Louise Miller-Frost (Boothby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank the member for Indi for this opportunity and acknowledge her sincere interest, her advocacy and her prior work in the health sector, particularly rural health. I certainly agree this is a matter of public importance. There are few things that so directly affect the quality of Australians' lives, no matter where they live, as the access to timely quality local health care, and Labor's always been the party of health care since Whitlam's introduction of Medibank and then the Hawke era, with Medicare. Labor built Medicare, and we will always protect it. Medicare is in Labor's DNA. The Albanese government is committed to strengthening Medicare for the future, and we know that to do this it will require considered and gradual reform. When we look around the world, it's clear that Australians are so lucky to have access to a world-class health system, despite its challenges. Key to provision of health services is sufficient quality staffing—doctors, nurses, allied health, paramedics and support staff—in primary care and in hospitals, and in metropolitan areas and regional, rural and remote areas.

My background is in the primary healthcare sector, non-clinical, and after nine years of cuts and neglect from the former government primary care is in the worst shape since Medicare began. Bulk-billing rates have plummeted. It's never been harder or more expensive for Australians to see a GP. Then, in the tertiary sector, we've all seen the ambulance ramping across the country, and of course what sits behind that is bed block in the emergency department and further bed block within the hospital. It doesn't matter where you are in Australia or what kind of medical assistance you need; getting the correct care when and where you need it has never been harder.

I'll say this isn't a new problem. It's a problem that's been a long time coming. We know that only 14 per cent of medical graduates now choose to work in general practice, dropping from the previous 50 per cent. General practice used to be a specialty of choice: being the primary care lead for your community, seeing a wide variety of issues and helping people literally from cradle to grave. Filling general practice and all manner of health positions in rural and remote areas has been a challenge for several decades, and there are a number of reasons for this. We haven't been training enough doctors, nurses and allied health practitioners in this country. The former government froze the Medicare rebate for six years, ripping billions of dollars out of primary care and causing gap fees to skyrocket. Why would you choose to work in an underfunded, understaffed sector?

Part of my 15 years in the health sector included a role recruiting doctors from overseas for rural and remote placements across Australia. In many of our regional and rural areas, general practice and hospitals are staffed by some excellent medical staff, trained from overseas, who've chosen to make Australia their home and bring their families to our wonderful country. But there are some real ethical concerns about this. While we in Australia are not putting enough money into training our own doctors, nurses and other medical staff, we should not be relying on overseas countries, often those in poor economic situations, to fund training for our medical staff in our country when they need them in their country. We need to be training Australians to take these jobs.

We've inherited a real mess: shortages of staff in all sectors of the health system, a Medicare system not fit for purpose and financial disincentives that drive students and graduates out of the areas where we most need them. What are we doing? We are funding an additional 20,000 university placements which includes nursing places. We have funded fee-free TAFE, and my local TAFE at Tonsley informs me that they've had an 140 per cent increase in enrolments, including students seeking to qualify as enrolled nurses. We've established the Higher Education Loan Program debt reduction program, which will eliminate HELP debt for doctors and nurses who choose to live and work in rural and remote areas. The minister for health has established the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce to look at how we can make Medicare fit for purpose in a country with our ageing population. It will identify the best ways to boost affordability, improve access and deliver better support for patients with ongoing chronic illness, backed by a $750 million Strengthening Medicare Fund. Labor will make it easier to see doctors by building 50 urgent care clinics across Australia, including one in Boothby to support the Flinders Medical Centre Emergency Department so that people in Boothby, Kingston and Mayo will have access to fast, bulk-billed care.

There's no doubt that health care in this country is critical to our quality of life. Once again, we've inherited a mess, but we have strategies to build back better.

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