Gordon Reid (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The federal Labor government is committed to strengthening healthcare services and our regional healthcare workforces right across this great country that is Australia. As a practising emergency department doctor at Wyong Hospital, I understand firsthand the importance of a robust regional health workforce, particularly in primary care. Our primary care clinicians—some of whom are present here in this chamber—know that, if you can treat an illness at the primary care level in those clinics, then you stop those diseases from exacerbating and don't end up seeing me in the middle of the night.

Following the election in 2022, one of the first actions made by the federal Labor government was to bolster doctors on the Central Coast by changing the region to a distribution priority area. The distribution priority area classification identifies locations in Australia with a shortage of general practitioner services. Changing the region to a DPA has meant that general practices across the region of the Central Coast—that's Robertson, Dobell and a little bit of Shortland, as I like to remind the minister—have access to a greater pool of available doctors. I note that recent data from department of health highlights that, since we came into government, last year Australia added one new doctor every hour on average, with more doctors joining in the last two years than at any time in the past decade. According to the department, an additional 17,846 new medical practitioners registered to practise in the last two financial years.

The 2022-23 cohort of 8,356 new doctors was the largest influx of new doctors in more than a decade, and that record was beaten in 2023-24, when 9,490 doctors registered to practise. This means that more doctors are registering to practise in Australia, more junior doctors are training to become GPs and more medical graduates are aspiring to become GPs since the federal Labor government's record investments in strengthening Medicare. In 2024, close to one in five medical graduates aspired to have a career in general practice or rural general practice, with 17.5 per cent of graduates nominating general practice or rural generalist as their preferred speciality in the annual Medical Deans' survey. In addition, the number of junior doctors choosing to go into general practice grows each year. In 2024, more than 1,600 doctors accepted a place on a government funded training program to become a GP or a rural GP—a 13 per cent increase from the year before. In 2025, more than 1,750 offers are expected to be made to junior doctors to begin government funded GP training, leading to an intake that could be up to 10 per cent larger than 2024.

The federal Labor government's work to improve healthcare services and regional healthcare workforces does not stop here however. On the Central Coast, in the electorate of Robertson, 38 general practices received grant funding between $25,000 and $35,000, through the General Practice Grants Program as part of strengthening Medicare. The federal Labor government has provided funding to general practices across Australia to make improvements to their practices, to expand patient access and to support safe, accessible and quality primary care. For example, in my electorate, the Terrigal and Avoca medical centres combined received $60,000. The funding has enabled both practices to become reaccredited as well as a new consulting room to be built in the Terrigal practice. Additionally, the funding has enhanced practices for infection control and enabled the upgrade of essential equipment. The federal Labor government is working hard every day to strengthen health care on the Central Coast, especially in primary care.

Another one to mention is the Saratoga medical centre. They received a grant of $25,000 from the Strengthening Medicare General Practice Grants Program to update their IT systems. This funding helped to improve patient access and has insured upgrades to critical IT systems that are essential for general practices to function successfully. Whether it's training more GPs, a tripling of the bulk-billing incentive or investing in our general practices, only a federal Labor government be trusted to protect and strengthen healthcare services and our regional healthcare workforces across Australia.

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