Justine Elliot (Richmond, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about the Abbott government's cuts to health programs and services. This budget contains so many cuts from last year's budget and at the same time it imposes almost $2 billion in new cuts to health. This is all despite the Prime Minister's election promise of 'no cuts to health', but that is exactly what we have got. In fact, total cuts across the health sector in his first two budgets now exceed significantly more than $60 billion. Some of these new budget cuts include the cruel cut to the IEM program, a $250 a month grant to assist people who need special foods because of genetic disorders. Despite the opposition continually calling on the government to reverse this cut, so far these calls have been ignored. It is a truly cruel and callous decision. The Abbott government has also abolished the GP after-hours hotline—a helpline that took more than 200,000 calls last year, some of those call from mums with sick kids in distress wanting help.

The budget has also cut $125 million from the Child Dental Benefits Schedule and more than $69 million from veterans' dental and allied health payments. We have also seen almost $1 billion in cuts to programs that fund important measures like preventative health care. And, of course, the government is also pressing ahead with its GP Tax by stealth, by freezing payments for general practices for four years. They are absolutely committed to this GP tax. They have tried many different forms of it. They are pushing ahead. This is all about the Abbott government trying to destroy Medicare through all these cruel and callous cuts.