Jerome Laxale (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank the member for Macarthur for the opportunity to talk about how Labor was elected to strengthen Medicare and how the most recent budget continues on with our election commitments. We know that only Labor can strengthen Medicare. Labor created Medicare. We'll protect Medicare, and we'll strengthen it. With the 2024 budget, we are taking further steps to reverse the cuts and neglect of the Liberals by enhancing the accessibility, affordability and quality of healthcare services nationwide.

I'm very happy to be able to say that the government will significantly strengthen Medicare in Bennelong. From 1 July, Bennelong will get its first federally funded Medicare urgent-care clinic at Top Ryde shopping centre. It will be open for seven days a week for longer hours, be fully bulk-billed and accept walk-in patients. No matter who you are, what you do or what you earn, you'll have access to the Top Ryde Medicare urgent-care clinic, and that access will be fully bulk-billed with no out-of-pocket costs because Labor believes that, to get urgent care, all you should need is your Medicare card, not your credit card. Funded in the budget, the Top Ryde Medicare urgent-care clinic is an upgrade on the NSW Health run clinic. From 1 July, it will operate as a federally funded clinic, and it will help significantly alleviate the pressure on the Ryde Hospital Emergency Department.

Last financial year, almost half of all the presentations at Ryde Hospital were for conditions that could have been managed in a less acute setting. By shifting these cases to the Top Ryde Medicare urgent-care clinic, patients will be seen more quickly and emergency departments will be reserved for the most critical of cases. The $227 million expansion of the Medicare Urgent Care Clinic program announced in the budget will establish another 29 clinics across the country, bringing the total number of medicare urgent care clinics to 87, and the impact of these clinics in communities is already evident.

Since the first sites opened in June 2023, the 58 existing Medicare urgent care clinics across Australia have handled over 400,000 presentations. In New South Wales alone, the 14 existing clinics have seen more than 65,000 visits, and Bennelong will get its own federally funded urgent care clinic in a few weeks time. It doesn't end there. From 1 July 2025, Bennelong will get its first public MRI licence as part of a $70 million program to increase the number of public MRI machines. Currently, local residents don't have local access to fully funded Medicare-billed MRIs. Our closest public machines are at Royal North Shore or Westmead. Locals had a choice of either being hundreds of dollars out of pocket or to travel out of area to get important MRI images. This expansion from 1 July 2025 will profoundly impact the accessibility of MRI services for everyone in Bennelong. It will mean that the current MRI machine at Macquarie University Hospital will shift from a private licence to a public one. It will help patients access affordable and world-class health care right at our doorstep. And with more public machines available, patients will experience shorter wait times and quicker, cheaper access to essential imaging services. These machines are crucial for early detection and treatment.

Since we were elected, we have remained committed to strengthening the healthcare system and providing tangible relief from cost-of-living pressures. Tripling the bulk-billing rate, making medicines cheaper, funding urgent care clinics and MRIs, we are a government that are undoing the cuts and chaos of the Liberals and Nationals. Contrast our record with those formerly in government. We know that when Mr Dutton was health minister, the Liberals' Leader of the Opposition froze the Medicare rebate, a freeze that remained in place for six long years. He froze it; we tripled it. The Liberals' Leader of the Opposition also cut $200 million out of the system aimed specifically at reducing demand on state-run emergency departments. He put pressure on these departments; we're opening urgent care clinics to take pressure off. Under the Liberals, the Leader of the Opposition tried to jack up the price of medicine by adding $5 to every script. He wanted to push up the cost of medicines, and we have cut them, saving locals in Bennelong almost $2.5 million in two years.

The difference couldn't be more stark. The Liberals opposed, froze and sought to attack Medicare. Under Labor, we'll continue to strengthen it.

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