Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Assistant Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to advise the Senate that these long-overdue changes to rural health have been very well received. For example, the Rural Doctors Association of Australia said:

Rural doctors are celebrating changes announced today by the Federal Government that will result in more doctors and better access to healthcare for the bush.

Professor Richard Murray, the immediate past president of ACRRM, said

This is an example of good public policy in action. It will make it easier to attract doctors to where they are most needed in communities across rural and remote Australia.

And the AMA president, Associate Professor Brian Owler said:

We congratulate [the government] for engaging with the medical profession, hearing and understanding the concerns of country doctors and their patients, and delivering a positive outcome.

That stands in stark contrast to what those in the Rural Doctors Association thought of the previous, Labor, government's policy approach, describing the ASGC-RA as an abomination of a scheme. And: 'Putting a suburb of Hobart, Wagga Wagga and Gundagai in the same section is a joke', Dr Mara said, pointing out the failed policy of the previous government.