Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of this bill, the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Lifting the Income Limit for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card) Bill 2022. This March the age pension was increased by 2.1 per cent—by $20.10 for singles, taking it up to $987 a fortnight, and by $30.20 for couples, taking it up to $1,448.80 a fortnight. While touted by the former government as the largest increase since 2013, the 2.1 per cent indexation lagged behind the Consumer Price Index trimmed mean annual inflation, which excludes large prices and falls, which increased to 2.6 per cent in December 2021.

This was the highest it has risen since 2014, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This means that cost-of-living increases are hitting age pensioners' budgets especially hard. Mayo is the oldest federal electorate by median age in South Australia and it is in the top 10 nationally. Older people in my community often share their concerns with me regarding the rising cost of rents, household expenses, council rates, power, petrol and services. The cost of health services and products are also top of the list of my constituents' concerns, whether it be the rising cost of out-of-pocket expenses for procedures and prescriptions or the diminishing number of bulk-billing doctors. In Victor Harbor, where the average age of residents is just over 60, there's not been a general practice that uniformly bulk-bills pensioner and concession cardholders for many, many years.

While costs continue to climb, this bill represents one practical way in which we can help to ease financial pressures for older Australians receiving the age pension. This bill will hopefully increase the yearly seniors health card adjusted taxable income limits, including deemed income, from $57,761 to $90,000 for a single person and from $92,416 to $144,000 for a couple. This benefit will help 50,000 self-funded retirees, who will now become eligible for the seniors health card. I've got to say that we don't talk enough in here about the challenges faced by self-funded retirees. Now they will be able to access concessional co-payments for the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, for medicines' concessional thresholds, for the PBS safety nets, at the doctor's discretion, and possibly even bulk-billing when they go to see their doctor. Co-payments for senior health card holders for PBS listed medicines will be reduced to $6.80 maximum, down from $42.50, for PBS listed medicines. They'll also be provided with access to other linked concessions from state and territory governments and private organisations. So this is incredibly welcome.

This is one of many initiatives that are required to ease the financial distress experienced by many older Australians, and there is much that we can do to that end in this place. For example, earlier this week I moved a motion saying, 'Let's let pensioners work without penalty.' We know there's a huge workforce shortage in our nation, and this could be a real game changer for both employers and older Australians. National Seniors found that one in five of the pensioners they surveyed said they'd be really keen to work again. They don't want to deal with Centrelink and the low threshold, where they're effectively earning $37 a day and then having to interact with Centrelink or lose 50c from every dollar earned in their pension. There are many seniors struggling in our community. Some are self-funded retirees and some are on the pension. It's our job in here to do the very best for our older Australians.

A related issue, which I hope the minister will consider, is that, right now, when you are applying for the pension, if you are in a $5 million home somewhere in metropolitan Melbourne or Sydney, and if that is your only asset, you are eligible for the pension. However, if you are a senior Australian from rural or regional Australia, and your house is on 20 or perhaps 40 acres, there are a whole lot of rules around whether you can get the pension. Effectively, for any blocks over two hectares in size, unless you fit some criteria, the rest of that property is included as part of your assets. I don't know if too many people in here have had a small property, a farm or a farmlet. You can't make a lot of income on those remaining 15 hectares if you're on a 20-hectare property. So I would urge the government to look at the two-hectare rule and lift it to 10 hectares. It just makes good sense. How can we have that inequality, where the home people in rural Australia live in is perhaps worth a lot less money than the home of those living in inner-metropolitan regions or metropolitan cities of Australia, and yet one qualifies for the pension automatically, because that's their only asset, and the other one doesn't? I don't know where this rule came from, but two hectares is incredibly small. A lot of people in their 50s are making a tree change—perhaps they're on 20 hectares—and they get to retirement age and they don't meet the criteria. They are considered to have the ability to make an income on the rest of that property, beyond the two hectares, and therefore they miss out on the pension because of that rule. I urge the government to have a close look at that, and I will be writing to the minister accordingly.

To come back to this bill, this bill goes a long way to assisting our older Australians, and therefore I commend this bill to the House.

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