health systems are already under pressure. They're already under stress. Why would you say, 'Okay, we're going to make that worse'?

Let's have a look at what happened with the state and territory ministers. There's the Labor premier of Western Australia. What did he say? 'Don't do it.' What did the South Australian premier say? Once again, he's Labor. What did he say? 'Don't do it.' What did Chris Minns in New South Wales say? 'Do not do it. Our public health system cannot afford it. It's under pressure enough.' Do you know one of the reasons why it's under pressure? The Minister for Aged Care and Seniors isn't doing his job properly. We're seeing people in hospitals being forced to stay in hospitals, because there are no aged-care beds for them. All of the Labor premiers said no. And then what did the others say? The Northern Territory said: 'Don't do it. Please don't do it.' What did the ACT—which is, once again, Labor—say? 'This is going to put pressure on our public health system.'

The Minister for Health and Ageing talks a big game: 'Everything's going swimmingly. No problems to see here.' Yet every state and territory across the country, Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria—well, if you've tried to get into public health in Victoria, good luck. They are broke. They've broken the health system. They've broken the economy. They've broken their roads. They've broken everything, and this is going to make it worse there. But every state and territory across the board is saying, 'Don't do this.'

We want to hear every single member on the other side putting their name to this, because they're going to live to regret it. It was obvious as soon as this was announced, because as soon as it was announced in the budget—and, once again, did they say before the last election that they'd do this? No. Did they take this to the Australian people? No, they didn't. When it was announced in the budget, everyone knew immediately that this was problematic. I looked at it and just went, 'No, this is just the wrong thing to do.'

I did my listening posts after the budget—and I won't forget this, because it was so sad that this lady had to approach me because of what this government is doing. A lady from town of Lismore—that's Lismore in Victoria, not Lismore in New South Wales. It's a small town of 350 people. It's a lovely rural community. She came up to me on the listening post and she said: 'Sadly, my husband died of cancer two years ago. We needed private health insurance for him. It saved him because he was able to get access to health care he needed. We were able to get that in an affordable way. Since his passing, as a pensioner, I've been making sure that I can save to keep the private health insurance going because I've got cancer as well. I want to be able to get the care that my husband got, because I know that's going to be critically important to me as I battle this.

'I don't know how I'm going to be able to do that, because my insurance bills are going up. My electricity bill's going up. My gas bill's going up. My private health insurance bill is now going to go up. Everything is going up, and I'm not going to be able to afford this. What do I do? Do I all of a sudden scrimp and save on what I need to feed myself to keep myself strong, to battle through this cancer? Or do I give up my private health insurance? If this gets through, that's what I'm going to be faced with.' I made a commitment to her that I would fight to try to make sure that these private health insurance changes didn't get through. It is incredibly sad to have someone come to you and say, 'Please help me, as I battle with cancer, deal with what this cruel Albanese Labor government is doing to me.' That is why we must hear from every single member. You have to own it. Every single member of the Albanese Labor government needs to own this decision.

You could sort of understand it if they'd looked at it and said, 'Well, it's not going to have much of an impact.' But 1.2 million pensioners? This isn't some sort of trivial amount. That's what you're doing. Those poor pensioners are already struggling because cost of living is going through the roof, and this is what you want to do? Well, if you're going to do it then every single one of Labor's MPs should stand up and say, 'This is why we are doing this.'

I can tell you this will not age well. And I have no doubt that, in the end, you will have to reverse this. You'll have to reverse it for two reasons, and I'll go back to where I started. The first reason is the states and territories are already saying: 'Enough is enough. What you're doing to our public health system is wrong. You're putting more pressure on it through this decision. You're putting more pressure on it, through the incompetence of your aged-care minister, and it is buckling.' The first time people are going to get a chance to say how bad it is and how they are feeling about it will be in the Victorian state election, and I can tell you that it's going to be overwhelming.

The second reason why this has to go, why it has to be opposed and why all of you have to own it, is you're about to make life so hard for 1.2 million pensioners who are already dealing with the cost-of-living crisis. They're already seeing their power bills go up. They're already seeing the price of what they can buy at the supermarket go through the roof. They're already seeing their insurance costs go through the roof. And now they're about to get another whammy with their diesel or their petrol, their fuel prices, and their gas prices going through the roof as well.

Hopefully, those opposite will vote for this because we want to hear from every member; none of them would want to be hiding away from such a callous decision as this. If you're going to make a callous decision like this, you want to stand up and make sure you're owning it. What we have to hear from them is what is the advice you give to these 1.2 million pensioners? What are you going to say to them? Now's your chance, every single one of you, to look those 1.2 million Australian pensioners in the eye and say, 'This is why we're doing this.'

Is the motion seconded?

I second the motion and I ask the Albanese government a simple question: are you facing your people? Have you been out there on the weekend? The member for Wannon talked about a family that have been impacted by cancer and their reliance on private health insurance and the rebate. I was speaking to a gentleman at an event in my community just this week, and he was extremely concerned. He's been struggling with cancer. He's been fighting cancer. And he also is reliant on receiving the rebate because he would otherwise not be able to afford his cancer treatment.

The minister for health talks a big game. He steps up in question time and says the government has to make tough decisions. Well, how about this government make the right decisions for Australians? It doesn't have to be that tough if the decision is right, and we know that this is completely the wrong decision. This is the same health minister who cut psychology sessions—20 psychology sessions desperately needed by Australians—in half. We had the policy, on this side, to return those sessions to Australians who need mental health help. This is the same health minister who is now stripping away the private health insurance rebate from older Australians.

Millions of Australians will be impacted. This is the nonsensical part about it. You don't meet a single Australian who thinks this is a good thing, and I'm not just talking about over-65-year-olds. This is going to impact every health insurance premium. I've spoken to the health insurance industry, and they said it's going to impact younger people as well. So it's not just about over-65s.

It's going to affect anyone who's at the public hospital.

It's going to go all the way through the system. Anyone that wants private health insurance—their premiums will be up. And, as you said, Mr Hogan—that's exactly right. Most importantly of all, our public health systems are under so much pressure. In outer metro areas like mine in Western Sydney, the hospitals are bursting at the seams. To have more pressure on our public hospitals—how can the Minister for Health stand, look the Australian people in the eye and say: 'This is the right decision. We are going to put more pressure on our already overstretched public health system, a public health system that everyday Australians rely on.' We already know the waitlists are extremely long to get into any elective surgery. We know that, when you go to an emergency room, it can be hours to wait. I know a woman who took her son, and he was vomiting up black the other day. They had to wait in the waiting room of the emergency department for over 11 hours.

It's going to get a whole lot worse.

It's going to get so much worse. You're waiting 11 hours now. With this completely heartless cut by the Albanese government, the pressure is going to get even worse. I can tell you story after story. I've got Warren in my electorate of Lindsay. He's 77. His wife is 76. He's paid for private health insurance for 62 years, and this is how this government's repaying him. His premium is already at $48.95 a month, and he said, very, very concerningly: 'I find it extremely upsetting that I no longer will be able to afford to pay the premium in the latter days of my life.' He's not looking forward to his future. He is not going to be able to afford to pay that premium. This is how this government is treating everyday older Australians, who have given this country so much and are so reliant.

But they're not just reliant; they're doing a service for all Australians because they're taking the burden off the public system. This government wants to put the burden right back on, and it is going to hurt. As I said, it's not just going to hurt older Australians; it is going to feed all the way through down to the younger generation, who are already paying through the roof for premium health insurance cover. As I said, it's going to hurt people in my electorate and in the outer metro suburbs of every one of our cities, where we are stretched to the limit. Our roads are stretched, our schools are stretched and our hospitals are going to be even more stretched.

The Health Minister is standing here today looking at Australians in the eye with his dimpled grin. He thinks that it's a good thing. He just thinks it's a tough decision. We have to make tough decisions. Minister, as I said at the outset, make the right decision. It's not just the opposition saying this is completely wrong and out of step with what Australians want. It is everyday Australians. It is our older Australians—

It's Labor premiers.

And it is Labor premiers across this country. We won't let you down. We'll keep fighting for you everyday Australians. We'll do everything we can because this is absolutely a load of junk.

The question is the motion be agreed to.