Kerry Nettle (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I wanted to indicate that the Greens are happy to support each of these amendments on the basis that they provide a range of options about how anyone may proceed with this bill. As I said at the outset, the Greens are opposed to the sale of Medibank Private.

I think there are some interesting issues that have been raised in the discussions. One of those issues was about how the Senate committee process has dealt with this legislation. I have been part of that debate previously to say that the one-day hearing—the bill being sent to a committee that considered this as nothing more and nothing less than a sell-off of public assets—did not allow for the same level of discussion about the health consequences of the sale of Medibank Private. That is the issue that has been the focus of the Greens concerns around this legislation and around the second reading debate. The next two amendments, which I will move later in the committee stage, are about the health consequences of this legislation, which we think would best have been dealt with in a different way than by the one-day hearing that they received under this government.

I want to talk about the financial position of Medibank and the issues that have been raised about the rights of existing Medibank Private members. I am sure everybody can find the section in the bill that deals with this issue; it is the compensation for acquisition of property section in part 8 of the bill. That is, of course, an acknowledgement by the government that this is a concern, regardless of what Senator Minchin may say to us in this chamber and on other occasions.

In regards to the contributions that members have made to Medibank Private, it is also worth pointing out that they are not the only people who have contributed to Medibank Private. Amongst those contributors is, of course, the Commonwealth, because the financial position of Medibank Private during the past 20 years has varied. It generated a loss in 2001-02 of $175 million, which resulted in the Commonwealth injecting into it $85 million in public funds. I suppose that comes to the issue of any role the public has in this particular asset and is central to the many reasons why the Greens are not supporting this particular sell-off. Given that these amendments seek to deal with ways that these issues may proceed, we are happy for there to continue to be discussion on how that may occur. Another issue that has been raised in the debate by Senator Minchin is that of a conflict of interest. The Parliamentary Library pointed out that the government has not provided any evidence of the likely forms of such a conflict of interest.

The final point I want to make is that Senator Minchin raised the view, as he has on many occasions, that there is no policy reason for the government to continue to own a health fund. I think this is the second time today that I have pointed to a former Prime Minister from the Liberal Party, Malcolm Fraser, who is opposing this sale. His opposition to this sale and the role that he has played in Medibank Private indicate that the Liberal Party of the past clearly had a policy reason for owning a health fund, and that is notably different to the views of the current Liberal Party.

With those comments, I indicate that the Greens are happy to support these proposals as options in the context of us not supporting the sale of Medibank Private and wishing primarily to deal with the health consequences of that, which have not been part of the way the government has sought to manage this sale or the Senate inquiry into this legislation, and hence the second reading amendment that the Greens moved and the next series of amendments that I shall move on behalf of the Greens in this committee stage.