Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

I see those experts over there, those grand experts of health policy, representing some of the poorest electorates in our communities—blah, blah, blah they go; off they go again—failing to represent the people of their communities. I am looking forward to campaigning every single day until the next election on your failure to stand up—

A government member: Bring it on!

to provide healthcare services to your community. I am looking forward to doing that every day.

We know that the support that this government is providing for nurses working in general practice has been poor. Consistent with the lack of transparency, lack of compassion and incompetence that has characterised this government, a fortnight ago this government tried to sneak through changes to the way health assessments are conducted by nurse practitioners in GP practices. Without any warning, the government reinterpreted the role of nurses and determined that practice nurse time does not count in Medicare Benefits Schedule health assessment items. Consistent with the way this government does business, the change was announced without any consultation whatsoever and the president at that time of the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association described this as having 'a devastating impact on the ability of general practice to provide high-quality preventive care.' Not long after this announcement was made, the government was shamed into backing down on yet another ill-conceived health policy idea.

The government should now back down on some of its other ill-conceived policies that will result in less places for nurses, less places for doctors, less hospital beds, blowouts in emergency department waiting times and elective surgery, and bed closures. The government should back down from its $50 billion cuts to public hospitals. It should back down from ripping up national partnership agreements that saw increased funding going into public hospitals in every community across this country. It should back down on its $7 GP tax. It should back down on its $1.3 billion hike to the cost of medicines and its unfair changes to the Medicare Benefits Schedule and the PBS safety nets. It should back down on its $367 million cut to the National Partnership Agreements on Preventive Health. If the government wants to try and change the healthcare system, it has to make sure that the healthcare system is focussing on prevention. But what it has actually done is cut all of the money from preventative services. I have been involved in healthcare policy development all of my working life, whether it was working within the Department of Health, whether it was working as a consultant in health consulting or whether it was working in direct care in allied health.

Mr Nikolic interjecting.

See this speech in context