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

I thank the member for Solomon for his question. He has a particular reason for asking this question, as no doubt he is very pleased that the project for the new step-down care unit at Royal Darwin Hospital is very well advanced. It will provide additional services to the community of Darwin and the surrounds. It forms part of the significant investments that the Rudd government has been making in health, in an area called subacute services. It is an area that people do not often talk about but which was described by the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission as the ‘missing link’ in our health system. As part of our COAG agreement back in 2008, where we put a record $64 billion into our hospital system—which was a 50 per cent increase on the agreement on funding for hospital services of the Leader of the Opposition—we also committed $500 million to increase subacute services by 20 per cent by 2012. This money is now starting to hit the front line.

I am very pleased to be able to announce today that some of the early investments are coming to fruition. For example, in the seat of Watson—the electorate of the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry—six palliative care beds have opened at Canterbury Hospital. I think the member for Dunkley will be interested to know that funding has been provided for four restorative care places at the Frankston Hospital and similarly at the Goulburn Valley Health service in Shepparton.

I imagine that the Treasurer will be pleased to know that 44 beds are progressively coming on line at the Eventide Nursing Home in his electorate. On top of that, $12.9 million has been allocated to expand specialist palliative care services, rehabilitation and geriatric care at Mount Gambier in the electorate of Barker, and also at Whyalla country general hospital in Grey. I noticed that the member for Grey was on his feet before. He did not ask me a question, however, about the investments in cancer services going into his electorate in Whyalla—more than $50 million, and a total of $69 million with the state government’s involvement, which was not mentioned by the member for Grey.

What this means is that we are already seeing services coming on line. But the good news is that under the recent COAG agreement, an additional $1.6 billion is being invested in subacute care services to provide 1,300 additional beds in palliative care, mental health community care, and rehab, both in hospitals and in the community. Of course, what this means is that the grand total of our investments in palliative care, in rehabilitation care and in subacute care is now over $2 billion. I want to emphasise that $2 billion because there is some magic in that amount now—that is, it is the running total of the damage that the Leader of the Opposition has caused and wants to cause to our health system. He already ripped $1 billion out of our hospital system when he was the health minister and now he is well on the way to promising to pull another $1 billion out of our health system following his budget reply.

Here we are, investing more than $2 billion into subacute services that are already being rolled out across the country, and the Leader of the Opposition is using that as his target to see how much money he can rip out of the system. We have already invested more than $2 billion in our cancer services—regional cancer centres, investments in drugs for cancer treatment and research projects on cancer. Again, the Leader of the Opposition is using that as his target. The simple truth is: Australia cannot afford to have the Leader of the Opposition as the Prime Minister. Our health system cannot afford the damage that will be caused when Mr Abbott yet again tries to pull another $1 billion out of our health system. We simply cannot risk it. All those investments that are starting to turn up in our electorates across the country need to be secure. We need the Leader of the Opposition to promise that health will be protected from his razor gang. He was not able to deliver that in his budget reply, but it is about time he stood up and made clear that he is not going to rip another $1 billion out of our health system.

See this speech in context