Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

You have got to smile when the opposition, in prosecuting their argument that the government do not support Medicare, have brought the stunning exhibits from more than 40 years ago! What we need to do is talk about some more recent history. We talk about some more recent history when the Prime Minister was the minister for health. Here is a question for you: which government added dental services to Medicare? Which government did that? It was the Howard government. Which government expanded Medicare to allied health services in the treatment of chronic disease? Who did that? Who was the health minister who expanded Medicare to introduce access for physiotherapists, dentists, podiatrists—for other allied health? Who was that? Who was the health minister who expanded Medicare, who improved Medicare? It was the current Prime Minister.

When you look at our health system and you look at how the health of our country compares, we do pretty well. We have one of the highest life expectancies in the world for both men and women. We see that improving. We see one of the lowest smoking rates anywhere in the world, and that has been from concerted action over the last 30 years from state and federal governments. We see vaccination rates improving. That was something that was a very proud achievement of a former coalition health minister, Michael Wooldridge, who actually saw Australia have the sorts of vaccination rates that we should enjoy. We have seen over the last 30 years the five-year survival rate from cancer increased from 47 per cent to 66 per cent more recently. We have seen a dramatic fall in people having a heart attack and dramatic falls in death from heart attack. We have seen death from asthma and COPD dramatically decreasing over recent times as well.

There is no doubt that Australia has a very good primary health care system. We have a well-trained GP workforce and we have multidisciplinary care. But as good as it is there is further improve improvement. The OECD has said that even Australia, which by all standards is regarded as an efficient system and by all standards is regarded as a good health system, still has room for improvement in efficiency and we have room for improvement in life expectancy. We do face a number of challenges into the future. The major challenges are how we manage chronic disease and what we do in terms of the coordination of health care so that people with conditions that do not need to go to hospital are able to be cared for better in the community.

As to what the opposition are raising in this point—their opposition to what is a modest co-payment—we have more than 100 million non-referred GP services, and it is reasonable for any insurer, especially the government, to say, 'What are we getting in return for that?' The opposition's approach is to say: 'The sky will fall in. It will be the end of the world as we know it.' But when you have a look at the health system, what you see is that Australia enjoys a great health system. We have a great primary health system.

In the past, the coalition has shown that it is the best friend that Medicare has ever had, and this government will continue to show that by strengthening primary care and strengthening the PBS. We need to make sure that it is sustainable into the future. We have seen growth in health expenditure and growth in PBS expenditure increase well above inflation and well above the growth of the economy in recent years. This is a modest proposal which will improve the sustainability of our health system under the challenges we will face in the future.

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