Alex Somlyay (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Like the member for Lalor, I wanted to be at that launch by Tony Abbott, the Minister for Health and Ageing, a very important event. I hope the minister will be in the chamber before I end my comments on the National Health and Medical Research Council Amendment Bill 2006 so that he may respond to some of the concerns the opposition expressed in the amendment moved by the member for Lalor. The member for Lalor talked about the value of medical research. I do not think there is much debate between members of this parliament on the value of medical research with respect to the benefits not only to individuals’ wellbeing but also economically. Similarly, medical workforce issues are affected by medical research. A nation like Australia should not be in a position where we have to import doctors and medical professionals. Representatives from the six states and the two territories are travelling around different countries of the world, competing against each other, to get foreign trained doctors into this country. The opposite should be the case. We should be in a position to export doctors to the rest of the world. I think we should use quite a substantial portion of our aid budget to train doctors for countries that desperately need medical practitioners.

The purpose of this bill is to amend the National Health and Medical Research Council Act 1992 for the purpose of introducing better governance arrangements and clarifying the accountability and reporting functions of the National Health and Medical Research Council, or the NHMRC, under that act. These amendments are not ad hoc changes. They are considered and thoughtful. They address governance issues identified by three major reviews in the past few years, but they go further than fixing the perceived problems. The amendments also aim to implement opportunities identified in those reviews, opportunities for improving health and medical research outcomes through a more accountable and independent council. This bill is aimed at strengthening the independence and accountability of the NHMRC. It clarifies the reporting lines of the CEO and the council and replaces the previously cumbersome accountability framework, which had three concurrent lines of reporting.

I am pleased to see the minister has entered the chamber to answer the concerns raised in the member for Lalor’s amendment, which I am sure he will do at the conclusion of my comments.

Currently, financial responsibility and operational accountability are divided. This bill clearly aligns accountability and responsibility. It makes the CEO fully responsible for the overall daily operation and administrative governance of the agency and has him or her reporting directly to the Minister for Health and Ageing while still keeping the secretary to the department informed. This enables the council to focus its full energy on providing expert medical and biological research and advice.

While the accountability and reporting structure has been streamlined, the roles and functions of the council, the principal committees and the working committees have not been altered in any way. The new agency will remain within the Health and Ageing portfolio but with reporting and accountability frameworks that clearly separate the NHMRC roles and functions from those of the department. It will be financially autonomous and the bill in no way affects the level of funding allocated for health and medical research, as was proven by the recent budget. This bill does reduce the size of the council from 29 to 19 members. However, this in no way reduces the breadth and depth of the council’s expertise. In fact, council members themselves have acknowledged problems with the current council size and no member has put forward any concerns regarding the proposed changes.

Established in 1936, the NHMRC is Australia’s leading expert body responsible for raising the standard of individual and public health. It does this by fostering health, medical research and training and by monitoring ethical issues relating to health throughout Australia. The NHMRC has an internationally recognised reputation for medical research, and these amendments are designed to keep Australian medical and health research among the world’s best.

Australians should be proud of what the government and the NHMRC have achieved in the past and aim to achieve in the future. Australian health professionals, scientists and academics have helped to improve the quality of life of millions of people not just in Australia but throughout the world. The council looks at not just ways of curing disease or controlling symptoms but prevention and minimising the long-term impact of disease for the person and for society. This is particularly important when we have an ageing population with increasing longevity. While we are living longer, many of us do so with chronic problems such as arthritis, cardiovascular disease and diabetes. While the research undertaken through the NHMRC may not cure those problems, it can help people to control and manage them, enabling us to continue to lead active and productive lives instead of becoming invalids and possibly needing high care.

The government recognises that the work of the council is important to our personal and national wellbeing. This was evidenced in March this year, when the Minister for Health and Ageing announced a $9.8 million boost for health research into chronic diseases, Indigenous health and the recovery process of older Australians who have been hospitalised. These are all important to the long-term health and wealth of our communities. As the minister said when he announced this funding boost:

The Federal Government’s investment in health and medical research through the NHMRC is more than $490 million this year, more than double the 1999 figure. Australia is a world leader in health and medical research—on a per capita basis, our research output is twice the OECD average.

There is more. This government is doing even better. In the recent budget, the Treasurer announced an additional $905 million for Australian health and medical research as a major investment in our future health. On top of the $200 million extra over seven years announced in the last budget, this year’s budget committed an additional $500 million over four years for research grants provided through the NHMRC.

On top of that extra $500 million to the NHMRC, the budget also provided $170 million over nine years to establish a new health and medical research fellowship scheme, which will allow Australia to attract and retain world-class researchers, which, of course, is also important to our scientific and economic wellbeing. The budget also provided a further $235 million in grants for a number of medical research facilities, to expand research in areas such as cancer and neuroscience.

As you can see, this government is very serious about health and medical research being done in Australia. It is not surprising that industry has also benefited from our strong position in medical research. Since 1992 it is estimated that the commercialisation of health and medical research has created over 350 companies and 3,000 to 4,000 new knowledge based jobs. As Senator Kemp said in his speech on the bill in another place:

The NHMRC has performed a pivotal role in supporting such research and fostering talented researchers in these fields.

What this means for Australia is that, in supporting the work of the NHMRC, we are benefiting not only from the health and research outcomes but also from the development and retention of scientific expertise in Australia and from the subsequent development of facilities and industries supporting both the research and its end product. Because this research is important to Australia, it is important that it be managed well. That is what this bill is about—good governance which still allows the council to have scientific independence and flexibility. I commend the bill to the House.

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