Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Minister for Regional Communications) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Kitching for her question. I'm incredibly proud of Australia's world-class health system. We've got a great combination of a public health system underpinned, thanks to this government, by a Medicare guarantee, and a world-class PBS system where you can purchase drugs, lifesaving in many cases and worth thousands of dollars, for $38. And we also have a strong private health insurance system, which ensures that those 13 million Australians that choose to go through the private health system can purchase insurance to assist them with that.

But we acknowledge there has been an issue with private health insurance and the affordability and simplification of the insurance system for many, many years. That's why, under our government, there has been the lowest increase to private health insurance premiums in 17 years, at 3.95 per cent—which those opposite know runs below health inflation, which runs at over four per cent. So we are under health inflation.

We've made other changes to the private health insurance system through meaningful reforms. For those living in rural and regional Australia, you can package up insurance packages that include travel and accommodation. We're making young people incentivised to take up private health insurance. In fact, we are committing to ensuring—