Nicola Roxon (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Dawson for his question. He has done a great job in his electorate arguing for the interests of his local constituency. I could not help but notice that it is not just me that thinks he has done a great job; in fact, the Daily Mercury writes: ‘You’ve done a great job, James’. Apparently the general consensus from community leaders in Mackay is that he has done a great job. So I am sure that those community leaders will be pleased to hear that in our intended agreement with the states and territories that is being negotiated, and was already referred to by the Treasurer earlier in question time, we intend to end the blame game. We want to stop the bickering between the states and the Commonwealth over who is responsible for what and show that if we work together we can deliver better outcomes in health to our communities. So I can make it clear that we intend to invest more money in our health system but, at the same time, we will not just be handing the states and territories a blank cheque. What we want to do is reward effort. We want to make sure that targets are being set and that we pay according to outcomes.

We have a very good example of how, in the first 12 months in office, we have already seen this sort of approach deliver benefits to thousands of Australians across the country. I am referring here to our early commitment and announcement that we would invest $600 million into elective surgery, and use it to illustrate how Commonwealth money and cooperation of the states and territories can deliver a significant outcome to the community. Members might remember from when we announced the $600 million that the first stage of funding, $150 million, was provided to the states and territories to perform 25,000 extra procedures and that the funding was tied directly to those outcomes. I am pleased to be able to report to the House that at the end of September, only three-quarters of the way through the year that this $150 million relates to, over 27,000 extra procedures had already been delivered—more than 27,000 eye operations, knee operations, hip operations—all having a vital impact for constituents, whether they are in Dawson or any other electorate, because of the leadership that the Commonwealth has shown. What it has meant is that the Commonwealth’s extra funding and the states’ willingness to pull their weight have delivered dividends for those families that we promised in the election that we would help. We have seen many states able to leverage the investment made by the Commonwealth to increase their own efforts, delivering this fantastic number of 27,000-plus procedures well ahead of time and showing that Commonwealth money used well, tied to outcomes with incentives, can deliver change—something that those opposite never tried to do in elective surgery and in fact did not try to do in health at all.

The member has asked what the community might see. You can expect to see more investment in health. You can expect to see investment driven change and incentive driven change and better outcomes for the community. You will see also our understanding that health is not just about hospitals; health is also about what we do outside the hospital system. We need to make sure that we are supporting our hospitals and we are investing more, for example, in preventative health. We know that 670,000-odd procedures in hospitals are preventable, so we have that large number of preventable admissions every year in our hospitals. We know that we have to do more to keep those numbers down, so what you will see is incentives paid for a reduction in preventable admissions, and other similar proposals. This is all about us making sure we use Commonwealth money to drive the change that is needed; it is working with the states and territories to deliver that change. The community can expect to see better health outcomes because we are in office rather than those opposite, who never took this approach.

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