Mark Butler (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

As I was saying, this is not new advice. The advisory committee provided the same advice five years ago. The former government, in their wisdom, decided not to follow it and, as a result, millions of patients paid twice as much for their medicines than they otherwise had to. Hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars have been paid out by patients because the former government decided not to follow the advice of the experts. Now, we are following the advice of the experts. It will halve the costs of medicines for six million patients, which is why the Consumers Health Forum has supported our decision, as has the Heart Foundation, Diabetes Australia, Arthritis Australia and the Breast Cancer Network. Every other patient group that has reported on this has supported our decision. It will halve the number of times those six million patients have to visit a GP, freeing up millions of GP visits every year that can go to other patients who are currently waiting to see their doctor, which is why every single is doctor's group has supported it.

As I said, every dollar saved by this measure will be reinvested into pharmacy, because on this side we support sustainable community pharmacy. We are talking with all groups in the pharmacy sector, including the Pharmacy Guild, about the best way to make that investment, including, in particular, the impact on rural pharmacies. I look forward to those discussions continuing.

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