Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to join my colleagues in this debate on the Fairer Private Health Insurance Incentives (Medicare Levy Surcharge) Bill 2009 [No. 2] and the Fairer Private Health Insurance Incentives (Medicare Levy Surcharge—Fringe Benefits) Bill 2009 [No. 2] to strenuously oppose this latest cash grab by the Rudd government. The Prime Minister, Mr Rudd, in a letter he wrote on 20 November 2007, just a few days before the last election, said to Dr Michael Armitage, the CEO of the Australian Health Insurance Association:

Both my Shadow Minister for Health, Nicola Roxon, and I have made clear on many occasions this year that Federal Labor is committed to retaining the existing private health insurance rebates, including the 30 per cent general rebate and the 35 and 40 per cent rebates for older Australians.

That seemed to me to be a rock-solid guarantee, in writing, that Mr Rudd would not be doing what he is doing in this bill. I ask Senator Sherry, representing the government in this debate, what it is that allows Mr Rudd to make a rock-solid written promise like that and break it with impunity.

On the first day back in this sitting of parliament we are debating a broken promise, a broken commitment, by Mr Rudd. Instead, one would have thought we should have been debating the greatest moral challenge of our time. Mr Acting Deputy President, you will remember that Mr Rudd called his Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme the greatest moral challenge of all time. Yet, if it is such a challenge, why are we not debating that this week? Why are we instead debating a broken commitment, a commitment made in writing by the Prime Minister just before the last election? I note in passing that the list of speakers is pretty short when it comes to the participation of Labor senators in this debate. I can well understand their reluctance and reticence to get involved in this debate. Which Labor senator would want to promote a bill that is a direct breaking of a written promise by their leader just a couple of days before the last federal election? I can well understand why Labor senators are running for cover in this debate. It seems incredible and improbable to me that, instead of debating the greatest moral challenge of our time, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, we are here today debating the breaking of a direct written commitment by Mr Rudd just before the last election.

Labor’s manifest inadequacies in health administration are many and varied. Wherever you look around the public policy area you can see Labor has failed in health as it has failed in economic management. During this debate I want to mention to senators an experience I have personally had in the way the Labor government has messed up pathology tests. You will recall that in the last budget the government took $180 million off pathology tests. Senators may know that in 1996 I had open-heart surgery and had my aortic valve replaced with a plastic one. To keep my heart operating and to keep me alive, I have to keep my blood thin, which means I take Warfarin every day. To make sure the Warfarin is properly adjusted, I have regular pathology tests. For the last 13 years I have had a pathology test every three or four weeks at no charge. Now under the Rudd Labor government it is going to cost me $40 a time to stay alive. That is not too bad for me—perhaps I can afford it—but there are many of my constituents who simply cannot afford the $40 a time under Labor.

Debate interrupted.