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

I thank Senator Walsh for the question and for the work she does as an advocate for the people of Victoria, particularly care economy workers across her state. There are more than 650,000 health workers in Australia: nurses, doctors, allied health workers and more. Every day they work hard. They turn up, and they work a hard day to keep us all healthy and safe. During the worst times of the pandemic, as all of us in this place knew, they worked hard to keep us safe, often placing themselves in danger to do so.

Our government wants Australian workers to earn more, and we want them to keep more of what they earn. That's why on 1 July, Labor will deliver a tax cut to every single health worker in Australia to help with the cost of living—not just to some of them but to every single one of those 650,000 health workers. A typical nurse earning $76,000 a year will receive a tax cut of $1,579, which is around double what they would have earned under the old plan of five years ago. Every single one of their patients who is paying tax will receive a tax cut as well—not just some of them, but every single one of them—reinforcing our determination to build on the measures we rolled out over the course of last year to help middle Australia with cost-of-living pressures.

We're also taking a range of actions to make health care more affordable for Australians. Under Labor's Medicare urgent-care clinics, we're making it easier for people to get the urgent treatment they need when they need it and without having to pay for it. Senator Walsh will be happy to hear that the doctors and nurses across Victoria responded to almost 66,000 presentations across the 10 urgent-care clinics in Victoria. There have been more than 150,000 presentations to the 58 Medicare urgent-care clinics that are now open and seeing patients across Australia, taking pressure off emergency departments and saving over $42.5 million in avoided patient episodes. (Time expired)