Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Mental Health) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I now move opposition amendments (2), (7), (10), (13) and (16) on sheet 7711:

(2) Clause 4, page 4 (lines 12 and 13), omit "Priorities. The Health Minister takes the Priorities into account", substitute "Priorities and to make recommendations to the Health Minister on providing financial assistance. The Health Minister must take the recommendations and the Priorities into account".

(7) Clause 10, page 12 (lines 23 to 28), omit "The Health Minister takes the Australian Medical Research and Innovation Priorities (which are determined by the Australian Medical Research Advisory Board under Part 2A) into account in making decisions about the financial assistance that is provided from the Medical Research Future Fund Special Account", substitute "The Health Minister makes decisions about the financial assistance that is provided from the Medical Research Future Fund Special Account following recommendations by the Australian Medical Research Advisory Board and taking into account the Australian Medical Research and Innovation Priorities (which are determined by the Advisory Board under Part 2A)".

(10) Clause 15A, page 17 (lines 14 to 16), omit subsection (2), substitute:

(2) The Health Minister must not require the Finance Minister to debit an amount unless:

  (a) the Health Minister has received a recommendation regarding the debiting of the amount from the Advisory Board; and

  (b) the Health Minister has taken into account the Australian Medical Research and Innovation Priorities that are in force.

  (2A) A requirement under subsection (1) is of no affect unless:

  (a) the Health Minister has caused to be laid before each House of the Parliament:

     (i) the Advisory Board's recommendations regarding the debiting of the amount; and

     (ii) if the recommendation was that the amount not be debited—the Minister's reasons for requiring that the amount be debited contrary to that advice; and

(b) both Houses of the Parliament by resolution have approved the making of the requirement.

(13) Clause 32A, page 27 (lines 8 to 10), omit "Priorities. The Health Minister takes the Priorities into account in making decisions in relation to the financial assistance provided from the Medical Research Future Fund Special Account", substitute "Priorities and make recommendations to the Health Minister on providing financial assistance. The Health Minister makes decisions about the financial assistance that is provided from the Medical Research Future Fund Special Account following recommendations by the Advisory Board and taking into account the Priorities".

(16) Clause 32C, page 28 (before line 13), before paragraph (a), insert:

  (aa) to make recommendations to the Minister on financial assistance to be provided from the Medical Research Future Fund Special Account; and

These amendments go to the principle that the health minister must act on the recommendations of the advisory board. Labor's amendments will limit ministers to only give instruction to make debits from the MRFF when they are based on the recommendations of the advisory board.

As I have already outlined, Labor believes that this process should be strengthened more than this, including through introducing a process of independent expert review as well as greater transparency on how that occurs. Labor's amendments will introduce a requirement that a decision has no effect unless the health minister has caused for there to be laid before each house of the parliament the advisory board's recommendations regarding the debiting of the amount and, if the recommendation was that the amount not be debited, the minister's reasons for requiring that the amount be debited contrary to that advice and that both houses of the parliament by resolution have approved the making of the requirement.

These amendments are consistent with the way the NHMRC administers funding and consistent with the principle that I have outlined; that is, that the MRFF funding should be subject to the same rigour that we apply to the National Health and Medical Research Council grants. Labor agrees that we should be funding different sorts of research. We are not opposed to the notion of translational research. We agree that commercialisation is the next step from the investigative driven research that the NHMRC does so well in our country. But there is no reason that we should not be applying the same sorts of rigour to the assessment process. Again I go back to the comments of the former CEO of the NHMRC, Professor Warwick Anderson, when he said:

When judging how to use public money for research only peer review can identify what is favourable and what is not.

I also note the comments from the President of the Australian Society for Medical Research, when she said:

… taxpayers really want to know that their money is going towards funding the best possible high-quality research that delivers health outcomes. All the evidence based on peer review in this country—and we have done a lot of this work in this space with independent commissioned reports—suggests that NHMRC peer review has actually been very successful in delivering better outcomes.

This is not an argument against moving towards translational research or commercialisation. This is an argument that says that we have a terrific program of peer review that works on this particular part of the research agenda, and we should use that same system to ensure that we get better translational outcomes and better commercialisation outcomes.

The bill as it has been drafted does not provide these assurances. That is why Labor is moving these amendments. They do not go as far as Labor would in government to improve the mechanism for distributing money from the MRFF, but they do improve the government's bill significantly. I commend the amendments to the chamber.