Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Health and Ageing. Would the minister inform the House how the government’s Strengthening Medicare package has lifted the rate of bulk-billing across Australia? Are there any alternative policies?

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I can certainly understand the member for Hinkler’s interest in this issue because, thanks to the policies of the Howard government, the GP bulk-billing rate in Hinkler is up almost 10 per cent over the last 12 months. Bulk-billing is not the be-all and end-all of Medicare, but it is important. It should be widely available, particularly to children and pensioners, and that is just what is happening thanks to the policies of the Howard government.

Thanks to the bulk-billing incentive payments that were part of Strengthening Medicare, the GP bulk-billing rate has lifted from 66 per cent in December 2003 to over 75 per cent last December. Figures released in the last fortnight show that, between 2004 and 2005, the GP bulk-billing rate rose in 144 out of the 150 electorates of this country. In 96 per cent of electorates the bulk-billing rate rose last year. I was interested to note that in the electorate of Brand the bulk-billing rate has risen by almost eight per cent over the last year. The Leader of the Opposition is remarkably silent on this topic.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It’s still less than it used to be!

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I hear ‘Sound Effects Mark 2’ over there talking about bulk-billing rates. Let me tell the member for Lalor: in her electorate last year the bulk-billing rate increased by more than 10 per cent to over 80 per cent. So while the member for Lalor has been appearing on Australian Story, making speeches undermining her leader and going on the front page of a magazine dressed in a $15,000 outfit—while she has been doing her Cheryl Kernot impersonations—we have been getting on with the job of delivering better health services to the Australian people.