Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I am not going to reiterate the arguments I made a short time ago other than to highlight our belief that this issue is about patients. They are being caught in the middle. I am concerned that the government is trying to hide behind the argument that wealthy practitioners are seeking to line their own pockets. I have highlighted the fact that we are concerned about some of the high costs and that this rebate probably does need to be reviewed—but in finer detail, not by just slashing it in half. We do not wear the argument that the only reason we should support the cut to this rebate is that there are practitioners who have high incomes. As I said, we acknowledge that there are issues there; equally, we think there are issues on the side of the ophthalmologists, who are concerned about it being slashed to just one rate, and that there needs to be some finessing of that.

The government have also highlighted, as has the opposition, the point that if the bill we have just dealt with does not pass the House of Representatives and this disallowance motion goes through we may be in scenario where we do not have any rebate for this procedure. I have sought advice on this and, as I understand it, the government could bring in a new rebate tomorrow. In other words, they have had plenty of time to sit down and talk to the ophthalmologists about this and plenty of time to deal with it, yet it still has not been resolved. As I said, there are issues on both sides; it is not the fault of one side or the other. However, patients are again being caught in the middle. The government could bring back a new rebate today. There is plenty of room for the government to manoeuvre.

It is unfortunate that we have had to go to these lengths to achieve this. I do take slight offence that this is being termed a stunt. The Senate is here to debate these issues. These concerns have been firmly on the agenda for months and months—since May. The government is right; it put this on the agenda in May—and people started raising concerns then. This was raised at budget estimates in May and early June, so it should come as no surprise that these issues are of concern. The Greens have been very careful to listen to both sides of the debate on this. We have heard the ophthalmologists, we have heard the government and we have sympathies for both. The point is: this issue has not been resolved, so we are reduced to this process in the Senate. Unfortunately, it is a mess.

The Greens want to see a way forward out of this. We have been trying to negotiate a way forward but unfortunately it has come down to this. We do not want to have issues of a complex nature such as this one on rebates sorted out in this chamber. It would have been much better if it had been resolved earlier. Unfortunately, it has not been and we have come to crunch time. The Greens have not been convinced that just halving the rebate in this way is the way to go. As I said, we have concerns about the impact of these cuts on those on low incomes and on the ageing in our community.

We are not convinced by the government’s call on this. We are extremely sympathetic to dealing with this issue but we have not been convinced by their arguments. Equally, we are not convinced by the arguments of the ophthalmologists that we should do nothing; we do think there should be some refinement of this rebate. We do not support the process to date and believe the government need to go back and rethink it. Equally, ophthalmologists need to be prepared to enter into negotiations about how we can resolve this in a way that causes the least pain to the people caught in the middle—that is, low-income Australians and the ageing in our community. We urge the government to rethink this and, if this disallowance motion is successful, to come back immediately with new rebate figures that can be supported by both sides—in the same way that they entered into negotiations with health professionals, the community and consumers to come up with a satisfactory outcome in the ART debate. The government do not have to leave this languishing. The ball is back in their court to show some maturity in this debate and come back with rebates that meet everybody’s requirements.