Page 3715 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 9 December 1992
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
This Government is not going to relent on its fight against the creeping cancer of what is occurring in Victoria. That is the sort of thing that will result in living standards falling, and that is clearly what is intended. There is no conscience among these people opposite about the living standards of working men and women. They do not care about it. They seem concerned only about the taxes of people who can afford to buy Ferraris and those sorts of things. They will reduce those taxes because those people are their mates; but they are not concerned about the people on the factory floors, in the shops, on the building sites. Their incessant hatred of the trade union movement gives a clear indication of where they are coming from in relation to job security, wages and working conditions, the living standards of most of Australia. Australians have indicated clearly that they do not want the Hewson package; they do not want the industrial relations package in Victoria, which will spread if Hewson has his way, and this Government will resist it.
Medicare Levy
MRS CARNELL: My question is to the Minister for Health. I refer to the Minister's answer to Mr Moore's question yesterday. In that answer the Minister indicated that the increase in the Medicare levy was going to be directed to general health areas such as medical and pharmaceutical. Does he now admit that this is not true and that the 0.15 per cent increase will be spent only on the incentive payment and a bonus pool, with, for his information, approximately $208m in the bonus pool and some $78m in the incentive package? Does the Minister now acknowledge that ACT taxpayers will pay an extra approximately $8m and get back under $1m in the incentive package?
MR BERRY: This is a complete joke. If you extrapolate Mrs Carnell's figures into the entire Medicare levy, it comes up at somewhere between $70m and $80m. On her figures, only $8m of that $74m would go into the health system. That is an absolutely ridiculous proposition. I explained yesterday, and this made it pretty clear, how much of the Medicare levy goes into doctors' fees. Mrs Carnell seemed to want to ignore that. Some of it goes into her very own hands - to pharmacists.
Mrs Carnell: We are talking about the increase.
MR BERRY: All she wants to do is talk about the increase, but you have to look at the whole package. The money from the increase will go into the bucket and it will be spread equitably across Australia. You and your New South Wales and Victorian mates who want to try to undermine Medicare are on a hopeless task. You will never undermine Medicare because 70 per cent of the Australian people depend on it, and nearly all Australians think it is a good thing for the Australian people. What Mrs Carnell is on about is to try to create the impression that the people of the ACT will be worse off with the increase in the Medicare levy.
Mr Humphries: They will be - $8m worse off.
MR BERRY: They will not be, because the Medicare levy will build up the amount of funds that will go to health across Australia. We are not separate from the rest of Australia, Mrs Carnell, when it comes to the provision of health care; we are part of Australia, and the entire levy will go to produce a better health
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .