Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I was saying in my earlier contribution on this bill, there are hundreds of thousands of senior Australians who have worked hard all of their lives, who have diligently put away money for a secure retirement and who will have their payments callously cut by this government. The budget includes a cut of $1.1 billion to older Australians through the abolition of the seniors supplement. The seniors supplement is an annual payment of $876 to people who receive the Commonwealth senior's health card. At the same time as government does this, it is also cutting $1.3 billion in concessions for pensioners and seniors which are to help them pay their water and electricity bills, rates and public transport fares. The Abbott government is cutting every single cent of the money that the Commonwealth puts towards concessions for these seniors that are for things like electricity and water bills and council rates.

We know that for many of these seniors these concessions are absolutely vital to their budget and to meet their costs of living. When you are on a low fixed income, it is extraordinarily difficult to manage those things. Yet this government has cut the money that the Commonwealth gave to the states and territories to assist with those very concessions so as to help those people deal with cost of living pressures. This is not to mention that the government is hitting older Australian with the new GP tax and higher costs on medicines. We know that many older Australians who are coming through the system now have certainly not been the beneficiaries of a lot of the prevention work that is happening or that was happening. As they age, they are finding that they do need to visit the doctor more and more. We know that they are more reliant on medications to keep themselves well and that they do access the health system more.

What this government wants to do with its new $7 GP tax is absolutely going to hit them. We know from the modelling that the University of Sydney has done that where it actually hits the hardest is on young families with children and on older Australians. It hits those two cohorts of patients. It is not about income level. It affects those two cohorts of patients in particular because of their need to access GPs, their need to access blood tests and pathology—and you will remember that the GP tax is also that—and their need to access diagnostic imagining as well. It is not just one visit; it is every time you visit the GP. The concessions only kick in after 10 visits—and that is 10 visits per year. You then tick over to the next year and you have to do 10 again. So for those on concessions that is an extra $70. That might not be much for members opposite, but I can tell you now that the from stories we have heard from the front line—GPs and patients who are contacting our electorate offices—this is a lot of money. I know that the member for Gilmore, who is not in the chamber now—just dismissed it as just a cup of coffee. Joe Hockey has dismissed it as a couple of middies of beer or a packet of cigarettes. They have dismissed it as that; but we are talking about people who are absolutely on the margins, who are managing every single dollar of their budget. For them, it will be $70 to go to the doctor—10 visits—before they then hit the concessional rate of this GP tax; that is an enormous amount of money. It is not just an enormous amount of money for low-income people; it is also an enormous amount of money for those people who are on fixed incomes, who may not necessarily be accessing a pension, who may not necessarily be accessing other benefits but who are in fact on a fixed income—and that is what this government wants to do.

As I said, a recent report from the University of Sydney revealed that the most likely impact of the GP tax will be on pensioners. An age pensioner couple with concession cards would pay on average $40 in co-payments for GP visits and tests, plus $59 for medications—$199 extra out of their budgets

The study reinforced the concerns of Labor and shared by the Consumer Health Forum, the AMA and the GP organisations that introducing a co-payment for GP visits, pathology, and imaging services could deter vulnerable groups from seeking medical care. The report was absolutely clear: elderly people will be hit very hard by the Prime Minister's GP tax. Again, the question has to be posed: how is that fair? How is it fair to ask more from Australian pensioners, who have already contributed so much to this country over so many decades?

We saw yesterday the first of the health budget bills come into this parliament—the government's decision to increase the costs of pharmaceuticals. And then, in a nasty little surprise, not only did they increase the costs of medicines but they also made it much harder for people to reach the safety net. The safety net is for those patients who particularly need to have multiple medications, and many of those are older people with chronic disease conditions. So, each time you go to the pharmacist, if you are a general patient on general concession, it is $5 extra, on top of what you already pay. For concessional card holders it is an extra 80c every time you fill a script. And trying to reach the safety net has become harder and harder and harder.

In their own budget papers, for example, they say that by 2018 concession card holders will have to fill 68 scripts before they hit the safety net. That is what they did yesterday. It is absolutely one of the most serious measures for older Australians in terms of their costs of living and how they manage their budget. What we saw yesterday was the absolute debacle of six speakers opposite—and I can see that they now have a cohort of people who have health backgrounds whom they are asking to speak on health budget bills. That is a good thing, and hopefully they have some experience to bring to the table about what is actually happening within the health system and how you actually work with vulnerable older patients in GP surgeries.

So, six speakers were selected to speak on the bill, and there was not a single marginal-seat backbencher who had the courage to come in and defend this measure, who had the courage to come in and actually debate the measure. Then we had the debacle of the minister who is responsible for this measure—whose job it is to see this measure through the parliament, to then go and explain it to people, to then go and get it through the Senate—not turning up for consideration in detail. In fact, he was in the chamber, he gagged debate on the bill and then he left, so he could not be present for consideration in detail.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Has that ever happened before?

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do not remember it happening before. It is a very unusual thing to have happen—for such a very serious bill from one of the most senior ministers in the government. He could not even be bothered to turn up for consideration in detail. Normally what happens—I have seen it happen a number of times before with consideration in detail—is that the minister will get up and reject the questions we ask, defend the bill, go on the attack, do all of those things, and get his backbench up doing that as well, and we will have a proper debate about the bill. But that health minister could not even turn up for consideration in detail and then gagged and gagged and gagged the debate again. That is what happened yesterday. That is a bill that increases the costs of medicines for older Australians. It increases the costs for every Australian. But we do know that older Australians in particular can be high users of medicines. Because of that, that bill had particular relevance to the many, many pensioners and older Australians in this country.

Before the election the Prime Minister said there would be no changes to pensions. The Prime Minister was not being truthful with older Australians before the election, and the Prime Minister should be truthful with older Australians now. At the same time as they deliver one of the harshest austerity budgets in our nation's history, they are proposing to spend around $100 million to increase eligibility for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card for people with higher incomes. Labor cannot support such twisted priorities in the context of what this government is doing in the entire budget to older Australians. It is as clear a display of the government's priorities as you can get: give to the top while you attack the people who are doing it the toughest. That is the framework that this government is operating within. We have seen it in the budget, which slashes support for vulnerable Australians. And now we see them extending support for people at the other end.

This is not the only example of those twisted priorities. Of course, the biggest example is the Abbott government's unfair and unaffordable paid parental leave scheme, which pays $50,000 to wealthy women to take six months off work to have a baby. There can be no justification for this sort of expenditure at the same time as pensioners—who earn around $20,000 a year—are going to have their payments cut. What sort of wrong priorities do you have when you have a government that thinks that is okay?

We heard the Treasurer, Joe Hockey, in question time today. He has been out there thumping the table, threatening about what will happen if he does not get these measures—these terrible cuts to some of the most vulnerable low-income and middle-income Australians throughout the country—through. Well, he has some alternatives. There are some alternative cuts, and we gave him one: get rid of your Paid Parental Leave Scheme. We have a paid parental leave scheme, something that Labor is very proud of. We are very proud that we had the first one in this country. It is Labor who championed the cause of paid parental leave and actually introduced a scheme—and it is working, and it is fair. But what this government wants to do is give $50,000 to wealthy women, women on high incomes, to take six months off to have their baby, at the same time—and this is all about priorities, so you have to look at it in context—as cutting pensions. It is absolutely the wrong priority, the wrong thing to do. The government was offered at question time to get rid of it. They know they have support in their backbench and lots of support on their frontbench, and they have support in the business community to get rid of it.

We are trying to give the Prime Minister as much space to ditch the Paid Parental Leave scheme and save face as we can. But so stubborn is the Prime Minister that he is not able to see the wood for the trees and think: 'Well, you know, I've got a cause here. Maybe I can come and say, "Well, you know, the budget measures aren't getting through. That means we can't afford to do this."' He can blame us if he wants. It is what he will do. We have given him the opportunity to save face. But he would rather cut pensions and punish the sick and vulnerable in this community than lose a bit of pride by ditching an absolutely dud scheme. Those are the government's priorities and that is what the Prime Minister is doing.

The government is all about looking after high-income earners while cutting support to vulnerable Australians. The government's budget is an ideological attack on low-income earners. What is worse, the government is concocting a false budget emergency as cover for its savage cuts. If there was really a budget emergency it would not be seeking to increase government support to high-income earners through this measure. It would also not be proceeding with a Paid Parental Leave scheme that will cost more than $20 billion—that is almost equivalent to all of the cuts in education and just under half the cuts to the public hospital system—and give $50,000 to wealthy women to have a baby. Cutting support for vulnerable Australians whilst proceeding with these sorts of measures is a clear example of just how twisted this government's budget priorities are.

How is it fair to cut pensions by $450 million yet expand entitlements for the Commonwealth seniors health card so that people with high incomes can access more benefits? How fair is it that a single-income family on $65,000 with two school-age children will be $6,000 worse off each year because of the Abbott government while this entitlement will be expanded so that people with higher incomes can access more benefits? How is it fair to cruelly abandon young job seekers and yet expand this entitlement to people at the higher end? The answer is that it is not.

It seems the Abbott government does not care about fairness. It does not care about vulnerable Australians. It does not care that millions of Australians will be worse off because of its savage cuts. The priorities are on display in this piece of legislation, and those priorities are all wrong. Labor will oppose it.

Of course, the Liberal Party like to think of themselves as the party that represents the views of seniors and self-funded retirees. But, recently, my office has been inundated with messages from angry seniors who feel betrayed by the Abbott government—seniors who are going to have their pension cut, seniors who are going to lose the seniors supplement and seniors who are going to lose important concessions after the Abbott government unilaterally announced it is going to axe the National Partnership Agreement on Certain Concessions for Pensioner Concession Card and Seniors Card Holders from 1 July this year. This means that the states will now have to pay 100 per cent of the costs of these concessions or seniors will lose these concessions. This is a savage budget for senior Australians, and, of course, it is those with the least who will suffer the most.

The Abbott government likes to pretend it is out there helping seniors. But seniors are smarter than that. They know that they have been betrayed by this government and by the Prime Minister. They know that they cannot trust the Prime Minister, who said repeatedly before the election that there would be no changes to pensions. How many Liberal MPs and candidates distributed flyers to seniors during the election saying, 'By the way, we're going to abolish the seniors supplement and take $876 out of your pocket'? Not one of them did. How many of them campaigned last year to scrap concessions for Commonwealth seniors health card holders for things like utility bills, public transport fares and council rates? Absolutely none of them. They are so dishonest. That is why so many angry seniors have been contacting our offices and, I am sure, the offices of many coalition MPs as well.

Labor will oppose this bill because we believe in fairness. We do not believe that we should extend supports to people at the top while at the same time taking money from those who are more vulnerable. We will fight this government because it has made the wrong choices and is seeking to implement the wrong policies. As we said in the MPI, budgets are all about priorities, and this government, clearly, has it absolutely wrong when it comes to this bill and all of those punitive measures to health, education and pensions that it is trying to introduce at the same time within its unfair budget.

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Commonwealth seniors health card is a very vital piece of government entitlement that is enjoyed by self-funded retirees around the country. But many would realise that that has not been indexed since 2001. It was a creature of the 1990s and it appropriately recognised that self-funded retirees who have planned for the future and planned for their retirement still deserve some consideration from government in accessing the wonderful PBS, the safety net and, where negotiated with their doctor, bulk-billing services. That is precisely what many seniors value above all from government.

Those thresholds have not changed since 2001. We know that individuals hitting the $50,000-income mark and couples hitting the $80,000-income mark, which have not moved, have been caught by bracket creep and are no longer eligible for those cards. Haven't the opposition really exposed themselves today for what they have been over the last six years in government? The Labor Party do not regard self-funded retirees as the core of this nation who have planned all their lives to be self-sufficient. Instead, the Labor Party have exposed their view that this group are enemies of the state and, for earning what I think is a very moderate sum of money of between $50,000 and $80,000, this group are earning way too much money to be deserving of a Commonwealth seniors health card. The Labor Party are just too pernickety and too tight to even consider allowing a Commonwealth seniors health card to these great Australians.

I say thank you to them. I think that most Australians would take a similar view that for someone earning around $50,000 it is thoroughly reasonable that there is some help at times when they need health care and are facing a large out-of-pocket cost and that they have access to a safety net. This is not saying that people should get a free ride; it is saying that they should have access to a safety net when health expenses are really high in one particular year. I think we should be proud that we have a system that offers a safety net. I have no problem with a couple who are seniors of retirement age, over the age of 65, having access to a safety net. I think to deny those families access to a safety net puts the Labor Party in a very bad light.

But it really took until today to hear the shadow minister's aggressive and condescending attitude to these Australians—millions of them—who do not collect a pension. Instead they do their best with their earnings that they have accrued over their lifetimes. They are often living on very small superannuation accounts. But I note that they are adjusted, taxable income. When you consider both forms of income, net losses through investments, foreign sources of income that have not been taxed overseas, other forms of superannuation that have been exempted since 2007 and adjusted income, people with incomes between $50,000 and $80,000 if they are single or a couple should be eligible. And that should move with inflation.

This is not a big ask. Surely after seven or eight years of indexation since 2001 it is right that we go back to this important cohort and say, 'The least you deserve is that your eligibility keeps up with inflation.' We have not gone to the Labor Party asking for any great favours. We have just asked for this group to be respected with the CPI indexation that we assign and provide and that I think most groups would demand—and that is simple indexation to keep up with the cost of living.

I do not think this is a terribly large decision for most people who are not directly involved; but for the 30,000 Australians who were to lose those cards over the next four years this would have been a major hit to their budget. I say again that they are people who have planned ahead for their finances and predominantly look after themselves. They pay full tote everywhere they go. To say to them they cannot even access the Medicare safety net is disappointing and even more so to deny them this card if they have a fluctuation in their income—one year here or there—purely due to nothing other than CPI correction.

I think it is a very small piece of generosity. It is a great shame that something as modest as this for people who look after themselves and have done so all their lives will be denied by the Labor Party. Of all the things we have discussed in this chamber over the last six months, I would have thought they could have waved this one through. They could have just looked self-funded retirees in the eye. The member the Ryan would have a similar view. We have thousands of these people who do it tough and do not have an automatic government wage coming into their account every fortnight. They often have households where there are significant rent and interest payments that they must meet. To deny them access to a safety net is something that I would be a little bit embarrassed about if I were a member of the Labor Party. I would be hoping that this debate would terminate quickly and that we would move on because it is a shabby position to take.

What has driven that decision? The first one could be that this is a Labor Party that is devoid of any ideas or even a willingness to articulate them, so it is just going to negate everything in this chamber. That debases the processes of parliament. The second and more concerning one is that we have a Labor Party that is so tied up with its union mates and so tied up in professing that they care for the poor—when they did very little for them in government—that they deny these things to such an important group. These self-funded retirees are the same group of people who say, 'No, we will not lead two decades of our lives on the government purse, if we can avoid it. We are going to try and do it alone. We are going to try and set up our superannuation so that we are independent. We would like to do a little bit of travel here and there with our savings.'

Another important development is that now instead of having these concessions cut off after a handful of weeks, our self-funded retirees can go overseas for a bit longer without losing access to their bulk-billing doctor, a PBS concessional arrangement of $6.80 or, finally, being able to access the safety net in a year where there are precipitous health cost.

I have made my point. I say to self-funded retirees out there: it is true the coalition will look after you at every turn. Never was such a light shone upon the Labor Party's negative approach to self-funded retirees and never was it so exposed as it has been in this very, very modest and humble debate about a relatively small amount of money that looks after 30,000 Australians. Every one of them listening today will now know where Labor stands on this issue.

Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bill is a classic example of twisted priorities from this government. On its own, this bill seems fair and reasonable. But, in the context of the budget and the number of cuts hitting people in our community, this is not a fair bill and these are not fair measures. At the same time that the government is introducing measures in this bill, they are cutting the aged pension. The government is cutting disability support pensions, carers' pensions and senior supplements. The government is also planning to cut the schoolkids bonus, income support bonuses and low-income superannuation contributions. The list of cuts in this budget, which are justified by the Treasurer and the Prime Minister because of a 'budget emergency', goes on and on.

It cannot be that there is a budget emergency if at the same time increasing support for those who are in the higher income brackets, whether they be people working or people who are retired. This proposal will see a $100 million increase in the eligibility for seniors health care for the people towards the top end of incomes in our community. I will be honest with you: this issue was debated in my electorate during the election. It was debated and I was one of the people who said, 'Look, if there needs to be government support, it should be targeted support.' Here I am, a marginal MP, willing to stand up and speak to my party's position here in this House, knowing that there will be some people in my community disappointed. In the other debates that we have had in this House, very few marginal seat MPs from the other side have been willing to stand up and put their name to their party's position and their government's decision to make massive cuts that hurt people in their electorates. Being elected is about being a representative, standing up and being willing to put your name to a decision that your party makes.

I note that a number of those marginal seat MPs are willing to speak on this bill. They will speak on this bill, but they would not speak on the bill yesterday which saw an increase to prescriptions that people need every day. We all know that it is our oldest seniors who have the most prescriptions, yet none of those marginal seat MPs were willing to stand up yesterday and put their name to the government's work. This government is all about looking after the higher income earners in our community whilst cutting support to the most vulnerable. That is the core problem with this measure. It is rewarding the few by taking from others—and taking from those most in need.

The government likes to say that we, Labor, use the rhetoric of class politics—but this budget is all about class politics. It is about pushing the most vulnerable further into poverty. It is not about supporting them and giving them the same opportunities in life; it is about pushing them further into poverty whilst at the same time rewarding those towards the top end. If the government were serious about there being a budget emergency, nobody would be safe—everybody would be having their concessions cut. There would be no increases to concessions. But what we have seen from this government is exactly that—them prioritising looking after the top end of town.

It is not just this bill; it is also the Paid Parental Leave scheme. Once again, it will be our highest income earners who will have their wages topped up by this government. It is not support for our lowest income earners, it is not support for our single parents who most need it; it is government support—taxpayer support—for our highest income earners. As a woman, as someone who is proud to be part of the Labor Women's Caucus—proud that I am part of a movement which saw the first paid parental leave scheme introduced in this country—I support paid parental leave. But I do not support a system that tops up the pay of those at the top end of the pay scale—which could include me or my sisters—at the expense of seniors, at the expense of pensioners or at the expense of young people who might be looking for a job. Those are the twisted priorities of this government. Cutting support for the most vulnerable Australians whilst proceeding with these sorts of measures is an example of just how twisted the government's priorities are.

Let us talk a bit about those twisted priorities. The PM, prior to the election, promised that there would be no changes to pensions—but we have now seen changes introduced. The Prime Minister is increasing the qualification age for the age pension to 70 by the year 2035. Maybe that is after he has retired, but it will definitely affect young people—the young people he did not tell before the election he would be kicking off Newstart for six months if they found themselves without work. The Prime Minister also broke a promise when he said he would not make life harder for Australian pensioners. He said that, yet we have heard all about the different cuts, the deep cuts, to pensions in the government's budget. One example is the simple issue of how the pension increases over time, how it is indexed. Currently the age pension is indexed in line with male total average weekly earnings, the CPI or the pensioner cost-of-living index—we take the highest of those three. The government's proposal is to index it in line with movements in the CPI only, which usually has the lowest increase of the three. That is the difference between Labor in government and the Liberals in government when it comes to supporting our pensioners.

Seniors and pensioners will also be hurt by the GP tax the government plan to introduce. Seven dollars may not seem like a lot to members of the government, but it is a lot to pensioners. It is a lot to people who need to seek medical help. This tax will hit Australian families, costing them $3.5 billion—straight out of their pockets. That is the core of the problem. That is another example of twisted priorities. It is also lazy policy, because it will ultimately lead to increased healthcare costs and more pressure on hospitals. We have heard GP after GP speak about how the GP co-payment will discourage those most in need of help from seeking it, from presenting to their GPs. In my electorate alone, doctors from Castlemaine, Woodend and Bendigo have all spoken out publicly about how they believe the $7 GP co-payment will stop sick people, vulnerable people and older people from seeking medical help when they need it—and how this will lead to more severe health problems and end up with them presenting at emergency, which is the last thing we want.

The increased co-payments under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme will also hurt pensioners and seniors. The government's proposal is that people will be asked to pay an extra $5 per medication. Already we have pharmacists saying that people are coming to them with four or five scripts from their doctor and asking them, 'Which ones should I fill?' This is an issue in some of the poorer areas of my electorate. The pharmacists have older people coming in and saying, 'I cannot afford all these medications; can you tell me which ones I absolutely have to have?' This problem is only going to get worse if this proposal, which has already passed the House, is passed by the Senate. It is also another broken promise and another clear example of how the Prime Minister's budget is full of twisted priorities.

The reason we want people to take their medication, the reason we encourage them to take the medication that has been prescribed for them by their doctor, is that it is simply good preventative health care. I have spoken to seniors who are outraged about this budget. Some of them have three or four medications that they take every day—to keep their blood pressure low or to keep their diabetes in check. We want to keep these seniors out of the emergency departments, so we want to encourage them to take their prescribed medications. But this hit, this broken promise, this increase in what they have to contribute towards their medication, will now put that idea at risk.

Here are some other things people from my electorate have said about this budget and its twisted priorities. Gregory said:

The inequality of the Abbott and Hockey budget will destroy the fair go aspect of our society. I do not want us to become a small America with its inherent winner takes all attitude.

These are not my words but the words of people in my electorate, speaking out against the twisted priorities in this budget. The words of William:

I want my kids to grow up in fair society. Abbott is attacking the egalitarianism that makes Australia such a great place to live. I have lived in the US and the neo-con dream is an inescapable nightmare for many disadvantaged and minority groups. Inequality and injustice is entrenched. I do not want that here.

The words of Tammy:

This is not a fair budget to the middle and lower classes!! Just taking from the poor yet again, disgusting!

The words of Jessica:

I'm a mum of two and together with my husband, we barely make up $90k per year. It sounds like a lot but it's barely enough some weeks to scrape by. Cutting funding to helpful social programs will hurt us and many other families I know in my area.

The words of Claire:

Because this Budget attacks the most vulnerable in our community rather than supporting them, I sign this petition.

The words of Gordon:

This budget seems to discriminate against the vulnerable. It aims to achieve financial balance without considering other consequences on struggling community members now and in the future.

The words of Garry:

The whole budget emergency claim is a fallacy. Sure there are steps that need to be taken over the next maybe 5 to 10 years.

But ripping money out of those in the community that can least afford it as well as being extremely cruel to many isn't the way to go.

At the same time the contradiction of introducing an extravagant parental leave scheme is very distasteful.

The changes that are contemplated affect poorer citizens permanently. They are nasty.

They are nasty and they attack those most in need. The words of Tara:

Because I'm a mum of 2 children and try my hardest to support my family the best I can adding more cost to medicines and doctors visits will only cause harder times and higher risks of letting my kids miss out on food or clothes just cause we may need medical assistance medication and being asthmatics these things are important to keep as cheap or free as possible. I want to make sure that my kids can live a good life, and I expect my government to help.

The words of Damien:

This budget, in addition to targeting the less well off, those with health problems, those with no job and many similar disadvantaged people, is putting Australia's economic prosperity at risk. If they do not support those most in need our economy will stall.

That is because we have seen this happen overseas. Austerity has been shown to cause more harm than good elsewhere: Australia should not follow a failed path.

Time to admit you're wrong and abandon your mean, tricky and cruel budget measures.

I completely agree with the words of these people in my electorate who are speaking out about the twisted priorities in this budget.

This measure will be popular with some, but not when they realise it is coming at the cost of their neighbours. There is one thing I know about the people of Bendigo and the people of regional Australia—it is that they stand up for one another. They care for their neighbours and the people in their community.

Our self-funded retirees will not be happy to know that they are receiving this increase at the expense of their neighbours, at the expense of those who are doing it tougher. This measure will over time result in more people accessing the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card at the higher end. It is another example of how this government is governing for their own and not for those most in need. It is another example of how the government is making sure that their mates in big business are protected, and that their interests are being put ahead of the interests of everyone else, including those in my electorate and those in regional areas.

Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Seniors Health Card and Other Measures) Bill 2014. Hundreds of thousands of Australian seniors have worked hard for the most of their lives. They have been wise with the allocation of their income, investing it sensibly and taking responsibility for their finances, ensuring that they and not the government fund their own personal retirement. We need to recognise this by looking after their own retirement needs. Self-funded retirees save the Commonwealth budget considerable pension costs. However, these self-funded retirees are being disadvantaged for their lifetime of hard work and the significant contributions they have made to the success of our nation.

The Commonwealth Seniors Health Card was introduced in July 1994, providing access to concessional prescription medicines under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, free hearing aids and certain free basic dental services. The card was available to people of age pension age who were not eligible for the Age Pension for reasons other than the income test—for example, insufficient length of residence or high asset holdings. The original purpose of the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card was to provide assistance to retired persons who were on low income. When introduced, the income limits for the CSHC were the same as for the Age Pension, so that the vast majority of retired persons issued with the CSHC were those who were asset rich but income low, such as farmers. In 1996-97 there were 35,244 cardholders and by 1997-98 there were 42,461 cardholders.

In the 1996 election the coalition promised to extend the income test thresholds and use taxable income, rather than income as assessed for the Age Pension, to assess eligibility for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card. Liberal government minister Senator Jocelyn Newman said in her 1998 Budget press release that this recognised 'the important contribution made by people who save for their own retirement'. These changes were implemented from January 1999, and by August of that year an additional 163,000 people had become cardholders. These changes, and a further increase to the threshold in 2001, changed the target group for the card from very low-income self-funded retirees to middle-income retirees.

I am shocked and appalled to find out that those opposite are opposing this bill today, because it was Labor who brought in the Commonwealth seniors health card in 1994. One could point out that they have neglected their policy since then, relying on the subsequent Liberal governments to fix up and improve the policy by assessing it differently from the age pension and allowing hundreds of thousands more self-funded retirees to access the card and by also increasing the threshold. Instead, those opposite refused to fairly index the pension in their previous two chaotic terms of government. Labor once again left it up to this side of the chamber to give a fair go to those people who saved for their retirement.

The purpose of this bill is to implement the government's election commitment to all Australians, regardless of their financial positions, to index income thresholds for the Commonwealth seniors health card. Currently, to qualify for the seniors health card a retiree must satisfy the senior's health card taxable income test. These thresholds, however, have not been amended since their introduction under the Howard government in 2001, remaining at $50,000 for singles and $80,000 for couples. The past 13 years, however, have seen a drastic increase in the cost of living, with $50,000 now being a considerably lower amount than it was in the Howard years.

As people grow older the wear and tear of a long life makes them more susceptible to a wide range of conditions and health problems. The majority are minor ailments such as arthritis, low bone density, and vision and hearing problems. But others, like diabetes, hypertension, respiratory problems and dementia, are serious issues that require regular medical treatment and medications to control. This bill means that 30,000 additional senior Australians will have access to discounts on Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme medicines, access to bulk-billed doctor appointments, at the discretion of the doctor, and access to cheaper out-of-hospital medical expenses through the Medicare safety net.

I have received a great deal of correspondence from my elderly constituents expressing their support for this bill, pleased to see the extra support the Commonwealth seniors health card will provide and the relief to their cost of living. I am proud to stand on this side of the chamber, where we are delivering on our election commitment to self-funded retirees and continuing our legacy of supporting those Australians who have saved for their own retirement. I commend this bill to the House and I condemn Labor for their mean-spirited opposition.

Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a real pleasure today to make a contribution to the debate on the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Seniors Health Card and Other Measures) Bill 2014. Of all of the pieces of legislation, this is a really significant example of the truly outrageous, twisted priorities of this Abbott government.

I respect the member for Ryan—I really do—but I take significant issue with the tone and tenor of the contribution she has made. People on the other side of the House get up today and say that they are the best friends of senior Australians and talk about how much senior Australians have contributed to this country; yet, at the very same time, they have recently delivered a budget that is an out-and-out attack on the people they are now saying they will defend. How can the member for Ryan sit here in this House and talk about how much she cares about senior Australians when she has been part of a government that is having a conversation about raising the pension age from 67 to 70? How can people on the other side scrap the Commonwealth seniors supplement and then come into the House and say that, because they are putting in place this measure, they are suddenly the great defenders of senior Australians? I can say that senior Australians around this country are not being fooled, and I will talk in some detail about interactions I have had with constituents on this subject.

For the benefit of those in the gallery, we are talking about changes that are being proposed to be Commonwealth seniors health card. The Commonwealth seniors health card is one of the really important ways in which we support senior Australians in our community, who have done so much to grow Australia and to make Australia into the great nation that it is. It is available to senior Australians on the lower income spectrum and it brings a range of concessions that assist with the cost of living. Many of you would have relatives who are eligible for these cards. It usually gets them bulk-billing rates at the doctor, some cheaper out-of-hospital medical expenses and often some transport concessions.

To this important assistance offered to senior Australians, the Abbott government has made some incredibly serious changes in the first budget it has brought down. The first and absolutely most significant of these is one I have referred to already—that is, the axing of the seniors supplement. The $800 a year that was part of the seniors health card is gone just like that because of a decision of the Abbott government. This $800 for a low-income retiree is a supplement that was designed to help with the big expenses that come irregularly during the year. A lot of seniors would use this, for example, to pay for their electricity bills. I have spoken to people at mobile offices around my electorate who are absolutely terrified because they actually do not know how they are going to balance their budget at home without the seniors supplement.

The government has also made some changes to eligibility which will include untaxed super in the eligibility assessment. The final measure which everyone on the other side is so excited about is the change that will extend the eligibility for this much reduced benefit by indexing the income threshold. It means that over time the eligibility for the seniors health card will increase. So, over time, the more you earn the more likely you are to be eligible for a seniors health card. It is a bit complex, but the really practical impact is that eligibility for this scheme will be extended to more Australians on the higher income end.

Labor is opposed to this measure because we are opposed to any such measure which will take support away from the most vulnerable Australians and give it to those who are less vulnerable. It is something we are seeing a lot of in this budget, and I will talk through some other examples. It is the values that sit behind measures like this that are so profoundly out of step with Australians' values, who logically see that the people who have the least should get the most support. We are very proud of the system of government support that we have in Australia because it is very incisively targeted. Despite what we hear from the other side, studies of social support systems around the world consistently show that Australia has one of the most efficient and effective systems of social support in the world. It is because we target the money that we have to those who are the most in need. This measure goes completely in the opposite direction. Combined with the other changes to the seniors health card that I have outlined, it takes away benefits from the people who need them most and extends the eligibility to a wider range of people who are on higher incomes.

The cost of extending the eligibility for these benefits is $100 million over the forward estimates. It is not a huge sum that will change the shape of the budget in the sense, for example, of a paid parental leave scheme that costs $6 billion a year. But it is a lot of money that could be targeted to the people who need it most, rather than using these taxpayers' dollars to extend benefits to people who are on higher incomes.

This is not something that any Australian would now be surprised to see from the government on the other side of the House. It is said that you do not really understand the character of a government until they deliver their first budget, and I have to say this is absolutely the case for the Abbott government. Just nine months after coming into office they have delivered an absolutely cruel budget that has taken away government support from the people least able to afford it. Yet they have also delivered cash splashes like the Paid Parental Leave scheme, which will see a top-up in maternity leave to the wealthiest women in Australia. It is initiatives like this example before us which reduce benefits to the worst off but increase benefits to those on higher incomes. It is very consistent with how this government operates.

The coalition's first budget was full of harsh cuts and, at the same time, very lavish new areas of spending. Let's think about the record we are dealing with here and go through some of the changes. This is a government that is trying to cut the indexation of the disability support pension. Can you believe it? The effect of cutting the indexation of the disability support pension is that, over time, Australians with disabilities will have less money in their pocket than they otherwise would have. They are cutting the carers' payments. Who will this government not go after? Again, over time, Australians who are involved in that important role of caring for people in their family and community will have less money in their pockets.

This government cut the schoolkids bonus, a very important government support provided to families around Australia—$410 a year for primary school students and $810 a year for secondary school students. This was a sum paid at the beginning and in the middle of the school year to help families manage big one-off costs such as school books, school shoes and computer equipment. It might be hard for people on the other side of the House to understand this, but there were people in my electorate who really depended on that money and were not able to scrounge together hundreds of dollars at the beginning of the school year if a young person in their household was asked to provide a laptop or something else. The government cut the low-income support supplement. That was $300 to people earning less than $30,000 a year. They cut the low-income superannuation contribution, which was a government contribution to help Australians on the very lowest incomes save for their retirement.

We need to look at the area of health, because that is where some of the most perverse and awful cuts were made in this budget. It now costs another $7 to go to the doctor. Before, families were at least able to know they were not going to have to budget to take their children to the doctor if they fell ill. I recently met with a GP in my electorate who is not particularly a Labor person. We talked through some of the impacts that she saw as a result of the co-payment. She operates in a very low-income area of my electorate. She talked about the issues she thinks she will see for families with a significant number of children—say three or four—who all get sick at once. While $7 might not sound like a lot, when you consider multiple people in the family falling ill at once, potentially having to get pathology reports and other things and then having to fill prescriptions, now that the cost of prescriptions has gone up too we are starting to talk about really serious dollars for people who are on low incomes. We do not want to live in a country where people have to worry about how they are going to budget to take their family to the doctor. That is just not the type of country that we live in.

Something else I will mention in brief is the changes to university fees. These are cuts that are going to have the biggest impact on the people in our community who can least afford to look down the barrel of starting their working life with a $100,000 debt. The young people in my electorate are just not going to go down that path. Yet, at the same time, in the context of all these absolutely egregious cuts, we have the big cash splashes. We have the Paid Parental Leave scheme that will see $2,000 a week given to mothers around Australia who are otherwise earning good money. We have the $20 billion fund for medical research. We support medical research for sure, but should the sickest people in our country—chronically ill people and the older Australians who are more likely to access medical services—be the ones to foot the bill for this?

And do not get me started on climate policy. This week we have seen the government very excited for itself because it has scrapped a tax that brought in significant revenue and instead plans to put in place a type of climate policy that pays big polluters taxpayers' dollars. It is absolutely crazy.

We have seen a lot of this kind of perversity, especially in relation to senior Australians. The legislation that is before us is part of the context of that. Senior Australians are in line with the gun with some of the changes in this budget. Raising the pension age to 70 will give Australia the highest retirement age in the entire world. For people who work behind a desk, that will mean something quite different from people who work in manual labour. From talking to a lot of people who live in my electorate who work in those more blue collar jobs, I know they are seriously worried about the idea of having to work until they are 70 and how they are going to preserve their health in those final years of their working life.

The other important initiative to mention is the changes to the indexation of the pension. The Abbott government is wanting to change the indexation of the pension—the rate at which the pension rises—from being attached to the average earnings of Australians down to the CPI, a much lower rate. This is a very good example which really shows us what this government's values are. What they are really saying here is that pensioners who do it very tough—because it is hard to live on a pension—should continue to do it tough while the living standards of the rest of the Australian community grow. So, despite the fact that our country is growing and our economy is growing, the government are saying that pensioners do not deserve to share in that wealth while they are not earning an income any more. That is something that Labor is not willing to abide.

I have mentioned the Commonwealth Seniors Supplement, but it is another important example of the attack on senior Australians that is part of this budget. I have been talking a lot to seniors recently because I have just run a number of morning teas in my electorate. I have spoken with a very large group of seniors in East Bentleigh, and the Leader of the Opposition was able to join me at that. I can say absolutely for those on the other side, in case they are not out there talking to people in their communities—I can understand why they might not want to be out there just at the moment—that senior Australians are incredibly angry about this. We talked about some of the perversities that we see in this budget, specifically the cutting of supports being used by senior Australians while at the same time the government is putting in place a very lavish Paid Parental Leave scheme. These seniors were seething with anger, and I had many great conversations about how Labor will continue to stand up for those seniors and continue to fight to have clarity and fairness in the support that we offer people around the country. I had another terrific seniors morning tea in Dingley Village. They are not always Labor people down that side of my electorate, but they are very upset about what the government is trying to do to them. I had similar conversations at a morning tea in Hughesdale.

The people at these morning teas are not just talking about things that this government is doing to senior Australians. They are not just talking about the change to the pension age and cutting the Seniors Supplement. They are not just talking about changes to the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card. They are talking about things that do not affect them personally but affect the people around them—their neighbours, their family, their grandchildren. They do not want to live in a country where the limited social support that we provide is being taken away from the people in our community who are most vulnerable and given to the people who have a little bit more. It is not how we do things in Australia. That is why we see the legislation before us as anathema to the Australian way, and it is legislation that we will not be supporting.

Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Seniors Health Card and Other Measures) Bill 2014. The Commonwealth Seniors Health Card is an important way for seniors to access affordable health services. It is a health care card which recognises the contribution of self-funded retirees. The card is available not only to people of age pension age who do not qualify for the pension but also to people who are on low incomes. After a lifetime of work and contribution to our nation, it is an important way of saying thank you to the many thousands of people who fund their own retirement. It is an important way of recognising the contribution that seniors make. It is an important way of recognising that many self-funded retirees are not on particularly high incomes. Some of them are on very low incomes and they need our help as well. The income threshold test is $50,000 for singles per year and $80,000 for couples. As the member for Holt has indicated, it offers some great benefits such as discounts on PBS medicines and cheaper medical and hospital expenses through the Medicare safety net.

It is staggering that the Labor Party is opposing this bill. Members on this side are quite shocked by the decision that Labor has made. Labor has decided to act in a very mean-spirited and nasty way to stop some 30,000 Australians accessing these important benefits. This is an important measure for seniors, and I draw particular attention to something the member for Ballarat said in her contribution. She said:

We do not believe that we should extend supports to people at the top, while at the same time taking money from those who are more vulnerable

The member for Ballarat has no concept of how this seniors card works. This is for people on low incomes. This is for people who need our help. This is for some 30,000 Australians who, rather than accessing medicines at something like $6.90, will now be paying $37.70 rising to $42.70. As I say, this is a mean-spirited and nasty decision and no matter what members opposite may think of our other measures—I will talk about those in a minute—this is unnecessary opposition to this bill. It shows that members opposite—it is quite evident that they are uncomfortable with this decision—are only interested in being obstructive. This is terrible, and I can assure the House that self-funded retirees, many of whom are on extremely low incomes, will not thank Labor for this decision.

Even the member for Bendigo acknowledged that some people in her electorate will be disappointed. What a shame that on a really sensible measure—to index the Seniors Health Card, to give more people access to it, to implement something that is sensible and is modest and is measured—those opposite could not join with us in extending this type of benefit to so many seniors, so many older Australians who need our help. Again we have this rubbish about $50,000 being a lot of money. The member for Ballarat saying that these are the people on the top shows that Labor simply has no idea. And many people are well under that level.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Then why are you cutting the pension?

Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will take the interjection from the member opposite, because this is a shabby opposition that even Bob Hawke is embarrassed about. In January this year Bob Hawke, looking at the projected deficit of $47 billion, said: 'This is a very large budget deficit that you are looking at.' Labor seem to be walking away from the suggestion that they can move into surplus in this first term, but what is required is the same thing. You have to have a Prime Minister and a Treasurer and a competent ministry that understands the issue and is prepared to make the hard decisions. Yes, we have had to make some hard decisions. We have not enjoyed making the decision to cut the seniors' supplement; it has been a difficult decision for us. We will be upfront about that, but, let me tell you, we will not cop the misleading rubbish that we are hearing from Labor and the scaremongering from Australian pensioners.

We are not cutting the pension. The pension goes up twice a year and in September 2017 there will be a change from indexation to CPI. That is correct, but let me say this: it was good enough for Labor to do it for those on Family Tax Benefit to move to CPI from indexation. Again, we see the utter hypocrisy of those opposite. Let me say to anyone watching this broadcast or reading it in Hansard: we are not cutting the pension. We will not cop the misleading rubbish that even Bob Hawke—who was a good Prime Minister and a great Labor figure—is embarrassed about it.

I want to refer very briefly to the co-payment and a very important safeguard in relation to the co-payment. Again, there has been a lot of rubbish talked about the co-payment. A total of 8.6 million concession card holders will be protected by the safety net. They will pay a maximum of $70 a year. On this point I agree with members opposite: for some people $7 a visit is quite tough, particularly if it combines a number of services—pathology and radiology may be combined with a visit to the doctor in the one visit. So it could be more than $7 in one visit, but the important thing that we have done is to provide for doctors to bulk-bill. There will be many doctors who decide to continue to offer bulk-billing to those who need it the most. Again I hear the echo of 'Rubbish' across the chamber, but it is simply untrue. Allowing bulk-billing is part of our reforms. What has been amazing in this debate is the talk of cost-of-living pressures and the absolute betrayal by members opposite against self-funded retirees—it was mean and nasty, but we have not heard anything about the carbon tax.

Today we are very proud that the carbon tax has been abolished by the Senate and that seniors will no longer be hit by an average of $550 a year through higher electricity and gas prices. While I acknowledge that for some seniors $7 as a co-payment might be quite tough for some, those same people are turning off their heaters because they have not been able to pay their electricity bills. Those same people are struggling with this dreadful, toxic tax which is costing manufacturing across Australia $1.1 billion—it has been a $9 billion handbrake on the economy. A year ago three of the most senior members of the then government, and now the opposition, said, 'We have terminated the carbon tax.' And three times since Labor has voted to keep the carbon tax. I can assure everyone in my electorate of Corangamite and across Geelong that this is a great day for manufacturing and our smart manufacturing future. It is also a great day for farmers. There have been many groups and agencies that have spoken out today applauding the repeal of the carbon tax—including the National Farmers Federation, who have been extremely critical about the way the carbon tax drove up the price of doing everything on the farm, from fertilisers to transport. Dairy farmers were hit with an average increase in their costs of between $5000 and $7000 a year. When we talk about the cost of living, what a shame that the members opposite do not have the courage to acknowledge that as of today we have to delivered a great bonus and a great benefit to older Australians.

There have been a lot of misleading statements made about our support for families and the seniors. I want to reflect on the very important welfare scheme we have in place for so many families. We have a comparatively generous welfare scheme—a great social safety net. A sole parent with two children aged under six and earning $60,000 in our 2016-17 budget receives a parenting payment single, the Clean Energy Supplement and Family Tax Benefit A of $7009. The Energy Supplement Part A is $139; Family Tax Benefit B is $3913; the Energy Supplement Part B is $69; Family Tax Benefit B and A supplement is $1200; and the supplement is another $300. That totals in government payments $12,630, making it a total income of $72,630 with the income tax of $12,147 and income after tax is $60,483. So there is a net gain of $483. Let us not forget that the income tax burden has been lowered substantially because we have raised the tax free threshold from $6000 to $18,200. When we talk about supporting families, that is a really good example of the incredibly generous government payments that we provide families who really do need our help. A dual income family with a 70/30 income split with two children under the age of six, earning $60,000 in 2016-17, receives total government payments of $10,067 and that is a total income of $70,067 with income tax of just $5667. The income after tax is $64,400, and net gain of $4400. They are $4,400 in front because of the very generous government payments that families like the ones I have referred to in my contribution receive. There is a range of other government support that families receive. There are rent assistance, the child care rebate of up to $7,500 per child and child care benefit. There are also access to family support programs, carer allowance and carer supplement to care for somebody with a disability and, for some, subsidised medicines through the PBS.

That is a really good overview of the support that we are providing to families. Today we have acted to lower the cost-of-living burden by ensuring that we deliver on our commitments to repeal the carbon tax. We are very proud of that. Members opposite would not be feeling too proud about their decision today. It is a really embarrassing decision for them to have made. It will cause 30,000 seniors on low incomes to miss out on some really important benefits. I can understand why people like the member for Bendigo are squirming in their seats and feeling uncomfortable with their decision. The opposition may disagree with other parts of our budget, but this is an unnecessary and very unfortunate decision that they have made. The people who will suffer as a result of it are seniors. They are the people who need our help. Let us start talking about the facts and let us reflect on the decision that the opposition have made today. Self-funded retirees all around the country, including in my electorate of Corangamite—there are some 25,000 older Australians in the electorate of Corangamite, which I represent very proudly—will be extremely unhappy with this decision. But we have not given up yet, of course.

The indexation of the seniors card reflects an important election commitment. I am very proud of the election commitments we are delivering in my electorate and across the Geelong region. The National Disability Insurance Scheme is one of the biggest safety nets we have seen in our lifetime. We are again seeing shocking, appalling, scaremongering from those opposite, including from the Leader of the Opposition, scaring people with a disability and their families and carers. I pay credit to the Leader of the Opposition, because when he was in government he helped these people; but now all he is doing is scaring them. That is incredibly unfortunate. I commend this bill. It is a wonderful initiative. I condemn those opposite for the decision they have made.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Seniors Health Card and Other Measures) Bill 2014 on this day, 17 July 2014. As the member for Corangamite touched on throughout her speech, today is a day of infamy, on which we saw the reasonable and responsible approach to addressing global warming destroyed by those opposite. The member for Corangamite did not talk about the seniors health card and other measures bill because she had nothing to say about it. Instead she seemed to focus on Labor Party activities. It made me see her Q&A performance in a new light. I thought it would have been difficult to go below that, but she achieved that today. I guess we will hear from many global-warming advocates opposite as they trot in here and do their little victory dance on this day of infamy. Throughout her speech, the member for Corangamite mentioned Bob Hawke, clinging to him as if he were some talisman who could give political leadership. Let us talk about Bob Hawke and what he did. Bob Hawke was able to do incredible things and take the Australian people with him, but we have seen the Tea Party extremists, these radical right-wing representatives—not conservatives—on that side of the chamber attack sensible responses to global warming. I know we are going to hear from these global-warming advocates as they dance around like the wyrd sisters from Macbeth, celebrating. The reality is that it is a day of infamy. I am amazed that, in her speech, the member for Corangamite would focus on their activities in the Senate when she should been talking about the legislation before us.

The policy measure in this bill will index annually the income test thresholds for the Commonwealth seniors health card to movements in the consumer price index. The seniors health card offers constituents in my electorate a range of benefits, including assisting seniors with concessional pharmaceuticals, with hearing aids and with dental and optometry services. Not for one minute am I going to parrot the lines of the Deputy Prime Minister and say that seniors living large, that seniors are wasting their money on cruises and the like. I know that whether you are on a pension or are a self-funded retiree cost of living pressures have been significant. I know that you as a Queenslander, Deputy Speaker Vasta, have seen electricity prices rise under Labor and LNP governments over the last few years. There has been something like a 70 per cent increase in the last five years. That is significant. There also have been increases in food prices, although fresh fruit and veggies accessed at the Brisbane markets, in my electorate, have been reasonably steady for the last couple of years. Many seniors voted for the Liberal and National parties in the last election, perhaps taking comfort from the statement of the Prime Minister, the then opposition leader, that there would be no cuts to the pension. We have just heard the member for Corangamite clarify that there will in fact be a cut to the pension by 2017. At least she had the courage to admit that fact.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And the GP tax.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

She also touched on the GP co-payment—$2 in red tape and $5 for the never-never—that is a price signal that will particularly damage those one in five Australians who are over 65, because the reality is that as we age the more likely we are to need to go to a doctor.

Ms Collins interjecting—

I take that interjection, polite as it was, from the member for Kingston—

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Franklin.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Franklin, sorry—about the fact that the co-payment might actually go up, in terms of putting out a price signal. When the Labor Prime Minister Paul Keating introduced compulsory superannuation in 1992, as part of the Labor government's cycle of innovative and bold wage records, the immediate concern was to keep a lid on inflation.

The long-term goals of the visionary Prime Minister Keating were threefold. The first goal was to build a mountain of national savings to fund domestic investment at a lower cost. We can check that box. Our savings are now the envy of the world; in fact, they are the target of many of the crooks of the world. That is the reality of Labor getting it right. We now have great national savings. My understanding is we have the third-biggest pool of managed funds in the world.

The second goal was to reduce the cost burden on the tax welfare system of an ageing population so that the pension was a safety net for only the low paid. Obviously it is not ample, but it is adequate. For self-funded retirees, dividend decisions and daily share market fluctuations can cause a lot of anguish. I know that. Many of them are living a life of quiet dignity, not wasting their money overseas on cruises, as Deputy Prime Minister Truss quite unfairly suggested. He is yet to apologise for that. It must have been tough for him going back to his electorate, which has a significant group of seniors.

The third goal of the Keating government was to allow the majority of people to fund their own retirement and to have the control and independence that comes with that. Labor has always been especially focused on improving the lives of our seniors. It was the Labor government that introduced the pension system in 1909. Back then, I think the average life expectancy for a male was only 52. Now life expectancy is up in the 80s. Back then, the ratio of workers to people on the pension was about seven to one. Now it is down to five to one or even four to one. The Whitlam Labor government's introduction of benchmarking the pension to workers' earnings has seen a doubling of the pension in real terms since 1972. Those were Labor government policies. In 1983 the Hawke government's statement of accord agreed to maintain the basic rate of the pension at or above 25 per cent of average earnings, a commitment reaffirmed by the government's statement, Better Incomes: Retirement income policy into the next century, released in 1989. A series of increases achieved this benchmark over the life of the Labor government.

Under the Hawke and Keating governments, the pension increased from 24 per cent of male total average weekly earnings under the Fraser government in 1982 up to 25.8 per cent of MTAWE on leaving office in 1996. In 1990, the Hawke government introduced the bereavement payment, equivalent to 14 weeks pension, payable to the surviving member of a pensioner couple. In 1994, the Keating government introduced the Commonwealth seniors health card. Labor has always been committed to looking after seniors. In 2009, the Rudd Labor government delivered the biggest increase to the pension in a century—something I am sure that MPs on every side of the chamber would acknowledge and still receive thanks for in their electorates.

The Australian age pension has endured through most of the 20th century and well into the 21st century—100 years of profound social and economic change, through world wars, a depression, recessions and booms, and even the global financial crisis of a few years ago that so-savaged world economies. Thankfully, we were able to steer our way through the crisis under Prime Ministers Rudd and Gillard and Treasurer Wayne Swan.

Today the age pension continues its vital role in providing income support on the basis of need to older Australians. It is a helping hand to those in need. We accept that. These changes have been enormous, but Labor's principle of giving older Australians security, support and dignity is the cornerstone of the system. This is the Australian way and it has obviously always been the Labor way. It is what drew me to the Labor party in the first place.

We appreciate and acknowledge the extraordinary contribution that senior Australians have made, and continue to make, to the Australian community through their experience and insight, through the care they provide for partners, friends and relatives and through their mentoring and volunteering. As we move into the centenary of Anzac, I particularly acknowledge that many of our seniors are the children of those Anzacs. They are a generation whose parents had horrors visited upon them, with 60,000 Australians dying overseas and not to mention more than 200,000 coming back injured most horrifically, with limbs lost. We should be particularly helpful to this generation of Australian seniors, whose parents went through that conflict where basically every street in Australia would have had a resident either killed or wounded overseas.

We know that many pensioners are finding it tough to make ends meet. I see that when doing volunteer work for Meals on Wheels dealing with people throughout the electorate. Cost-of-living pressures from groceries, bills and petrol mean it is harder and harder to make ends meet. In the 12 years of the Howard government there was no improvement to the base rate of the age pension. Obviously, that was something that was going to take place in the government's 13th year! The Howard government claimed credit for legislating the 25 per cent of male earnings benchmark in 1997, but that Labor policy had already been delivered consistently over the period of previous Labor governments. We believe that good governments protect the pension for those who need it most: people who have worked hard throughout their lives and who have given so much to our great country. That is why our focus has always been on making it easier for self-funded retirees to have a comfortable lifestyle in their retirement.

The government's recent cruel and nasty budget introduced measures to cut the age pension, the disability support pension, the carer payment, the seniors supplement, the school kids bonus, the income support bonus, the low-income superannuation contribution and many other payments that I could list. It is a horrible visitation upon electorates. I am sure members opposite with a significant number of seniors in their electorates would not be looking forward to the next election when the seniors of Australia will wreak their revenge at the ballot box. Now the government has proposed to spend—

Eric Hutchinson (Lyons, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order on relevance. This debate is about the Commonwealth seniors health card and we have not heard very much at all from the member on the other side—

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Lyons. This a wide-ranging debate. The member for Moreton has the call.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

With respect, Mr Deputy Speaker, I have been totally focused on the seniors health card and other measures bill. No wonder they are worried. These one-term wonders have wreaked this horrible budget on their seniors. No wonder they are nervous. They are getting a little bit flighty, a little bit punchy maybe.

I am not for one minute suggesting that the government's proposal to spend $95.5 million to increase eligibility for the seniors health card for those at the top of the pay scale means that you have a comfortable lifestyle. I understand that. I have met with many of my self-funded retirees and I have spoken—in fact, at Mount Gravatt, in your electorate, Mr Deputy Speaker Vasta—at some of the self-funded retirees forums. But, in the context of the budget and the horrible budget decisions visited upon older Australians, the Labor Party will oppose this bill.

We believe that assistance needs to be provided through pensions and income support, and all the cuts that have been trotted out by Prime Minister Abbott are what we are focused on. We provided an historic increase to the pension when in government—the biggest in 100 years. It meant that pensioners could better meet front-line services. Obviously, it is in our DNA to look after the pension; it is something we hold dear. Those people who are already struggling to make ends meet will be slugged with a tax every time they go to the doctor, which will easily increase above $550 per household that those opposite claim is the cost; but, as we know, that is an average. Pensioners understand electricity and gas. They know how to put on a jumper and how to turn off lights in a room. For them to be slugged with all these other costs and for the idiots opposite to then hold up this $550 is unbelievable. Those opposite are betrayed by their own brain, obviously.

Seniors will now be paying higher fees for their medicines and will suffer the repercussions of the heavy burden put on our health care system as the government slashes funding to health and hospitals, even though they said before the election that that would not take place. The bill before the House betrays the government's twisted priorities to support higher income earners, or people with more money, while cutting support for vulnerable Australians. It is a weird budget, where the government asks the people who are the poorest and most vulnerable to do all the heavy lifting, while the top quartile does the lightest work in this budget. They obviously smoked too many cigars and did not do enough thinking, and that is why this toxic budget will come back to bite them at the next election.

Even Australia's GPs are saying that the GP tax is unfair and bad for the health of ordinary Australians. Pensioners and families are under constant attack from this government, and with the fuel tax and other taxes on the cost of living, this legislation should be resisted. (Time expired)

Eric Hutchinson (Lyons, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

With due respect to the member for Moreton, one could be forgiven for not knowing exactly what the Social Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Seniors Health Card and Other Measures) Bill 2014 is about. Indeed, it is about an election promise that we went to the people with in September 2013 to index the income thresholds for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card. I know for those on the other side that election promises are sometimes things that they struggle with, but we are determined to make sure that our election commitments are delivered. While today is not a day for hubris, the decision that the Senate made today on the carbon tax makes it indeed a good day for families. It is indeed a good day for households; it is indeed a good day for small businesses all around this country, including my electorate of Lyons.

The measures relating to the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card apply to self-funded retirees in recognition of the contributions and, in many cases, the sacrifices that they have made over the course of their working lives. How important are self-fund retirees? They have taken responsibility for their contributions in order to make it possible for them to have the sort of retirement that they would like to have. As I say, in many cases, they have done this at great personal sacrifice. They have saved the taxpayers of Australia and, ultimately, the Commonwealth budget considerable cost by virtue of the fact that they have been able to implement measures to support themselves. This was an election commitment that we made and that we took to the people.

People have made the commitment to take on the responsibility to fund their retirement, often without the benefit of superannuation, over their working lives. Why is it that everything we have heard from those on the other side sounds as if they are almost taking as offence that these people could be so brazen, so bold, to have made provision for themselves? I simply do not understand it. I do not understand the thinking of this party towards people who taken responsibility, people who have made, in some cases, significant sacrifices. What is the hatred that exists on the other side for those people? What is wrong with those people that they have actually done the planning, made the sacrifices and funded themselves into their retirement?

We are talking here about 290,000 Australians who have done this through their working lives. They are not wealthy people in many instances, and that is why we have indexed the card from a modest $50,000 for singles and $80,000 for couples who are entitled to the health card. In my electorate of Lyons, 1,020 people receive the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card. Indeed, many of these people are not wealthy people. It is expected that up to 30,000 Australians, in addition to the 290,000 Australians who are already eligible for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card, will, because of the indexation thresholds being increased, now be eligible. We should be celebrating these people, because every person who funds their own retirement is one less person that the taxpayers of Australia need to fund. It is not rocket science. I think it was Paul Keating who said—and we have heard a lot about Bob Hawke today, and rightly so—that those somebodies are actually the taxpayers of Australia, who fund government spending. This measure simply means that more individuals will qualify for the Seniors Health Card and the concessions that are provided by the card, including the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme at a concessional rate, access to bulk-billing doctor appointments, and cheaper out-of-hospital medical expenses through the Medicare safety net. Indeed, 290,000 Australians will benefit, and up to 30,000 additional people will benefit. Indexing the income thresholds will commence on 20 September 2014, according to the CPI, or the cost of living, which will mean that self-funded retirees will qualify for this benefit or retain the value that the card offers as cost-of-living increases. Amendments to this legislation apply to the Seniors Health Card under either the Social Security Act 1991 or the Veterans Entitlements Act 1996.

One of the other key measures in the amendments before us today is that the time during which people with a seniors healthcare card who travel overseas will not need to reapply for the card has been extended from six to 19 weeks. I think this is a wonderful initiative, particularly for migrant families and people who are looking to have family reunions overseas. Those people around Australia, some of those 290,000 Australians with a Seniors Health Card, will be able to sleep easy tonight knowing that they will be able to go overseas to visit their relatives, some of whom they may not have seen for many years, and that if they stay away for less than 19 weeks they will not have to reapply for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card.

To try to localise this, I reference the president of the Northern Tasmania branch of the Association of Independent Retirees, Mr Graeme Barwick. He says that much of the proposed reform regarding the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card will be welcomed by Tasmanian independent retirees. He also said that his association has been lobbying for four years to have income thresholds for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card changed. Indeed, it was an election commitment that we made and that we took to the people, and we are delivering on that election promise—the federal government's commitment to index the income threshold to self-funded retirees applying for the Seniors Health Card to inflation from 20 September this year. He said that most independent retirees will be particularly happy about the extension of the maximum time that card holders can spend overseas before they have to reapply for it. In particular, this will apply to those people looking at having family reunions in different parts of the world. Graeme says that the six-week time frame did not work particularly well, even for those who perhaps chose to take some time overseas as part of a vacation. He is really pleased to see the changes, because it has been a long time since these qualification requirements were adjusted. He said that when he first applied for the card in the early 2000s the income threshold was set at $80,000 for a couple and $50,000 for an individual. So, it has been nearly 14 years since this recognition of the important commitment that these people have made and often the sacrifices that self-funded retirees have made during the course of their working life that these thresholds are now being indexed.

We have heard a lot from the other side with respect to pensioners. Again, there were some fundamental commitments that we made in the lead-up to the election. We said that we would stop the boats. We said that we would get rid of the carbon tax, and indeed that is what we have delivered on today. Also, the benefits that will apply to older Australians, including those people on the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card and self-funded retirees, and pensioners as well, not only will not have the burden of $550 a week that was imposed, on average, on every household around Australia but also will be able to keep the concessions. They will be able to keep the concessions—which were in fact the energy supplement, for example, which were commitments that were delivered by the previous government. We have honoured those commitments, and not only will you not have to pay the carbon tax but also you will be able to keep the energy supplement.

So, for all older Australians—be they self-funded retirees or be they pensioners—indeed this is a good day. And the best way we have been able to help pensioners is by getting rid of the carbon tax. The impact also flows through to electricity prices. It was only last week that the Tasmanian Energy Regulator highlighted the fact that electricity prices in my state will fall by 7.8 per cent and that pensions will continue to go up. For the next three years pensions will be indexed by either male average weekly earnings or the cost of living. Beyond 2017 they will continue to go up twice a year: they will go up in March and they will go up again in September each year, and they will continue to go up by the cost of living—which is how they were indexed in March this year. The scare campaign that has been run by those on the other side in respect of pensioners particularly has been simply something to behold. I am new to this, but the mistruths are there in black and white. And I say to every pensioner in my electorate—and there are many; I have one of the older demographics in the country; Tasmania has one of the older demographics in the country—that your pensions will continue to go up. Each household will receive on average a $550 benefit because the carbon tax will no longer be there as of tomorrow. You will retain the energy supplements that were part of the compensation—for goodness sake; how does that work, what madness is that?—but you will not have to pay the carbon tax as of today.

I talked about social services when I previously spoke in here on another piece of legislation. We have a real challenge not only in this country but globally when you look at the demographics. Birthrates between 1950 and 1955 were 37 for every 1,000 people globally. Between 1990 and 1995 that had fallen to 24.3 for every 1,000 people. In the period 2030 to 2035 that is expected to fall to 16.1 for every 1,000 people. These are the challenges that we face not only in this country but globally. For example, in Australia in 1960 there were 10 working age people for every single person over the age of 65. Today there are five people of working age for every Australian over the age of 65. In 2050, it is predicted there will be 2.8 people of working age for every person over the age of 65.

We should be celebrating self-funded retirees and we should be so grateful to them. They are not wealthy people. Many of them did not have the luxury of having a superannuation contribution through most of their working life but were able to set themselves up for a retirement of their choosing. We should be grateful to the contribution that they have made, and this is recognition that we as a government value those 290,000 Australians—including, in my electorate of Lyons, the 1,020 Tasmanians—who have done that planning and made those sacrifices to prepare themselves for their retirement. We are indexing the thresholds for the Commonwealth seniors health card, which will allow it to retain its value and will retain available concessions when they visit the hospital or their GP. This is a good thing.

One thing is sure: older Australians have seen it all before. They know that coalition governments pay off debt. We did it in 1996. We have a bigger challenge in 2014. But those on this side are up for the challenge and we will deliver on the commitments that we made to the Australian people to pay back the debt that was created under six years of Labor. We have done it before and we will do it again. That is one thing that older Australians truly understand, whether they be self-funded retirees or pensioners. They have seen it all before. Older Australians know that as a household and as a nation you just cannot continue to pay the metaphorical mortgage on the metaphorical credit card.

Debate interrupted.