Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I note the interjection from the other side of the House, and my advice to the member interjecting is that the Howard government’s record in the area of health was abysmal—absolutely abysmal. Instead of investing in health, they chose to invest in health insurance rebates. What we are trying to do is have a full health policy that invests in all aspects of health and, as part of that, provides assistance to those people who need it with their health insurance.

I think that the current Minister for Health and Ageing has made some truly progressive moves in the area of health. It is about making health accessible for all Australians, it is about providing choice within the health system, it is about enabling people to access the care they need and it is also about preventative health. This health minister has been very proactive in that area.

I note that the opposition’s solution to the issue of saving some money in the area of health is to introduce a tax on tobacco. I really find that most interesting. This is the same opposition that stood up, member after member after member, arguing that a tax on alcohol would not be a deterrent to young people drinking alcohol. They argued that taxes do not work, despite the fact that the AMA said that taxes do work. Now we have this turnaround where all of a sudden the opposition have discovered that taxes on products can influence people’s behaviour. It is worth pointing out to the House that, whilst the opposition came up with this proposal to introduce a tax on cigarettes, they were quite flawed in the way they managed to balance their numbers. They could not quite get the numbers right and there was a shortfall in the figures that they presented in relation to the savings that could be made.

But this is not about taxes on cigarettes. This is not about taxes on alcohol. This is about fairness and equity. This is about ensuring that those people who need assistance with their health insurance receive it. This is about targeting the rebate to those people in greatest need—people on lower and middle incomes—and it is about people on higher incomes taking responsibility and being prepared to take out their own health insurance. I believe that this will have minimal impact on the number of people who take out private health insurance and retain their private health insurance, as I think the choice to have private health insurance at the top end is fairly inelastic. I commend the legislation to the House. I fully support every aspect of this legislation.

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