Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Sorry, Senator Xenophon—minor parties and Independent senators. I was not in any way attempting to leave you out. At a time like this it is stunning that the Liberals are rejecting this bill and voting against the surplus and against relief for working families. Minister Roxon and the government thank the Greens, Senator Xenophon and Senator Fielding for their constructive approach to this issue.

I also want to make the point that our public hospitals are on a firm footing. We have already injected $1 billion this year, and they stand to benefit significantly from COAG at the end of the year. We are happy to support the amendment Senator Siewert will move for a review into the impacts of this measure on public hospitals, but we do not believe there will be any adverse impact on public hospitals as a result of this legislation that will pass through the parliament today. We would also particularly like to acknowledge the Greens’ support for using wages as the indexation factor into the future. We believe that this will lock in fairness for the future. It will make sure this surcharge will remain relevant to future incomes and will never again become the tax trap that the former Liberal government created.

We are also continuing discussions with Senator Xenophon and Senator Siewert regarding the terms of reference for a Productivity Commission inquiry into the cost of different procedures in the public and private systems. It is important to note for the record, as Senator Xenophon has done previously, that the government is already well advanced in negotiations with the states and territories to provide more transparency and accountable reporting on public hospitals. We are also in discussions with the private sector about the same performance indicators applying to private hospitals so that we will have a truly national system of reporting across public and private hospitals for the first time. The Productivity Commission will be able to draw on some of this work in its inquiry.