Dan Repacholi (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

There is nothing more important than bringing a new human into this world. It is vital that women have access to the best possible maternity services, whether they live in my electorate of the Hunter, the member for Sydney's electorate or the electorate of New England. The risk to mother and baby should not depend on where you live.

Health care and especially the topic of women's health care is something that is at the top of the list of priorities for any Labor government. We recognise and we understand how important maternity care is, and we know how important all women's healthcare needs are. We showed this in the last budget, where we had a major focus on how the healthcare needs of women can be better met. We've invested $160 million to tailor services, tackle bias and improve access for women.

We have also focused on making sure that expecting mothers are better looked after on one of the most important days of their lives. We are doing this by investing over $56.5 million to add new items to the Medicare benefits schedule to support access to more flexible, high-quality and tailored midwifery care. This includes longer postnatal consultations. This includes giving more women access to the care of their choice during pregnancy. A woman-centred, continuous model of care offered by midwives is often the preferred model for many women. This investment will give women more choice and facilitate the building of relationships between mother and carer throughout the pregnancy journey, which is an important part of making sure women have access to the maternity service that they need.

We also know that there are very particular issues when it comes to giving birth in regional areas. That's why we have committed funding to continue strategies to prevent preterm and early term birth in particular maternity services and First Nations communities, which will help to reduce the number of babies born too early.

The fact is that, when a woman is pregnant, she is the centre of everything that happens. This is the way it should be, and this is why we have developed Woman-centred care: strategic directions for Australian maternity services, to provide direction on a national scale to support Australia's maternity care system and make sure it reflects the way that care should be given in the modern day. Regardless of where you live, Australian families need to have access to safe, high-quality, respectful maternity care. As long as we're in government, we will fight for this every day.

If we're going to make sure that women in rural areas have access to the high-quality maternity services that they need, we need to take a good look at the issues they are currently facing and the barriers that are preventing people in rural areas from accessing these services. One of the biggest issues is workforce shortages. These workforce shortages can affect the ability to access safe, quality maternity care. If there are no midwives, there can be no maternity services. To fix these workforce shortages, we need to strengthen the supply of those in the maternity workforce. This can't be done without a focus on training and development. If there are more people trained to provide maternity services, there will be more women across Australia in our rural communities who will have access to the services that they need and deserve. We are aware of the need to increase the workforce and increase the number of people who are trained to provide these services, and we are acting to make a difference. All Australian governments are collaborating closely to develop national maternity workforce solutions. We are working with the states to make sure that these issues are addressed so that women nationwide are better supported.

I'm a dad and I know what it's like to be expecting a child, but obviously I don't know what it's like to be carrying one. But the one thing I do know is that it can be an extremely stressful and difficult time for many expecting mothers in all kinds of different situations. So providing maternity services goes far beyond just giving birth. The support needs to be available the whole way through the process, and that's why we're opening 12 perinatal mental health centres across the country to support women and families. We are a government that cares about families, women and their health, and our track record proves that.

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