Guy Barnett (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I stand to oppose the motion moved by Senator McLucas and the Labor Party in this place. I do it because I believe a number of things. I believe that the Labor Party are stuck in the past. They are on the opposition benches for that exact reason. They want everything to stay the same. This is notwithstanding that every one of the state and territory governments around the country, not this year and not last year but a decade or more ago, sold their state insurance organisations. They were owned by the state governments and their insurance offices have been sold. That includes the GIO in New South Wales, the SIO in Victoria, Suncorp in Queensland, the SGIC in South Australia, the SGIO in Western Australia and the TGIO in Tasmania. I will touch on that again shortly. Not only that—this is a Labor Party that, with decision making in its grasp when they were in government, sold Qantas and the Commonwealth Bank. I will indeed also touch on that again shortly.

I want to go back and look at some of the reasons that this government is united in support of the sale of Medibank Private. We believe it is in the interests of the public. Also, we believe it is in the interests of the taxpayers and, indeed, the members of Medibank Private. I will explain why. In my view, it makes no sense for the Australian government to own Australia’s largest private health insurance fund. I will put it as simply as possible. Why would the government want to own a billion-dollar-plus business enterprise with a $2.8 billion annual turnover that provides no universal service obligation to taxpayers? It trades in the black and has never returned a dividend. Occasionally, it requires a taxpayer contribution to bolster its capital backing. This is something that Senator McLucas failed to mention in her address to this Senate.

The government has no business being a player in the private health insurance market while also being a regulator of private health funds and their premiums. This ensures either a perceived or real conflict of interest and, for this reason alone, I find Labor’s opposition to the policy puzzling. I believe that the party opposite has adopted a policy of seeking relevance by blanket opposition to any significant proposal that this government puts up.

As I have indicated, Labor has talked about the increase in premiums. No, premiums will not go up as a result of a sale. Tony Abbott in this parliament referred to Labor’s sale of Qantas and said that it did not push up airfares. Labor’s sale of the Commonwealth Bank—what happened to that; what happened to interest rates? They did not go up as a result of the sale of the Commonwealth Bank.

There has been much comment on how a sale would reduce competition, but a sale of Medibank Private could strengthen the market and boost competition. In my view, for Labor to oppose the sale is them on pure ideological autopilot and opposing for opposing’s sake. Since 1998, both major parties have sold or share-floated—and I have looked at the research—over $50 billion worth of public assets. That is not only our side; it is the Labor Party as well. The Labor Party were responsible for the sale of the Commonwealth Bank, Australian Airlines and part of Qantas.

In my view, businesses run business better than government runs business. Why do I say that? Because I have a business background. I understand the workings of small business to some degree, being a former Tasmanian government small business award winner in Tasmania. But the opposition side is full of representatives from the union movement. Where is the business background on the other side? Why does business operate business better than government?