Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

In case there is any doubt about the true meaning of Budget Paper No. 2 page 179, I would refer the Leader of the Opposition to the explanation for these cuts in projected spending—and that is, expected lower growth in public hospital usage because of the shift to private hospitals expected because of the government’s 30 per cent private health insurance rebate and Lifetime Health Cover. So this is not some technical readjustment, reassessment of hospital costs or anything like that, it is a deliberate ideological decision by the former government in which he was health minister to move money away from public hospitals.

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