Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

It may be worth going back to what Dr Michael Wooldridge, the then health minister, said in his media release on 20 August 1996:

High income earners will be asked to pay a Medicare Levy surcharge if they do not have private health insurance.

For this initiative, high income earners are defined as single people earning more than $50,000 or couples and families earning more than $100,000.

These are the people who can afford to purchase health insurance, and this measure will relieve some of the pressure on the public hospital system.

That is what the then health minister said in 1996. But he did not leave it there. In 1997 he said in a media release:

High income earners who still haven’t joined a fund need to understand that the extra 1 per cent Medicare tax surcharge will start to be levied on their income from the 1st of July. (Time expired)