Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The most important thing to remember about the Australian health system is that it is a combination of private and public systems, and through that combination the Australian people get a very good health service. The facts of the matter are that without a strong private sector there would not be the capacity in the public sector, in the public hospitals, to cater for the needs of the Australian population. There are just not enough beds, not enough operating theatres, and the waiting lists would be very long. That is why the Howard government Lifetime Health Cover policy was important—it enabled people who otherwise might not have been able to take out private health insurance to do so, and that meant they could access the private hospital sector and the private medical sector and not use the public hospital sector which, had they done so, would have been even more overcrowded than it is now with longer waiting lists and poorer service—not because the professional people in the public hospitals are negligent or disinterested in the people who come to those hospitals but simply because of the enormous weight of numbers, which would slow down the service.

The government's changes to private health insurance are already having an adverse effect on our hospital system, and Labor's private health insurance changes will put more pressure on public hospitals which are already struggling under the $1.6 billion cut to hospital funding under Labor's MYEFO

We believe in private health insurance. We believe in the private sector. We have to make sure that Labor is stopped in its tracks and that the quality of Australian medicine is maintained.