Andrew Gee (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

And very regional, as the member for Barker says. What it's going to do is greatly reduce the number of GPs available to country areas. The Rural Doctors Association is very alarmed by this. Dr Megan Belot says that they:

… were set up primarily to address the shortages of doctors in rural areas by mandating that Overseas Trained Doctors (OTDs) and rurally bonded medical students… spend time working in the bush …

To introduce this change, without the implementation of rural specific policies to address the very real issue of the maldistribution of the medical workforce across Australia, is very concerning for the future of rural general practice.

Dr Belot said:

We are fearful for rural communities right across Australia who are now at extreme risk of losing their doctors as they take up positions closer to the cities, abandoning their rural and remote patients who will be left with no access to care close to home at all.

She sounds a further warning:

This will cost lives of rural and remote patients who already suffer poorer health outcomes than their city counterparts.

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners is also warning that this policy change is going to adversely affect rural and regional Australia. The president, Dr Karen Price, has stated:

Robbing Peter to pay Paul will not solve the GP shortage in communities across Australia. And that is what the unintended consequence of this policy will be, it will draw GPs from more rural areas to MMM2 areas—

Those are the more urban areas.

The rural chair of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, Dr Michael Clements, has also sounded the alarm bells. He says it's not good news for more rural and remote parts of Australia. He talks about a migration of doctors out of more regional, rural and remote areas. This policy is of real concern. (Time expired)

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