Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health Administration) Share this | Hansard source

Just to allay the minister’s concerns: far be it from me to verbal the Minister for Health and Ageing, even though that is something that she herself is quite up to doing when she circulates propaganda sheets which present questions asked at an inquiry as a statement of position. Let me quickly read out to you the direct quote of the answer provided by the Minister for Health and Ageing to a question by Matthew Abraham on 891 ABC yesterday morning. Mr Abraham asked a very incisive question:

And how will you stop them from putting up their rates to compensate for this, because you wouldn’t want them to go broke, would you?

Mrs Roxon said:

Well, no, that’s why I say, you’ve got to balance those things and I don’t want to pretend to the community that, you know, there isn’t an inevitability of some increases…

The reality is this—