Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

In those early hours of Sunday morning, Australians heard from a Prime Minister in denial: lashing out and blaming everyone but himself. He forgot to acknowledge any of the members who had followed him over the cliff into electoral defeat. But by Tuesday he had changed his tune. Suddenly he emerged, weaving a tale of faux contrition. The Liberal Party, he said—never himself—had a problem with Medicare. Australians did not trust the Liberals with their health care. He said:

We have to do more to reaffirm the faith of the Australian people in our commitment to health and to Medicare.

He went on:

We will work harder, much harder …

And:

… I would like Australians to believe that commitment to Medicare is completely bipartisan.

What has happened since then to breathe any life into that faux contrition? What has he done about Medicare and the policies they took to the election? Absolutely nothing. The Prime Minister has admitted that he has a problem with Medicare, but he has shown no interest in fixing it: not one change of policy and not a single dollar of cuts undone. He has backflipped on the backpacker tax and he has backflipped on his ironclad commitment on superannuation, but when it comes to cutting Medicare he knows which side he is on. What else would you expect, in fact, from a Liberal Party that are ideologically opposed to universal health care? They have always championed a two-tier American-style healthcare system.

This is a government which, for the previous three years, has done everything it can to push the price of health care back onto Australian families. Every parent knows the feeling when your child has a cough that sounds like it is getting worse, a temperature that is climbing or a fever that simply will not break. In that moment, you would give up everything: you would sell the shirt off your back and the roof over your head. But because of Medicare we do not have to do this. The idea at the core of Medicare is that every Australian can get the care that they need when they need it. Australians take pride in Medicare and what it means. Medicare speaks to our distinctive Australian character—our egalitarian tradition of the fair go. But the Liberals have spent the last three years trying to hollow out Medicare: taxing it, cutting it and eating away at the foundations—seeking to tear down Medicare down brick by brick, piece by piece.

The government's record on Medicare speaks for itself. Because of the Turnbull government cutting bulk-billing, 14½ million Australian's will have to pay more to see a GP. The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners recently found that one in three GPs are already revising their business models because they cannot stay viable under the Medicare freeze. Out-of-pocket health costs have increased by 19 per cent under this government. For a typical family with two children with no health scares, these Liberal cuts will mean an extra $400 a year in doctors bills.

Cutting funding for children's dental: a massive cost-of-living hit to working-class families. Cuts of billions from our hospitals are overcrowding emergency rooms and increasing waiting times for beds, knee operations and hip replacements. They are increasing the price of medicines so even pensioners will pay more every time they need a prescription. Cost already deters one in 12 Australians from seeing a specialist, yet this government is imposing new up-front fees and charges for scans, blood tests, X-rays and diagnostic imaging. Vulnerable Australians in the fight for their lives deserve a government alongside them in that fight. Instead, they are being forced to pay $100 extra for a mammogram, $300 for a mum being diagnosed with breast cancer and over $1,000 for an Australian to deal with melanoma. One hundred days after the election—the faux contrition—nothing has changed.

This motion asks the Prime Minister to put his money where his mouth is. To those coalition members currently for Gilmore, Capricornia, Robertson, Leichhardt, Dawson, Dunkley and La Trobe: you cannot come to this parliament and vote in defence of cuts to Medicare and think you can go home to your electorate without those electorates hearing about it. This is a test for every government member of parliament. You cannot complain about Labor's campaign on Medicare if you will not vote to reverse the cuts; anything else you will be caught out on.

We do not want any more press conferences from the government or longwinded lectures. We want to see them guarantee to keep Medicare in public hands as a universal health insurance scheme—what is wrong with that?; guarantee to protect bulk-billing so every Australian family can get in to see their doctor when they need to—nothing wrong with that; reverse the harmful cuts to Medicare by unfreezing the MBS indexation; reverse the cuts for vital pathology and diagnostic imaging tests; abandon the plans to increase the cost of prescription medicines; and develop a long-term agreement to properly fund our public hospitals.

This is a lesson that the government needs to learn. If it is not affordable, it is not accessible. If it is not available to everyone, it is just not Medicare. Sadly, the Liberals have always looked at Medicare as a cost to cut. They know its price, they just do not understand its value. Medicare is not just a brand name, branch office or multinational company. It is not a conglomerate where you strip out the assets for a corporate raider. In the Labor Party, we do not believe in outsourcing the responsibility we owe to our fellow Australians. We cannot imagine that caring for one another is something that should drive private profits. We know that Medicare is not a hedge fund—it is a national institution. It is a community standard. It is the Australia that we tell our children to believe in, the nation that we want to see in the mirror. It is the great egalitarian idea that universal health care is the fundamental basis of the fair go all-round. Labor will fight for the great Australian idea that universal health care stands for the notion of the fair go all-round. It is the bedrock of fairness.

This motion is a test for the government. They can vote to save Medicare or they can lock in behind their plans to undermine it, step by step, piece by piece, brick by brick. It is time for the Liberals and the Nationals on the back bench to tell Australians where they stand. It is that simple. Today, members of the government can vote for bulk-billing or against it. Today, government members can vote for affordable medicine or against it. Today, government backbenchers can vote for children's dental or against it. They can stand up for the Australians who need a mammogram or a blood test, or they can vote against it. It is as simple as that. This motion is not about the conclusion of the last election; it is about an issue which Labor will pursue every day, every week and every month to the next election. Either the government members of parliament can vote to save Medicare, to defend it, or they can vote against it. Australians will be watching them and Australians will mark them down. We will talk in all of their electorates about the hypocritical position of government members, who, in their electorates, say they love Medicare, but who, in the House, vote to hurt it. (Time expired)

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