Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. After the election, the Prime Minister said that he had learnt his lesson about his cuts to Medicare. So why does this health department document reveal that his Medicare freeze stays until 2020 for 113 different types of Medicare services? Doesn't this only confirm that the Prime Minister has actually learnt nothing since the election about Medicare and that he and his Liberal government cannot be trusted with Medicare in Australia?

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am glad the Leader of the Opposition has spoken about trust. Nobody, through his life, has betrayed the trust of Australians more consistently than this Leader of the Opposition. This is a man who, eyes filled with tears, talked about the importance of raising the Medicare levy by half a per cent to better fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme. He called on the coalition to support it, and we did. But now, of course, when the opportunity comes to fill that gap that he and his party left, he chooses tactics over principle, politics over policy and his own shabby political path of self-interest over the advice of the majority of his own shadow cabinet.

It does not just stop there. How long and how often have we listened to the lectures about needs-based funding? How often has David Gonski's name been taken in vain by this posturing fellow—a fellow dripping with empathy and concern about Australian students but then does 27 secret deals so appalling that David Gonski's collaborator Ken Boston described them as a 'corruption? Seventy-five times he is on the record supporting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister will resume his seat.

Mr Champion interjecting—

The member for Wakefield is warned. The Manager of Opposition Business, on a point of order.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On direct relevance, Mr Speaker: in terms of being on the topic area, we have shifted not just from Medicare but to an entirely different portfolio in this answer.

Government members interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Members on my right do not need to answer the Manager of Opposition Business when he has raised a point of order with me. The Manager of Opposition Business will know that I have spoken on this issue before with respect to trust in a preamble, but he does have a valid point. The question was about health and Medicare in particular, and I am sure the Prime Minister is about to direct himself to that subject matter in the question.

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are guaranteeing Medicare. We are establishing a Medicare guarantee fund. We have backed our guarantee with an additional investment of $2.4 billion for Medicare over the next four years, which includes lifting Labor's Medicare indexation freeze. This was a Labor freeze imposed by Labor, and the Minister for Health has negotiated with the AMA and the general practitioners to progressively lift that freeze, and that is happening. At the same time, the rate of GP bulk-billing has continued to rise in the first quarter of this year, hitting 85.6 per cent. We are delivering on our commitment to a strong Medicare and a strong PBS. We are listing new drugs on the PBS, drugs Labor did not list. We are listing drugs like the drug Entresto, for the treatment of chronic heart failure. We have listed over 1,400 new medicines on the PBS. How many were listed under Labor's last three years?. There were 331. They rationed those life-saving drugs; we are providing them for the health of Australians. (Time expired)