Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

In contributing to this debate this evening, I'm going to tackle three key areas of health care which people in the community have said to me are urgent priorities. We must recognise that people in our community are struggling through a cost-of-living crisis, struggling to keep the roof over their heads, struggling to afford the weekly shop—and, yes, struggling to be able to access the health care that they urgently need.

First, let us look clearly at this question of access to general practice, of being able to go and see your GP. If you cannot access a GP when you need it because of cost, there are so many negative health consequences. In my home state of Western Australia, the average out-of-pocket cost for a 20-minute GP appointment is $42.66. Now, to some in here that might sound like not too much. Why are people complaining? Why is that a struggle? If you're a shadow minister, a minister or even an assistant minister, that might just pass off the top of your bank account, and you wouldn't even notice. Well, for most people in the community, for most people in WA, that amount of money is just not doable, not if you are also balancing feeding your kids or paying the rent, or cobbling together enough for the mortgage. You just can't do it.

While it is welcome that the government has introduced bulk-billing incentives, what we see from the Cleanbill report is that what has been done so far is not enough, that about 750 clinics are estimated to have actually increased their rate of bulk-billing. That is nowhere near enough to get to the target of enabling people to see the GP using their Medicare card, which was what was promised at the election—nowhere near enough. So people in my home state are continuing to go without the access to the health care that they need. And they cannot make up the difference between their weekly expenses and paying those prices by making some papier-mache objects to sell, using the press releases that this government put out during the election—and still puts out now—congratulating themselves on what a great job they've done.

People cannot pay their GP using the self-satisfaction of this government nor does it help anyone to sit and listen to a debate where the Liberal Party—who have had a great time this week, eating themselves alive in front of the entire parliament—disingenuously claim that, if they were still in government, Medicare would be better. Give us a break! If you want to join in at this time and be genuinely interested in building the healthcare system in this country, then good. It's about time. And, if you over there, in the Labor Party, want to actually get yourself off your high horse for being part of Medicare's establishment decades ago and actually engage with the reality of the people who need health care and who live and die on the question of whether or not their services are bulk-billed or whether or not they can get to see a doctor, then it's about time. Join in with the rest of us that are actually responding to the community demand for action.

The ability to see the GP for free for everyone—that is what is demanded. That is what is needed. That is what the Greens went to the election proposing to establish. And before anyone asks any questions about how it might have been paid for—by making big gas corporations pay their fair share of tax. Now, if you did that, you may not be invited to be on the board of Woodside or BHP after you end your political career, but I would hope that you would be able to sleep a bit better at night knowing that you put your community first.

We are at a moment in time in 2025 where our healthcare system does not recognise the fact that the mouth is part of the body. Dental care is excluded from Medicare. That makes no sense at all. The Greens have long advocated for the establishment of a universal dental system so that people can live free of dental pain and free of gum disease, and where people can once again eat the foods they used to, so they could be saved from the experiences of diabetes, heart disease and dementia, which we know are so deeply related to poor dental and oral health. I was very proud to lead a parliamentary inquiry in the last parliament that explored, in great detail, what it would actually mean to establish universal access to dental care in Australia. It is clear to anyone looking that this is a change whose time has come. Maybe there are those in this parliament that are not ready to come all the way with the Greens to a space where we have universal access for all in our community. But let us begin.

Between 2010 and 2013, the Greens were able to work—thanks to the support of the community—across the parliament to establish the Child Dental Benefits Schedule. We could expand that scheme to cover all children. We could implement the recommendations of the aged-care royal commission and establish a seniors' dental benefit scheme so that those older Australians who are right now living in perpetual agony, unable to eat the foods that they love and unable to smile without fear of causing fear, could actually live with hope and free of pain again. We could finally close the absurd loophole in Australian cancer rehabilitative treatment which sees every other part of rehabilitative cancer treatment and care covered by Medicare except that related to the mouth, to the teeth, to the gums—the maxillofacial loophole. Let us begin, because people need access to dental and oral health care. They cannot continue to bear the pain, to bear the weight and the burden of having to burrow into their retirement savings, having to siphon off their super to fix their teeth. This isn't okay. This isn't fair or just. Let us get this done.

Finally, in the context of some of the debates we've had this week that have been so hurtful and so unnecessary towards members of our community who are trans and queer folks, let us work together to make sure that Medicare and the healthcare system fully supports trans people, provides what is needed to trans folks to live with pride and dignity, and puts a great big barrier between people's individual health care and the bigoted views of politicians who would seek to whip up hate and fear. It is hard enough being a queer person in this country, a trans person in this country, living every day knowing that you will experience discrimination and you will experience exclusion as much as, if not more than, you will experience love and inclusion, without worrying that the health care that you need will not be accessible, will not exist at all in your community, or will be subject to so many bureaucratic, nonsense, paper-pushing processes that you won't even get it in time. In my state of WA, the situation we have right now with trans health care is a shame. It's a shame on the state government and it's a shame on the federal government. It is so unnecessary and causing so much harm. It's not okay.

Let us work together to build a healthcare system that actually meets the needs of the community. It is not good enough for politicians in this place to set their standard of success at the level of ambition that they personally believe is good enough. We must set our level of ambition and we must judge ourselves against the extent to which we meet the needs of the community, the actual needs of the people who send us here. The resources to do it are there if we would but take them. If we could find in ourselves and in our positions of power the courage to confront powerful vested interests and corporate influence, then we would find enough resources to get this done. Not only would we find enough resources to get it done; we would not have to be in an absurd situation where a government elected on a platform of supporting disabled people in our community turns around, as this Labor government has done, and decides to implement cuts to the very National Disability Insurance Scheme it promised it would preserve.

Today I tabled a petition from 60,000 people who do not and will not cop the cuts from this government to our NDIS that risk the removal of the vital allied health supports, the support coordinators and the plan managers. They will not cop it and will not be silent. They understand the connection between disability supports and Medicare. They understand the commitment that those who sought to keep the Liberals out of power made at the election, and they understand that if you do not intend to keep your word, then there will be electoral consequences for you and your party. But before we get anywhere near that place, at the beginning of this parliament let us come together around some of the most basic opportunities for progress and change—getting dental care into Medicare for seniors, for kids and for those recovering from cancer. (Time expired)