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

My question is again to the Minister for Health and Ageing and refers to ‘Project good guys’. Minister, isn’t it the case that this brief confirms the worst fears of Medibank Private members when it states, ‘Unlike other businesses that can defend themselves by making commitments for the future, we cannot make promises about future premiums and claims payments on behalf of a potential new owner’? Minister, doesn’t this statement prove that there are no guarantees for the three million Medibank private members and that after the sale they could face even higher premiums and reduced benefits?

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

I point out to the member for Lalor that competition and not government ownership is the best guarantee of good service. I make two further points. When members opposite had some sense of responsibility they actually believed in privatisation. They privatised the Commonwealth Bank and they privatised Qantas. They did that because they knew that privatisation could and would be good for those enterprises. I say it will be just as good for Medibank Private as it was for those organisations which the former Labor government privatised. The other point I make about private health insurance is that this government is the best friend that private health insurance has ever had. Most of all, thanks to the private health insurance rebate, premiums are $1,000 a year lower for the average family than they otherwise would be. The first thing that members opposite would do, if they got into government, would be to abolish the private health insurance rebate.