Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

So, yes, perhaps it is taking place in a telephone box. But, apparently, it does not include Senator Nash, because she tells us nothing is on the table—yet we have had the health minister himself telling us there is going to be this frank and fearless discussion. Time is running out, because the budget is due in May, under 12 weeks away. We are told there is a plan. We are told there is frank and fearless discussion. When is that going to happen? When will voters in my state of Western Australia get to hear about what is in store for them? What is in store for Western Australian families when they go to a doctor? How much more is the Abbott government going to force them to pay?

Again, we see this emerging theme: don't let facts, science or academic research get in the way of ideology. The AMA, usually the friend of the Abbott government, is totally opposed to any kind of GP co-payment and, indeed, questions what is actually going to be put in place. It goes further and says there is no proof of overservicing—something we even heard Senator Smith go on about today—no proof that a co-payment is going to do anything at all. Further, the AMA says it will push people back to hospitals, and yet the government will not confirm what will happen in our hospitals. Indeed, people have talked about a co-payment, if you front up to an emergency department. So it is time now for this government to come clean about its plan. We were told today—it is the only thing we heard today from Senator Nash who said 'some plan'. It must be a secret plan. It is time to put the plan out there.

The Abbott government, prior to September, was very clear about its agenda. Ever since then we have seen a secret agenda and it is a big secret in Western Australia. Western Australians have a right to ask and a right to know if they are going to be having to stump up a co-payment that will add to the cost of families already suffering massively high electricity bills under the mismanagement of Colin Barnett. Indeed, as Senator Sterle says, the Prime Minister wants to model himself on Premier Barnett. The only thing they have got in common at the moment is they both seem to have lost their treasurers. But it is time, clearly, for the government to come clean, to tell the people of Western Australia what is in store for them before the Senate election.

Question agreed to.