Carina Garland (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the minister for health: how is the Albanese Labor government making medicines cheaper for millions of Australians, what advice has informed the government's policy and who will benefit?

Mark Butler (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Chisholm for her question. I know how hard she campaigned in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne on our promise to make medicines cheaper, and our government are delivering on that promise. Just last July we slashed the maximum amount that pensioners and concession card holders would pay for their medicines across a given year by 25 per cent, and in September we cut the price of 2,000 brands of medicine, putting $130 million back into the pockets of hardworking Australians. As everyone in this House knows, on 1 January we delivered the biggest cut to the price of medicines in the 75-year history of the PBS, putting more than $200 million every single year back into the pockets of hardworking Australian patients.

But there is more that the government can and the government should be doing here. Over summer the peak medicines experts, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, advised our government that more than 300 common medicines for chronic disease should be able to be supplied for 60 days rather than the current maximum of 30 days. This would bring us into line with pretty much every country to which we usually compare ourselves: the UK, New Zealand, Canada, France, Germany and so many others besides. It would halve the number of times those patients would have to visit the GP to get a routine repeat script, freeing up millions of GP consults, which everyone in this House knows is desperately needed. It would halve the cost of those common medicines for six million Australian patients living with chronic disease—medicines for blood pressure, heart disease, cholesterol, Crohn's disease and so much more. Overseas evidence tells us that this extra dispensing arrangement will increase medication compliance by up to 20 per cent. The AMA said this is a win for patients, ultimately delivering better health outcomes and taking pressure off the health system. This is good for the hip pockets of Australian patients, and it's good for their health as well, which is why a long list of patient groups—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Mark Butler (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I notice that the opposition is simply interjecting with the pharmacy lobby's talking points, not patient groups. Asthma Australia, the Heart Foundation, Diabetes Australia, the Breast Cancer Network, the Consumer Health Forum—name a patients' group that has opposed this measure.

Honourable members interjecting—

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Minister for Climate Change and Energy, the member for Groom and the member Barker will cease interjecting.

Mark Butler (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is not for the first time that government has got this advice, because five years ago the former government got the same advice from the same advisory committee, and, instead of choosing the interest of patients, they chose to do nothing. Over those five years, hundreds of millions of dollars have been paid by patients when their medicines' experts told them they didn't have to.