Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

I can indeed confirm that this government has a rock-solid commitment to the future of Medicare. I am not going to be lectured by those on the other side about the Medicare freeze and I will tell you why, because many people listening might not know that it was actually Labor that introduced the Medicare freeze, and indeed it was the member for Sydney. It was reported in Australian Doctor on a 22 May 2013, 'Doctors can afford rebate freeze, says Plibersek.' Not only did they introduce it; they said doctors can afford it. She said:

I understand that GPs have all sorts of expenses in running their surgeries and employing staff and so on, but the average billing from Medicare is more than $350,000 a year.

Ms Plibersek said she accepted some GPs would opt out of bulk-billing as a result of the freeze, but she hoped that not many would take this course of action: 'I'd be disappointed if a lot of people made that choice,' said the Labor minister at the time. She dismissed concerns that the freeze would pressure doctors to compromise care—