Sussan Ley (Farrer, Liberal Party, Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Throsby for his detailed list of questions, and I will answer as many as I can. Obviously, those that are not directly responded to in the next four minutes will be referred on notice. I disagree with the premise on which the member for Throsby is basing most of his remarks.

I will start with hospital funding. Hospital funding to the states from the Commonwealth is going to grow significantly over the next four years and in total by well over 20 per cent. The important focus for me when it comes to the next health and hospitals agreement is working with the states and territories to make sure that the agreement is in the interests of patients. This is not about the political football that gets kicked around this place. This is about a deal that is in the interests of patients. To suggest that these are cuts is entirely wrong. There is no role for the Commonwealth, as a funder of services, to continue an activity based funding model the drivers of which the Commonwealth has no control over. It does not make sense. We saw the previous government under Prime Minister Rudd, in a desperate deal to get the states to sign up to the takeover of hospitals, add money layer upon layer. The most ridiculous example of this was designed on a national partnership around performance, which would have been good if there had been proper measures of that performance in place, but there were not. It was effectively like a company saying to its shareholders, 'We'll pay your directors on performance but, by the way, if they don't perform they'll get these guarantees anyway.' So when we came into government we took away those guarantees, because they were simply icing on the cake for which state governments had to do not very much at all. We have taken a step back and said, 'Rather than have this argument'—because we appreciate that we are here for the patients—'let us work on a strong agreement.' But to suggest that the Commonwealth has cut funding to the states for hospitals is absolute nonsense.

Likewise the member for Throsby talked about dental benefits. I know, as a person who is interested in preventative health, that dental is a key area. We have just extended the national partnership with the states for 12 months, while we undertake the discussions that I have just mentioned about overall health and hospital funding, for $155 million. We have also extended access for children under the Child Dental Benefits Schedule. That is really important, because dentists will tell you that if you can get somebody's teeth right by the time they are 18 there is much less work for them later in life.

The member for Throsby talked about measures in the budget and statements that I have made. I want to make it very clear that the measures we have in the budget are our fiscal responsibility. There was no confusion between my remarks on subsequent occasions. I simply said that, while I work hard with the crossbench every day and appreciate their input, I am not going to put measures into the Senate that they have already told me they will not pass. And we know we are not going to get any cooperation from Labor so, while we may have those conversations, we usually do not get very far. So I have said that, because of the debt and deficit left to us by the previous government, our determination to be fiscally responsible means that where one measure comes off the table another measure goes on. That will be the subject of a very productive consultation that I will have.

The measure the member refers is about the PBS—the cost of medicines. We have just concluded a significant agreement across the supplier chain of medicines, recognising very much patient affordability when it comes to purchasing often multiple scripts and recognising that it is vital that we drive the uptake of generic medicines—that affordability matters. The bill that is in the Senate this week is very much about that. We need to keep medicines affordable on a day-to-day basis because we also know that coming through the system are life-saving drugs the real cost of which is hundreds of thousands of dollars to the government. We will put them on the PBS and we will maintain our responsible approach. While I keep consumers and the costs they pay for their health front and centre, I also maintain the responsibility that I have to the budget and the national accounts as a whole. We will come up with a very strong policy.

The member has mentioned something that he calls a GP tax but I never have. Yes, my department has done modelling—and, by the way, it is nowhere near what is being claimed by the opposition in terms of increase. There is a pause on rebates—a pause that I have said I will lift at the earliest possible opportunity while maintaining fiscal responsibility.

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