Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Stewart for the supplementary question. Obviously, the Medicare urgent care clinics are a part of this because they are free of charge, bulk-billing centres for those patients that use them. Alongside that, we're addressing the pressures in primary health care in a number of ways. Other measures include the tripling of the bulk-billing incentive, which took effect from 1 November. The college of GPs called this 'a game changer'. It is early days, but we're already seeing the number of clinics around the country that are returning to bulk-billing after decades of cuts and neglect. For example, in New South Wales, in one clinic, we saw the rate of bulk-billing in September, when half of appointments were bulk-billed, rise to two-thirds in November. This is an important change. It shows that our focus on affordability and accessibility of health care is working.