Mark Butler
Hindmarsh · Australian Labor Party · Australia
“But earlier today we were all in here voting on the latest instalment in the member for Lindsay's ongoing but thus far unsuccessful campaign to rebrand the Liberal Party.”
“I thank the member for Werriwa for her contribution and for her really strong support for everything we're doing to make Medicare stronger and make medicines cheaper. I thank all members for their contributions to the debate on this bill. As the member for Werriwa said, Medicare is the very best of Australia.”
“I thank the member for his question, which is a question I've answered before in this place since the budget. As I've said on a number of occasions publicly and in this chamber, the additional support that over-65s have received since about 2004 for their private health insurance premium is something we did revisit given the significant p…”
“But, under ours, they'll receive an increase of more than 20 per cent, or an additional $160 million in this year alone, which means more doctors, more nurses and better care in Tasmania.”
“Importantly, this bill provides stability so patients can continue to benefit from the outcomes of these programs and strengthened access to primary care.”
“That approach gives providers and the government greater certainty while preserving the flexibility needed to keep program settings up to date as health system needs evolve. Importantly, the bill does not change the underlying policy settings of existing programs.”
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“Next year that price will come down even further, to just $25 a script, if the bill that I introduced to the parliament this morning passes over the course of the coming few weeks. When we first listed Trikafta three years ago Australia was a relative late-comer to this wonder drug. But, with this, the fourth expansion of the listing we've already made in just three years, Australia is now the global leader in equity of access to this drug for the cystic fibrosis community. That is the value of Australia's PBS, and that is why we will never give it up.”
“Nathan was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis as a little infant, and his mum was told that she shouldn't expect him to survive childhood. Not only did he survive; he also went on to represent Australia as part of the Wallabies—the only person on the planet who has played contact sport at an elite level with cystic fibrosis. Without PBS listing Trikafta costs about $250,000 a year. I have spoken to families—I think the member for Robertson was there—who had to remortgage their house to give their sick kids access to that drug. Many others, obviously, didn't have that opportunity, and they just had to go without. Now Nathan and hundreds of patients like him will get access to this drug not for $250,000 but for $31 a script.”
“Four waves of cheaper medicines policies in the last term of parliament have already delivered Australians a saving of about $1½ billion, but those huge savings don't account for the benefits of the almost 350 new listings on the PBS that our government has made—including, for example, the eight women's health drugs that I talked about in yesterday's question time. Earlier this month we also expanded access to the life-saving wonder drug Trikafta. For the first time, people with cystic fibrosis who have rare and ultrarare mutations will have access to that drug. One of those hundreds of patients is Nathan Charles, who joined the member for Robertson, the cystic fibrosis community and me in Sydney to announce this listing.”
“It is so terrific to see the member for Robertson back in this chamber. He's a great local member, now down that end of the chamber, and he's also a terrific source of advice for those of us in the health portfolio. He knows that the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the PBS, is one of the core pillars of Australia's world-leading healthcare system. Established by yet another Labor government almost 80 years ago, it delivers Australians affordable access to the world's best medicines, and our government has been working hard to make those medicines even more affordable.”
“This bill delivers on a significant commitment made prior to the election; it builds on earlier actions undertaken by the Albanese government to deliver cheaper medicines and it helps strengthen Medicare and improve the health of all Australians. I commend the bill to the House. Debate adjourned.”
“This commitment will provide savings to general patients of over $200 million every year, continuing to give even more savings to general patients once the 2025 one-year general patient co-payment freeze finishes at the end of this calendar year. The reduction to $25 provides immediate cost-of-living relief to patients without a concession card, while also ensuring the PBS remains a sustainable investment for government. This level of investment was selected to ensure it does not come at the expense of priorities such as: The general patient co-payment will continue to be indexed on 1 January each year in line with the existing indexation arrangements. Indexing from 1 January 2027 will be calculated off the new general co-payment amount of $25, thereby saving patients' out-of-pocket costs well into the future.”
“While many PBS medicines cost significantly more than the patient contribution, the patient co-payment for the 2025 calendar year is $31.60 for general patients (that being patients who are not concessional card holders). This bill amends the National Health Act 1953 to reduce that co-payment to just $25. This allows Australians to continue to access affordable medicines which in turn will reduce the cost of living by providing a significant reduction to the general patient PBS co-payment. From 1 January next year, over 5.1 million Australians will pay less for their PBS prescriptions than they would if this bill does not pass.”
“The amendments made by this bill will ensure that all Australians who don't hold a concession card will have access to more affordable medicines. The PBS is the primary mechanism through which the government subsidises access to prescription medicines and is a key component of Medicare, providing significant direct assistance—as much as $18 billion in 2023-24—to make medicines affordable for all Australians. The PBS represents a significant component of the Commonwealth's investment in Australia's health system. To assist in achieving sustainability of the PBS, patients contribute a co-payment towards the cost of their PBS subsidised medicine and the Commonwealth pays the remaining cost.”
“That has saved those Australian patients around $250 million already and allowed them to avoid around 35 million unnecessary trips to the pharmacist. In January this year we froze the cost of PBS medicines, with copayments not rising with inflation for all Australians for the first time in 25 years. Together, these four measures the government has already implemented have saved patients $1½ billion in the cost of their medicines. But we are determined to do more to make medicines even cheaper. This bill represents the fifth wave of reform to deliver cheaper medicines. As a result of the changes made by this bill, the maximum Australian general patients will pay for PBS medicines drops from $31.60 to just $25—a saving of more than 20 per cent. The last time a general patient's PBS co-payment was $25 was in 2004, over two decades ago.”
“In July 2022, we slashed the safety net for pensioners and concession card holders with more free and cheaper medicines, sooner, with a 25 per cent reduction in the number of scripts a concessional patient must fill before the PBS safety net kicks in. That change has already delivered 73 million additional free scripts, saving pensioners over half a billion dollars. Then in January 2023, the largest cut to the cost of medicines in the history of the PBS, with the maximum cost of a general script being slashed by the government from $42.50 to just $30. Already that has saved general patients $770 million in their hip pockets. Beginning in September 2023, we finally introduced 60-day prescriptions for common medicines used on an ongoing basis—saving time and money for millions of Australians with an ongoing health condition.”
“I move: That this bill be now read a second time. N ational Health A mendment (C heaper M edicines ) B ill 2025 It is a privilege to introduce the National Health Amendment (Cheaper Medicines) Bill. This bill delivers on the government's promise to deliver cheaper medicines for all Australians. Delivering cheaper medicines is one of the key pillars supporting our promise to strengthen Medicare, alongside more bulk-billing, more doctors and nurses and more urgent care clinics. Making medicines cheaper is not just good for the hip pocket, as important, obviously, as that is; it's also good for your health. This bill builds on the actions taken by the government to deliver cheaper medicines during the 47th Parliament.”
“Before that, women were paying $320 a year for that cutting-edge medicine. From the first of January, they'll pay just $75, a three-quarter cut in the price of that medicine. The reason why we are going so hard on making medicines even cheaper is not just for the hip pocket. It's a benefit to the cost of living, but it is also so important for health. We are trying to support Australians in making sure they can fill every single script that their doctor says is important to keep them healthy.”
“Now, they pay barely one-tenth of that cost. But we are determined to do more because, to the Prime Minister's comments, the Australian people said 'yes' to even cheaper medicines, and so, from 1 January, the maximum cost of a script will be slashed to $25—the same rate it was all the way back in 2004. This morning, the Prime Minister, Assistant Minister McBride and I met a young woman, Cara, who already in her early years is grappling with a number of chronic health conditions. She is on a number of medicines, and they really do put a dent in her household budget. One of those medicines is Slinda, a highly effective contraceptive pill that tens of thousands of women have been using for months and months and years and years and have been paying top dollar for. We added it to the PBS earlier this year.”
“There had not been a new oral contraceptive pill added to the PBS for more than 30 years or a new endometriosis medicine added to the PBS for more than 30 years, and there had not been a new menopause hormone treatment added for more than 20 years. This is not because they hadn't come to market; they just hadn't been added to the PBS, forcing women to pay top dollar for those new cutting-edge medicines. We changed that. In the last several months, we've added three new contraceptive pills, three new menopause hormone treatments and two new endometriosis medicines onto the PBS, saving women millions and millions of dollars that, frankly, they shouldn't be having to shell out in the first place. For example, the endometriosis medicine, Ryeqo, was costing women $3,000 a year—that cutting-edge, highly effective treatment for endometriosis.”
“Thank you to the member for Newcastle. On more than one occasion, she has reminded me that you can't be serious about strengthening Medicare if you're not serious about supporting women's health. Women consume about 60 per cent of health services in this country, often not because they're sick but because they're women looking after their reproductive health and, by extension, supporting the reproductive decisions the broader family makes, or because they're going through menopause or perimenopause. A number of Senate inquiries in the last term of parliament lifted the lid on the years of neglect of supporting women in those areas of our healthcare system.”
“That is why, particularly under the leadership of former minister Wells in this area, we had to compress pretty much a decade of reform into just three years—not helped of course by the budget cuts that the opposition leader initiated as the minister for aged care through the 2016 MYEFO that actually took money out of aged care and didn't redeploy it to reform but actually just returned it to general revenue, obviously contributing to the situation that led to the royal commission in the first place. So it doesn't really sound very nice in the opposition leader's mouth to complain about the situation in aged care that we have had to fix over the last three years after a decade not just of neglect but of actual cuts initiated again by the now opposition leader when she had responsibility for this portfolio.”
“I thank the Leader of the Opposition for her question. Over the last five years, we have, as a country, pretty much doubled the number of home-care packages in the system, from about 150,000 to a little more than 300,000, and we will need to continue increasing those home-care package numbers vary significantly for, really, as long as any of us are in this parliament, because the oldest of the baby boomers, we know, are now pretty much hitting the average age of entry to the Home Care Packages system and in a few years time will hit to the average age of entry into the residential aged-care system.”
“But then I was even more puzzled by the opposition seizing on this as some great, new deception by us, because it was their policy as well, and I'd imagined that the leadership group that got together, when we announced the policy, to consider whether or not they'd support it, might have actually asked some questions. Sitting around with their 'Peter Dutton for PM' keep cups, they might have asked a couple of questions about the policy they endorsed half an hour later.”
“It's back to over 90 per cent. But, as we have said, it has continued to drop for people without a concession card. That is why the Prime Minister made a commitment to extend bulk-billing relief, in November—not now; in November—to all patients, to every single Australian. Clinics are already telling us that they'll be moving to a full bulk-billing model. Now, I've been a little puzzled by the coverage over the last couple of weeks that a quarter of clinics would not move to 100 per cent bulk-billing, as if that was some revelation. It was actually in our media release in February, because that was the modelling that the department put in place.”
“Speaker, as you know, I love a question about bulk-billing. I absolutely love it, and I've been waiting for one. We're more pleased to talk about bulk-billing than maybe any other policy in Medicare because, for us, bulk-billing has been at the beating heart of a system of universal health insurance generationally opposed by those opposite. And the Leader of the Opposition is right; when we came to government, it was in freefall. The Leader of the Opposition had a bit to do with that. As a health minister who never increased the Medicare rebate and as a health minister who extended the freeze from her predecessor for four long years, the Leader of the Opposition knows a bit about why bulk-billing was dropping. But the record investment we made in 2023 did have the desired effect on bulk-billing for concession card holders.”
“Pensioners will not see an increase in their medicine prices for the rest of this decade. As a whole, those four measures have already saved patients $1½ billion in the cost of medicines. But there's more. There's more, because this week I will introduce laws to deliver on the Prime Minister's promise at the guild conference to make medicines even cheaper and to slash the maximum co-payment for general patients to just $25 a script. The last time it was that low was in 2004, 21 years ago. More than five million patients will benefit from this fifth wave of cheaper medicines from this prime minister. It will be good for their hip pocket, but it will also be good for their health.”
“That is why we are focused so strongly on making medicines cheaper. In just our first three months in government, we slashed the maximum amount that pensioners would pay for their medicines, across a given year, by 25 per cent. That already has delivered 73 million additional free scripts, saving pensioners over half a billion dollars. We then delivered the biggest cut to the cost of medicines in the history of the PBS, from $42.50 for a script down to $30, and already that has saved general patients $770 million in their hip pockets. We finally allowed doctors to issue 60-day scripts for common medicines that were taken on an ongoing basis. Already that has saved Australian patients around $250 million and allowed them to avoid 35 million unnecessary trips to the pharmacist. And this year we froze the price of medicines.”
“Congratulations go to the member for Gorton for her election and her first question. We are really looking forward to her first speech later today. She knows that our promise to strengthen Medicare rested on four pillars: more bulk-billing, more doctors and nurses, more urgent care clinics and cheaper medicines. Making medicines cheaper is not just good for the hip pocket, as important as that is; it's also good for your health. When we came to government three years ago, the Bureau of Statistics told us that every year around one million Australians, because of cost, went without filling the scripts that their doctor had said was important for their health. Pharmacists were telling us of customers coming through their front door, asking for advice about which script they really needed to fill and which they could go without.”
“There are still remote loadings that would apply to areas in Tasmania like in Swansea and Queenstown, which will attract a 40 per cent loading, and in King Island, with a 50 per cent loading. The very generous travel arrangements for NDIS providers that apply to pretty much no other scheme in the country are being made slightly less generous but are still much better than any of those other schemes that I just mentioned attract as well. (Time expired)”
“It's a decision I support. To address the member's questions, I have a couple of points. For Tasmanian prices, many therapy supports were getting paid significantly more than the same therapies being delivered in Sydney and Melbourne. It was $30 an hour more for physiotherapy, about $20 an hour more for psychology—a temporary arrangement intended to develop a market in jurisdictions like Tasmania. That market is now mature, and it's proper that those prices return to the national level. I also make the point that rates across the board for therapy are still higher than pretty much any other system you could look at: health, veterans care, Comcare and other things like that. Even with some of the reductions put in place this month, they are still substantially higher.”
“One tool in the NDIS reform toolbox is pricing reform, introducing more robust pricing arrangements than—I think anyone in this place would accept—we've had up until now. The member asks me about the pricing determination that's been made by the independent NDIA board, taking effect this month. It follows, undoubtedly, the most comprehensive review of NDIS prices conducted in the scheme's history, a review that covered 10 million data points and had—to the member's question—very significant consultation behind it. The principal objective, of course, is to ensure that every participant gets the best possible value for money for their plan, that they're not paying above the odds for any of the supports and services that they get. I stress this was an independent decision of an independent board, but it is one I support.”
“I thank the member for his question. Can I say at the outset what an enormous honour it is to have been appointed as the Minister for Disability and the National Disability Insurance Scheme. On this side of the parliament, we take great pride in the establishment of this scheme. It is one of the great social reforms of our age, one supported by the now opposition and one, I remember, also strongly supported by the member for Clark in that term of parliament after 2010. We're very proud of it, but we're also committed to making sure we get it back on track and ensure that it's sustainable for the future, particularly in the interests of people living with a disability. I think everyone in this parliament knows that the growth rate we inherited, when we came to parliament, of about 22 per cent per year was simply unsustainable.”
“We know we're not going to be able to train enough Australians quickly enough to deal with the challenges that you have been talking about so strongly, Member for Calare, which is why we're also trying to cut red tape and cut costs for overseas trained doctors in countries where we have a high level of confidence, like the UK, New Zealand and Ireland, to come into Australia particularly to practice in the bush. In the last 12 months there has been a 500 per cent increase in the number of GPs from those three countries applying to come here and work in communities like yours.”
“We've got more GPs in training this year than ever before in this country. We want to expand that again, and that includes more in the bush as well. We want to reward doctors who work in the bush, which is why, in our first budget, some time ago, we increased incentives for GPs working in the bush, particularly if they had additional skills in areas like emergency management, obstetrics, mental health and the like. The bulk-billing incentives that apply through our bulk-billing reforms are higher in the bush than they are in the cities, which is why, of the additional bulk-billed visits since we put those plans into place, they have disproportionately benefited the bush. And the Minister for Education introduced very significant student debt relief provisions for medical graduates if they agree to go and work in the bush.”
“As the member knows, there is no simple fix for this challenge, which is why we are trying to work right across a range of areas to improve access and also affordability. As he said, we've got to train more young people as doctors in rural communities. We know that, if they train in the bush, they're far more likely to stay in the bush, which is why we have added CSPs, Commonwealth supported places, into rural Australia and why we've committed to, in time, 200 more medical school places, which will be run through the education portfolio in partnership with the health portfolio. In due course, we'll be making it clear how we'll put those out for tender. We've also done a range of other things to train more not just medical students but post-medical school graduates in general practice.”
“Thank you to the member for Calare. Congratulations on your re-election. Thank you to you and your team for our engagement over the last period of time on what you describe—the really significant challenge of access to doctors in rural Australia. Thank you for the roundtable of GPs you organised in your community that we conducted together just before the election. I've said, from the time I was appointed to this portfolio, it has never been harder to find a GP in Australia than it has been over the last several years, and it's even harder again in the bush. I know that. As our population has been getting larger, older and, in many ways, sicker, we haven't kept up with the number of GPs anywhere in the country, but particularly in the bush.”
“Our expanded urgent care clinic will mean that 80 per cent of the Australian population will live within a 20-minute drive of an urgent care clinic. They will be looking after two million patients each and every year, every single one of whom will be bulk billed. It is absolutely a core part of our plan to strengthen Medicare.”
“This clinic bulk bills and validates parking— I think that's the first clinic I've heard of doing that, as well. It never stops getting better— It is a testament to public health. I am so grateful for the experience we had. At the last election, we promised 50 more of these urgent care clinics, including one in Greenslopes, the other end of the member's electorate. Expressions of interest have already opened for some of those clinics. We've committed to all 50 being open in this financial year, but I'm doing everything I can to get as many open as I can before Christmas. As the Minister for Education and the Prime Minister have said, we are so focused on delivery. We are so focused on repaying the trust shown to us by the Australian people, including around our plan to keep strengthening Medicare.”
“We promised 50; we delivered 87. They're all open seven days a week with extended hours and fully bulk billed. More than 1.7 million Australians have already gone through one of those 87 clinics, including 23,000 in south Brisbane. Around a third of those patients are kids under the age of 15, like Natassja's four-year-old daughter, who went to the south Brisbane urgent care clinic after an accident at kindergarten. In her Google review, Natassja said that Anna, the receptionist, was terrific, that Kirsty, the nurse was 'the most generous and patient nurse I have ever encountered'. She gave a bit of a wrap for Dr John as well. Natassja's review went on to read: We were there for less than an hour, and left with all the information we need and a little lady who was all bandaged up.”
“To the new member for Griffith: congratulations on your election and on an absolutely terrific first speech last night. And thank you for the energy with which you sold our government's plan to strengthen Medicare—for more doctors, nurses, bulk-billing, urgent care clinics and for even cheaper medicines. Your background—as a leader of the mental health organisation, the Kookaburra Kids Foundation—made you absolutely the right person, along with Senator Wong, to announce our government's commitment to expanding the Gidget Foundation centre's support for perinatal mental health, as well. I was especially delighted, in early March, to join the now member for Griffith at the Medicare urgent care clinic in Woolloongabba, the South Brisbane Medicare urgent care clinic—that's one of 87 clinics we established last term.”
“He then tried to abolish bulk billing altogether and make every single Australian pay a fee every single time they went to the doctor and every single time they walked through the front door of an emergency department, because that is what this man wants in this country: an American style, user-pays system of health care, not Australia's Medicare. If you think that that sorry, sad old leopard, the Liberal Party, has changed its spots, listen to what the shadow health minister said in the Senate only a few weeks ago. Senator Ruston said: 'At no time have I or anybody from the coalition ever suggested that the only card you need to take to the doctor, going forward, is your Medicare card.' And that is the choice over the coming weeks. It's about the value of this beautiful green card.”
“I was surprised yesterday when the Leader of the Opposition interrupted his speech explaining why he was going to vote against a tax cut for every Australian taxpayer to brag about his record on bulk billing. I was surprised but not disappointed, because I don't think you understand how much we love it when you talk about your record as health minister! I don't think you understand how much it warms the cockles of our hearts. We hope you do it a lot more over coming weeks. Yes, bulk billing was 84 per cent, because he inherited a very good position from a former Labor government. But he then said there were too many free Medicare services. We all remember that.”
“Thank you to the member for Lingiari, because, for her and for everyone on this side of the House, bulk billing is the beating heart of Medicare, and it was in freefall when we came to government. That's why, of course, in our second budget, we tripled the bulk-billing incentive for pensioners, concessional cardholders and kids, which delivered last year an additional six million free visits to the doctor, lifting bulk billing for that cohort up above 90 per cent again. But we know it's still under pressure for other Australians, which is why this week, in the fourth budget, for the first time, we've extended bulk-billing support to every single Australian—because we know that seeing a doctor for free is not just good for your hip pocket; it's also good for your health.”
“We're increasing funding for GPs to provide support during menopause and for the insertion and removal of long-acting contraception. After literally decades of no action in these areas at all from the former government, Australia's women are finally getting the support that they deserve and they need from a stronger Medicare. We've done more in the budget last night than literally has been done for decades. It's the sort of action you only get from a Labor government.”
“I've been taking Slinda for 18 months, but the cost does add up.' All contraceptives should be affordable, but this PBS listing is going to deliver huge benefit and opportunity for so many women. And it's not just contraception. For more than 20 years, not a single new menopause hormone treatment was added to the PBS. This year already, we've added three, ensuring that around 150,000 women every year will save up to $400. And, for more than 30 years, there was not a single new medicine added for endometriosis, a condition that impacts about a million Australian women. In the last six months, we've added two, including most recently one that will save women almost $3,000 a year. We're also opening more endo and pelvic pain clinics.”
“We've heard that message loud and clear, and last night's budget includes almost $800 million to deliver Australia's women more choice, better care and lower cost. It's extraordinary to me that it has been more than 30 years since a new oral contraceptive pill has been added to the PBS. A bunch have been added to the private market and registered with the TGA. This year already we've added three new pills including the only single hormone pill, Slinda, which is used by about 100,000 Australian women who've been paying top dollar in the private market. Jemima from St Kilda, who's 42, wrote to us and said, 'I've been taking the pill since I was 17, but as I've got older I've wanted to know more about the progestogen-only pill.”
“I thank the member. Along with the Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care, the member for Macquarie and the vast number of women on this side of the House consistently remind me that you can't be serious about strengthening Medicare without a strong focus on women's health because women consume about 60 per cent of all healthcare services in this country, and they face huge lifetime health costs—not because they're sick but because they're women—in areas like contraception and reproductive health, and during perimenopause and menopause. In this term a couple of really important Senate inquiries have lifted the lid on literally decades of neglect, revealing a very deep sense among so many Australian women that they're just not listened to, that their symptoms are often minimised or even fully discounted in the healthcare system.”
“And he'll do it again because—he warned us last week—past performance is the best indicator of this guy's future action. We know he will cut the urgent care clinics and patients will end up paying, including patients in the Yarra Ranges.”
“… … … That's why we need a Medicare Urgent Care Clinic for the Yarra Ranges. And he will be so pleased that one of the 50 from last night will be in the Yarra Ranges. He might not be so pleased that that this bloke, the Leader of the Opposition, is opposed to it. We will support it. I say this to the member for Casey: we've got your back, sunshine, even if this bloke has left you high and dry. But I also say to the member for Casey: you shouldn't be surprised. This guy has never liked free Medicare services. He's always wanted American-style user-pays health care. That's why he tried to make everyone pay every time they went to the GP. That's why he tried to make everyone pay every time they went to a hospital emergency department.”
“That's why last night we funded 50 more urgent care clinics, including in Ellenbrook in the fast-growing north-eastern suburbs of Perth. Once they're open, four in five Australians will live within a 20-minute drive of an urgent care clinic. More than two million patients will be seen every single year. The opposition leadership have opposed this from day 1. They've called it wasteful and opposed it. But, like with so many of the ideas from the Leader of the Opposition, the backbench is starting to take a different view. The young, energetic member for Casey back there loves urgent care. He has a petition calling for a Medicare urgent care clinic in the Yarra Ranges: Imagine this: You wake up feeling unwell on a Saturday morning. It's not an emergency, but you need to see a doctor.”
“Thanks to the member for Hasluck for that question. She remembers that at the last election we promised 50 Medicare urgent care clinics. They would be open seven days a week with extended hours and would be available for walk-in urgent appointments. Well, we didn't open 50; we opened 87 clinics. Already they've seen more than 1.2 million patients, a third of them seen on weekends and a third of them under the age of 15, but every single one of them fully bulk-billed. All they needed to take was their Medicare card. They're not only getting terrific-quality urgent care where and when they need it in their own communities, free of charge; they're also taking real pressure off our hospital emergency departments.”
“Stick a needle in my eye!' It's just like in 2013, when, time and time again, he promised there'd be no cuts to health. Well, we know there'll be cuts, and we know Australian patients will pay, because that's his past performance—because, in his heart of hearts, he's never supported Australia's Medicare. He wants an American style system of user pays. ( Time expired.)”
“Last week, as the Prime Minister said earlier, the Leader of the Opposition said, 'Past performance is the best indicator of future practice.' And he's right. So let's look at this man's past performance. Of course, as health minister, he tried to jack up the price of medicines by up to $5 a script and make pensioners wait even longer to access the free medicines we're currently delivering them by the tens of millions. This term, more recently, they voted against our cheaper medicines policies and consistently described our measures as 'wasteful spending'. As we lead into the election, my guess is that the Leader of the Opposition is now going to put his hand on his heart and promise there will be no cuts to Medicare: 'Cross my heart. Hope to die.”
“That's why this year we froze the price of PBS medicines for Australia's pensioners right up until the 2030s. That's why last week the Prime Minister announced that we will cut the maximum price for general patients even further, down to just $25. Had we done nothing in this term of parliament, that price would have hit $50 next year—not $25 but $50. For example, the half-a-million Australians who are now on Eliquis, a very important stroke prevention medicine, would have been paying $600 a year for that life-saving medicine. Next year, with a 60-day script, they'll pay just $150—a 75 per cent saving delivered by Labor. As the question says, of course, all of this progress is at risk.”
“I thank the member for Robertson for his question. He knows that, when we came to government, about a million Australians were saying they were either deferring or not filling at all the scripts their doctors were giving them because of cost. That's why the member for Robertson promised his electorate on the Central Coast that we would make medicines cheaper. We have delivered on that promise. There are 66 million additional free scripts for Australia's pensioners. We made the biggest cut to the price of medicines in the history of the PBS—down to $30—and we finally allowed doctors to issue 60-day scripts, giving patients twice the amount of medicine for the price of a single script. Already, these measures alone have saved Australians $1.3 billion at the pharmacy counter, but we know we can do more.”