Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health Administration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate—

(a)

notes that:

(i)

the Senate disallowed the massive reduction in MBS cataract surgery rebates pursued by the Rudd Labor Government, with the objective to have the MBS rebates for cataract surgery maintained at the ‘2008 Regulations’ level,

(ii)

the Minister for Health and Ageing justified the massive 50 per cent cut to Medicare rebates for cataract surgery by arguing that the procedure was now ‘quicker and easier’ to perform and now took only about 15 minutes instead of the 45 minutes when the procedure was first introduced,

(iii)

the Minister for Health and Ageing never provided any Australian data to substantiate those assertions, while an AMA survey of 334 ophthalmologists indicated that about 70 per cent of ophthalmologists took between 25 and 40 minutes to perform cataract surgery,

(iv)

that it is further understood that the procedure band for cataract surgery has not been altered on the National Procedure Banding List, indicating no significant cost/time changes have occurred, and further

(v)

the Minister for Health and Ageing has so far failed to acknowledge that MBS rebates for cataract surgery:

(a)

have been reduced twice before since they were first introduced, by 30 per cent in 1987 and by 10 per cent in 1996, and

(b)

have been indexed by about 2 per cent per annum since 1996, below CPI and below AWE, to take account of productivity improvements;

(vi)

the Minister for Health and Ageing or her department appear to have made some belated efforts to collect data to identify the average length of time taken to perform cataract surgery; and

(b)

orders that there be laid on the table by 12 pm on Friday, 20 November 2009:

(i)

any information the Minister for Health and Ageing, her office or the department has received, compiled or commissioned on cataract surgery times in Australia since the Senate successfully disallowed the reduced rebates for cataract surgery on 28 October 2009, and

(ii)

any information held by the Government in relation to procedure bands for cataract surgery on the National Procedure Banding List since its inception, including the cataract surgery related procedure band information on the most recently updated National Procedure Banding List.

Question agreed to.

Kerry O'Brien (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I rise to make a short statement. The government voted against this motion. We recognise that, with the support of the Greens, the opposition—Senator Cormann in particular—has a majority for the motion, and we will not call a division.