Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House notes that:

(1) Australian Hearing Awareness Week runs from 23 to 29 August 2015;

(2) Australia has world class hearing services including those which have been delivered through Australian Hearing since it was established to assist returning Diggers in 1947;

(3) hearing loss currently affects one in six Australians and is predicted to affect one in four Australians by 2050; and

(4) events will be held all around the country to raise awareness of hearing issues including the Australian Hearing Hub Open House which will be held at Macquarie University on 22 August 2015 in the lead up to the Australian Hearing Awareness Week.

Australian Hearing Awareness Week is a very important week that runs from 23 August to 29 August 2015—next week. It is very important for people to focus on their hearing and, in particular, on testing it. We have to thank the organisers, the Office of Hearing Services and the Deafness Forum of Australia. There are events running around Australia. In my own electorate, Australian Hearing have a bus which I have seen around in the electorate from time to time. The last time I saw it will was at the Jack Young Centre for Seniors at Salisbury. It will be stopping by various locations throughout Adelaide. On 27 August, between 9 am and 4 pm, it will be at Bunnings Munno Para, so it will be busy—a lot of people do their shopping there. It will be providing the same service that Australian Hearing has been providing for so many years. In fact, since 1947, this important Australian institution has been serving the public under governments of both persuasions. It even had significant expansions during the Holt and the Howard governments. Australian Hearing is an institution that we should be proud of. We should also be proud of Australia's record on hearing. I am sure that members following from the opposite side will give us an indication of that.

Unfortunately Australia's success in this area is under threat because the government's audit commission recommended the privatisation of Australian Hearing. Australian Hearing is a very important anchor for all of the private services, all of the charity services, all of the research that is done and all of the medical exports. Australian Hearing is the foundation stone of all of that. It is a great pity that the government has left a cloud over this institution—the cloud of privatisation.

Recently there were Senate hearings into this privatisation, and what did we find? We found that the government has not consulted enough. Mrs Porter, who came to give some information to the Senate committee, said:

… we had compiled a really long list of questions that we have constantly sent to the Office of Hearing Services, the Department of Health and the Minister for Finance about all the issues that we are concerned about. From my understanding, those were really not addressed at that consultation.

She also said:

We did a submission when we heard about the scoping study. We decided to do a submission which we sent to the Department of Finance. After we sent that, we did get asked to go to PwC, who gave us a fair bit of their time. We have not seen a scoping study.

What we have seen here is a government that launched a scoping study but did not consult anybody about it—not any of the service providers or anyone in the industry. It basically had a consultation that nobody went to.

We know that consultation is so important because one of the other issues that was brought up at the Senate select committee was the interaction between Australian Hearing, the Office of Hearing Services and the NDIS. Some of the evidence at that Senate committee was that that question has not been resolved and is entirely up in the air.

We have a government that has not consulted and a government that has not thought through the interactions of hearing services. Services are provided by Australian Hearing to a person from birth until the age of 26 and post 65 years. But the government has not thought about the interaction with hearing services that goes on in an individual's life between the ages of age 26 and 65. We know it has not thought that through, because the Senate heard evidence to that effect. We know it has not thought through the privatisation, because in the budget it has kicked the can down the road another few months while it arbitrates within the government about whether to privatise an institution that has been around since 1947 under governments of both persuasions—an institution which does not need to be privatised.

There is no money in it. All that will happen is that services will become contestable. Australian Hearing services 468 locations, including 212 remote locations. In a country this large no collection of providers will be able to provide the service that Australian Hearing, a government backed and government owned institution, does. The government should think about what it is doing and reject privatisation.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

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

I second the motion. I rise today in support of this motion and I commend the member for Wakefield for moving this motion. I understand it is an area of great interest to him. It is very important for the House to acknowledge that, in Australia, Hearing Awareness Week runs from 23 to 29 August 2015. This is particularly pertinent given that hearing loss currently affects one in six Australians and is predicted to affect one in four Australians by 2050.

This motion also provides an opportunity to acknowledge the role that Australian Hearing plays in our nation's health system and to understand why this organisation should be kept in government hands. It was only about twelve months ago that I spoke in this House about my concerns about the Liberal-National government's proposal to potentially privatise Australian Hearing. At the time, I spoke of the vital service that Australian Hearing has provided to the people not just in my electorate of Richmond but indeed right throughout the nation since its inception in 1947.

In fact, Australian Hearing was established by the Chifley government in 1947. It was started to provide services to returning servicemen and servicewomen and to children who had lost their hearing from rubella outbreaks. It has operated in government hands ever since. It is now the sole hearing service provider for children under the age of 26. It also provides services to former military personnel, age pensioners and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders over the age of 50. Australian Hearing provides services at 468 hearing centres and visiting sites throughout Australia, including many rural and regional centres where hearing health services might not otherwise be available. Included in the 468 locations are 212 remote communities. The services include hearing tests, fitting hearing devices and providing counselling and rehabilitation programs.

It is hard to imagine who would service these communities if Australian Hearing were to be privatised. As we have said, we on this side of the House oppose the privatisation of Australian Hearing services and we are concerned about the possible impact that privatising Australian Hearing could have upon the quality of services and the ability to access such services. The peak bodies representing hearing impaired Australians have also expressed their strong opposition to the government's proposal to privatise Australian Hearing. The fact is that Australian Hearing and the National Acoustic Laboratories play a significant and important role in providing world-class hearing services at a low cost to hundreds of thousands of Australians every year.

Australian Hearing has an internationally recognised reputation as a best practice government provider and research organisation. Indeed, that great record of achievement is now under threat because of this government. But the fact is that the government has absolutely no case for privatisation and has ignored the widely expressed concerns about risks to the quality of and access to these services.

This is an important discussion to have, especially with Hearing Awareness Week almost upon us. As we have said, that week runs from 23 to 29 August and aims to highlight the many events being held around the country. The events will focus on the nation's hearing health and the many solutions that are now available to the rapidly growing number of with hearing impairment sufferers. Events will be held around the country to raise awareness of hearing issues, including the Australian Hearing Hub Open House which will be held at Macquarie University on 22 August in the lead-up to the Hearing Awareness Week.

As we all know, and as the member for Wakefield said in introducing this, hearing does matter. It is important that we do more to understand the causes and the scale of the problem that we face today. In fact, one in six Australians have some sort of hearing impairment or disorder and this is predicted to affect one in four Australians by 2050. We know that hearing impairment or deafness afflictions occur via a number of ways through medical conditions or injury. Some people are born with hearing impairments while others may develop them as they get older or, indeed, through injury or exposure to loud noises. It is vitally important that we do raise awareness of those early warning signs and to ensure that people get checked. A decline in one's hearing tends to go unnoticed for some time—it can be a gradual process—and it is important that people are aware of the warning signs and that they get checked as soon as they are aware of any issues.

As I have said, Australian Hearing provide an extensive array of services, particularly to young adults who are under 26 years of age, Indigenous Australians, former military personnel and elderly Australians with complex hearing needs. They provide a range of very important services often to people who simply cannot afford the full commercial services for hearing tests, for fitting hearing devices or for accessing some of the many excellent rehabilitation programs that are available as well. We know that Australian Hearing can provide these services and we know that privatising these services would be devastating for those groups that are in need. As we focus upon the value of Australian Hearing in Australian Hearing Awareness Week, let us keep working to keep this great organisation in government hands so that it can keep doing its vital work.

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

It is a pleasure and an honour to speak on the motion on Australian Hearing Awareness Week. I need to inform everyone that my attempts to raise this motion in the Federation Chamber were unsuccessful. I was rebuked, and I apologise for being five minutes late.

Hearing is something that we must be mindful of. There have been many famous and prominent Australians who have suffered with hearing loss. Much of it is due to cumulative exposure, as we know. I want to say to the member for Richmond that I think they were relatively ill-informed comments to be highly critical of the role of the private sector in hearing. Like dentistry, the private sector plays a very important role. It only betrays that the member for Richmond has never walked into a private hearing provider when she talked about the quality that they deliver. The quality is exceptional and no independent and fair-minded person would say otherwise.

The member for Richmond did raise a significant point about the community service obligation if one were to ultimately dispose of the assets of Australian Hearing to potentially private sector buyers. The big concern really would be if it were purchased by a major multinational that was basically the provider and vendor of just one hearing aid line of products. That would be a concern. Not all private providers do that and there is a chance to energise the sector by having Australian Hearing in hands other than those of the government.

Let us now focus on 23 August. I know that the notion of Hearing Awareness Week has been used as a Trojan Horse to have a red-hot crack at the private sector, which Labor has tried to do today, but I reassure all of those Australians who quietly walk into a private hearing provider that yes, the quality of care is just the same as at Australian Hearing, which is government owned, and no, the sky will not fall in, the private providers will not rip you off and penalty rates will not be affected if you see a private hearing provider—they will look after you; you are in great hands. Our health system, much as Labor tries to deny it, is built on the back of private provision, and having a blended private-public model is actually what makes it so strong—something that Labor has never understood and has fought against since the mid-1970s.

Hearing can be lost with both relatively acute and seriously severe events. Examples of those are military service and exposure to sustained levels of high-volume music in nightclubs. I mention those two because we need to be aware the risks facing not only veterans, farmers and those who work in industry but also those who have high levels of recreational noise exposure. They are both very important. Awareness is important. The propensity to throw on some ear protection is sometimes seen as being weak and not being able to handle it. Farmers in particular say that they have done it forever and they do not see the problem. We need to have those really clear discussions about the importance of looking after your hearing.

I will go through some examples. Once you start exceeding 110 decibels, which is similar to a gunshot or to a jet taking off, you can only stand around one minute of that kind of exposure before you start seeing damage to the inner ear. At the other end of the equation at about 65 decibels, which is probably a really noisy household appliance, you are unlikely to see too much damage until you have had more than one hour of exposure.

Importantly, once children lose their hearing it is almost impossible to bring it back without great expense. It is important to note that many of the hearing aids that are available to children are removed once they turn 18 because the public access program terminates. The problem there is that people are given at the last gasp before they turn 18 the best possible hearing aids and then basically they are left with that device for however long it lasts. It is clearly iniquitous. I agree we need to look after kids but we also need to find a smoother way of looking after people who have severe needs but happen to be 18 years and one day old.

The incidence of hearing loss of course increases just with age. We know that half the population between 60 and 70 are affected and that rises to 80 per cent once you get to 70. We are already doing everything we can to help veterans, and no-one on either side of the parliamentary fence would question that. Most importantly, I think an excellent message to leave with is that, if there is one group that is not fully aware of their exposure, it is young people, particularly with recreational exposure in nightclubs and loud music concerts. We do need to say to them that it is completely okay to wear hearing protection in those circumstances because that exposure is causing a wide degree of chronic but low-level damage that will ultimately be a large bill for this nation.

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Wakefield for bringing this very important motion to the House. I acknowledge that National Hearing Awareness Week is from 23 to 29 August. I say to the previous speaker that this motion is not about our blended public-private health system because the government is seeking to make it purely a private system and get out of providing services through Australian Hearing. Along with my colleagues and the mover of this motion, I am concerned about the impact that the privatisation of Australian Hearing could have on the quality of services and access to services. This is about ensuring that Australians with hearing loss can access services. The current status is that the government has deferred making a decision on the privatisation while it consults on how Australian Hearing will fit into the NDIS. More to the point, in last year's budget, the Treasurer stood up and announced a scoping study into the privatisation of Australian Hearing. He did so without talking to any of the people involved—the peak bodies or consumers. This was a unilateral decision that the Treasurer introduced in last year's budget.

Australian Hearing was established by the Chifley government in 1947. It was started to provide services to returning servicemen and women and children who had lost their hearing from rubella outbreaks, but since that time it has grown and now provides service to many, many young people and particularly children. I would like to share with the House the story of a young mother of twin boys who came to see me, Angela Lamb. Her two boys, Kai and Ryan, were born at 28 weeks, and Ryan had very significant hearing loss. Angela told me how it was all a blur at the start; there were numerous tests that had to be undertaken; luckily the costs of hearing aids, FMs and batteries were all covered for her by Australian Hearing. Angela also had access to early intervention services. Those early intervention services were coordinated through Australian Hearing and have made an enormous impact on Ryan's life. I met with Ryan and he could communicate really effectively with me, all because of the input from Australian Hearing. He has been able to attend a mainstream day-care centre, and he will be attending a mainstream school next year. He has been exposed to so many different things because of the way his hearing loss has been handled by Australian Hearing.

It is not only children who benefit from Australian Hearing. Australian Hearing is vitally important to Angela and to other parents with children who have lost hearing. I have also been contacted by a number of senior Australians who have used the services of Australian Hearing. They speak so highly of it and they rely on it to ensure that they get access to the quality hearing services they need to maintain a good level of hearing.

I would also like to share with the House that Australian Hearing provides 468 hearing centres throughout Australia, including many visiting centres in rural and regional centres where hearing health services might not otherwise be available. Services include hearing tests, fitting hearing devices and providing counselling and rehabilitation programs. Included in the 468 locations are 212 remote communities. It is hard to imagine who will service these communities if Australian Hearing is privatised, because we all know it is hard to get private health services in remote areas. Together with its research division, the National Acoustic Laboratories, Australian Hearing helps people with complex hearing health problems to participate fully in life by developing language skills, participating in education and enjoying the family and social activities that lead to a fulfilment of life. Australian Hearing has been a valuable service in our country for years. I support it, Labor supports it, and we want it here to stay.

John Alexander (Bennelong, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on this motion. I am grateful to the member for Wakefield for again raising the important issues around hearing and hearing loss in this place and for giving me the opportunity to highlight the Abbott government's proud track record in this area, together with the local connection to my electorate of Bennelong. Hearing loss affects one in six Australians and is expected to rise to one in four by 2050, as a result of Australia's ageing population. The Abbott government is committed to reducing the avoidable incidents and consequences of hearing loss in our community and will continue to provide eligible Australians with access to high-quality hearing services.

The Hearing Services Program provides access to quality hearing services under the voucher program and community service obligation component. In 2014-15 around 270 hearing providers, including Australian Hearing, delivered services nationally to almost 670,000 voucher clients with an average age of 80 years and at a cost of around $384 million. During this period Australian Hearing was provided with $62.693 million in funding for community service obligation services. Australian Hearing delivered services to 58,034 CSO clients, including 33,150 children and young adults. The federal government also provides the National Acoustic Laboratories, the research arm of Australian Hearing, with approximately $4 million annually to support research into hearing health, rehabilitation and prevention. Over the past year the government has consulted with key hearing stakeholders on the implementation of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and how it will affect the delivery of hearing services in Australia. A report back to government on the outcome of the stakeholders sessions is being prepared.

In the 2013-14 budget the former Labor government decided that funding for services delivered under a range of Commonwealth health programs, including the community service obligation program, were to transition to the NDIS. This will change how services are provided, irrespective of Australian Hearing's future ownership. The Hearing Services Program is only one of 16 programs transitioning in whole or in part to the NDIS. As a result, the scoping study into the privatisation of Australian Hearing has been deferred in order to allow the stakeholders consultation process to be undertaken. The consideration of future ownership options for Australian Hearing will not impact on the eligibility for, or the funding of, the community service obligation, whose services will continue to be available to those eligible. Consulting further with the deaf community will help the Australian government manage the transition of certain clients of the Hearing Services Program to the NDIS as well as inform the government's consideration of the scoping study into Australian Hearing.

The electorate of Bennelong has often been described as the innovation capital of Australia. In the hearing space alone we are most fortunate to boast Cochlear, the Australian Hearing Hub, National Acoustics Laboratories and, of course, the amazing research experts from Macquarie University. Next week we will be celebrating Australian Hearing Awareness Week with a range of activities in Bennelong. On Saturday 22 August the Australian Hearing Hub will have an open house—a free family-friendly event that will include hearing tests, research activities, demonstrations and a tour of the amazing anechoic chamber. I encourage all my colleagues to come to Bennelong and make the most of these great opportunities, but if you are not lucky enough to be able to visit you can also participate in the Big Aussie Hearing Check 2015. Australian Hearing is rallying the country to come together in one special day in the name of hearing loss prevention. Volunteers will be popping up at famous landmarks, community halls, RSLs, pharmacies and health centres around the country to offer free hearing checks throughout the week. Australian Hearing will also be attempting to set a Guinness world record for the most number of checks performed in a day.

Research shows most Australians are reluctant to get their hearing checked. Like with most health concerns, prevention is always better than cure. Hearing is a vital sense, with loss having the potential of a myriad of repercussions, and I encourage all Bennelong residents to celebrate Australian Hearing Awareness Week and get their hearing checked.

Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Infrastructure) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I start by thanking the member for Wakefield and shadow parliamentary secretary for health for bringing this matter of hearing awareness before the House. Members will not know that he is a fierce champion for the users of Australian Hearing Services inside our caucus—they may be familiar with his advocacy work within the community, but he has a fierce voice and he is ever active on the matter. If good government were to start today, the first speaker from the government side on this motion would have been the Minister for Health. The minister for health would have taken the very short walk from her office to the dispatch box and she would have assured the House that the government no longer intends to proceed with the privatisation of Australian Hearing Services. That would be a welcome decision by this government; it would be a decision welcomed by all members on this side of the House. Members on this side of the House feel very protective of Australian Hearing Services. Of course it is an institution that belongs to all Australians, but we feel protective of it because it was a Labor Prime Minister in Ben Chifley who established Australian Hearing Services in 1947. It was, as the member for Shortland has told the House, started to provide hearing services to returning soldiers who had lost their hearing during battle in wars throughout the Pacific and in the European theatre and also to children who had lost their hearing from rubella outbreaks. It has done a very good job in government hands ever since.

Australian Hearing provides over 468 hearing centres right throughout Australia, including in many rural and regional centres where hearing health services might not otherwise be available. I hope there are going to be some speakers, apart from me, who will stand up for rural and regional constituents, because these are the areas that, more than any, rely on services that would not otherwise be available to them. In my own electorate of Throsby Australian Hearing has outlets in Warrawong, Dapto, Shellharbour and Albion Park. Many low income families in those areas simply would not have those services available to them were it not for these outlets. I take the opportunity to commend the work of the staff at Australian Hearing Services in those outlets and indeed right throughout the Illawarra and Southern Highlands.

Together with its research division the National Acoustics Laboratories, Australian Hearing helps people with often complex hearing health problems to participate fully in daily life. This is achieved through helping them to develop language skills, participate in education and enjoy the family and social activities that lead to a fulfilling life—things that we all take for granted but things that they would not be able to participate in without the services that Australian Hearing provides. Of Australian Hearing's 468 locations, over 210 are located in remote and rural communities throughout the country. It is hard to imagine who will service these communities if Australian Hearing is privatised. I know that I speak for many hundreds of families throughout rural and regional Australia when I echo their concern and stand in parliament today to champion their needs. I also point out the plight of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, around 70 per cent of whom live outside capital cities. They experience the highest levels of ear disease and associated hearing loss in the world. Rates of hearing problems in these communities are often 10 times more than rates for non-Indigenous Australians, and it is inconceivable how they will have those services provided if the government gets its way and proceeds with its plan to privatise Australian Hearing Services. Over 50 per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the Northern Territory have some form of hearing loss, with about 10 per cent of those having moderate to severe hearing loss.

If you want to look for a cause for people not being able to fully participate in education or if you want to look for a cause for people not being able to fully participate in the workforce, you need look no further than their incapacity to hear properly. How can we blame a child who does not attend school because they cannot hear what the teacher is saying because they do not have hearing services available to them? As a wealthy country, as a smart country, we can do a lot better than this. We must protect Australian Hearing. I commend all those on the Labor side and all those who support the same position on the other side of the House for championing the cause of Australian Hearing, which must remain in government hands.

David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I take this opportunity to again put forward my support for Hearing Awareness Week, between 25 and 31 August, and I congratulate the Deafness Forum of Australia for its initiative in promoting Hearing Awareness Week. The key objective of this week is to highlight hearing impairment and hearing loss, and provide greater recognition of this issue. It is not an uncommon problem, unfortunately. Hearing loss affects one in six of us Australians, and many of these problems can be prevented. There are issues around prevention and identification, but there are well-established services providing help and cure.

First of all, congenital deafness—through rubella and other uterine infections—which everyone is familiar with, can only being identified by widespread screening of children at very early ages. To get that intervention early, with cochlear implants, is vital. We have many institutions that are doing a fantastic job, and I would like to congratulate them, particularly bodies like The Shepherd Centre that run very effective intervention and training programs, and all the clinicians who are involved in cochlear implants—not to mention the Australian technology at the forefront of that invention which has liberated many people trapped inside sign language and other avenues of communication.

Another cause of hearing impairment is glue ear, a condition where the inner ear fills up with muck as a result of acute inflammation. This is also remediable, by putting little drains in the ear. In my electorate of Lyne, there are a lot of children, and, as the previous speaker, the member for Throsby, outlined, many people are not identified as having this problem. We have Australian Hearing services in Port Macquarie and in Taree that are doing a really great job trying to identify and offer relief to a lot of these people. But it is in the paediatric space that there are the best outcomes; therefore, regular, broad screening for hearing impairment in our young Australians is vital if we are going to make a big impact, as well as getting those with congenital and major hearing loss access to cochlear implants.

There are other forms of deafness we should be aware of, such as industrial deafness. Fortunately, most businesses and companies are now aware of prevention being better than cure. Earmuffs of all varieties are freely available, and it is a rare workplace now that does not have actions in place to mitigate that.

With regard to hearing services, the Commonwealth does provide a wide network of Australian Hearing offices, and I would like to highlight that they do a fantastic job. There are also private providers in this space, and I bring to the attention of the parliament the fact that some of this activity is, in my opinion, very opportunistic. They seem to be marketing the technology rather than addressing the problem. It is only with concerned, honest brokers that we are going to get universal attention and unbiased, not-commercially-driven analysis of who needs hearing intervention. It should be based on clinical judgement, clinical measurement and appropriate intervention, not on getting the most sales of hearing aids that people may or may not need. So we have to be careful whenever there is a push to intervene in certain areas, and make sure that the right decisions are being made.

We need to analyse this problem very clearly before we blow up a good service. It is with great pride that I have been able to have my say.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is always good to have a doctor in the house!

Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I acknowledge the member for Wakefield's contribution in bringing this motion before the House. I listen with interest when the good doctor, the member for Lyne, brings commentary to the House; it must always be taken in its entirety. He is a man who is of the utmost integrity.

I rise to speak on this motion because there is an image captured in my head. It was on an episode of 60 Minutes about what our wonderful doctors and nurses are doing in hearing advancement. I saw a small child, born deaf, having a hearing implant switched on for the first time and hearing its parents laughing, a parent calling its name. Previously, that world would have been blank, totally silent, but it now had voices, and noises like people's feet shuffling and, outside, birds singing, leaves rustling. All that would normally have been blank for a deaf child. Having that implant switched on for the first time is momentous not only for the child but also for the parents: imagine the life-changing environment it provides for a parent.

I was fortunate enough, when growing up, to have a great little mate—to this day I still refer to him as a brother—who was not completely deaf but, by crikey, he was on the way, and as a result we all learnt sign language. My sign language is not that good, but I can do the alphabet and I have enough pace about me to swear a couple of words back at him! But they are skills you never forget. I was probably 13 when I stopped signing, but I could still do it. When I am at a function or somewhere and there are people who are signing, although they are very quick I can pick up the gist of what they are saying.

I think it is important that we acknowledge that it is hearing week. It does normally fly under the radar. I acknowledge that Hearing Awareness Week runs from 23 to 29 August. There will be promotional stuff all around the country during the month of August. Australians have world-class hearing services, including those which have been delivered through Australian Hearing since it was established back in 1947. You can image the diggers returning from both world wars with their hearing gone after the bomb blasts. That is a side effect of the terrible wars. The last thing they probably heard was an all-deafening, mighty explosion.

Hearing loss currently affects one in six Australians and is predicted to affect one in four Australians by 2015. Why would it affect one in six? If I just did a straw poll of my colleagues here in this House, that number would appear to be accurate. There are advancements in technology happening in this space at the moment. Years ago hearing aids were clumsy, large, obstructive and visually ugly. Now there are members of this House who quite adequately hear and communicate and operate effectively with each other as a result of the advancements in hearing aids. In this chamber as we speak there are people utilising hearing aids—and if they are not, they should be.

I say to members and my mum who currently use a hearing aid: keep using it, stay involved in your community and stay active. We should praise and bless those magnificent people who have contributed such life-changing devices to the Australian public. I praise those people involved in the sector.

Debate adjourned.