Justine Keay (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yet again I need to put on the record that Tasmania has felt the brunt of the government's Medicare bulk-billing freeze. There were over 383,000 fewer visits with bulk-scheduled fees across the country in the last six months along. Tasmania is the hardest hit, with bulk-billing for GPs dropping nearly two per cent in that period, from 76.4 per cent to 74.5 per cent, the lowest in the country. As a result of the government's cuts, Tasmanians are paying more and more out of their own pocket for their own health care. This is in a state with an increasing ageing population and with people who are generally lower paid and simply cannot afford to cover the extra cost needed to see a doctor.

GPs across the country are reeling from the open attack on general practice. The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners in a letter to me recently said, 'Nowhere is this being felt more acutely than in the northern suburbs of Hobart and in the north-west of Tasmania,' in my electorate, where for the first time in memory struggling patients are being asked to pay out-of-pocket expenses for GP visits. As recently as October, the AMA warned that this would happen with AMA Vice President Dr Tony Bartone saying:

The freeze is an enormous burden … on GPs.

and

Practices cannot continue absorbing the increasing costs.

He also said.

Many patients will pay more to see their doctor because of the Medicare freeze.

Unfortunately, it seems his predictions have come true. The reality is that these cuts are hurting—.(Time expired)