Page 3786 - Week 14 - Thursday, 10 December 1992
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Madam Speaker, section 6 of the Act provides that the Minister for Health, Education and the Arts may establish and conduct the Ambulance Service. Since the change of government in June 1991 the Minister responsible for the services is the Minister for Health. Similarly, section 8 of the Act provides for the Minister for Finance and Urban Services to be the Minister responsible for fixing the rate of levy. Since the change of government, matters of taxation are my responsibility as Chief Minister and Treasurer.
Madam Speaker, to overcome ongoing difficulties arising from changes to Ministers' titles, the Bill proposes to refer simply to the functions under section 6 and section 8 being the responsibility of "the Minister" and allowing the Administrative Arrangements Orders to specify that the administration of section 6 of the Act, which relates to the conduct of the Ambulance Service, is to be with the Minister for the time being responsible for the service, currently the Minister for Health. The Minister, for the purposes of the rest the Act, including setting the levy rate, will be the Minister responsible for taxation issues. As a precautionary measure, Madam Speaker, the Bill also provides for the validation of the instrument dated 17 February 1992, Determination No. 14 of 1992, which set the current prescribed rate of 53c as the Ambulance Service levy under the Act, thereby ensuring that the ACT's revenue from the date of its effect, which was 1 March 1992, is protected.
Madam Speaker, the Bill also amends the formula specified under section 8 of the Ambulance Service Levy Act. When introduced, the ACT Ambulance Service levy scheme was deliberately modelled on that of New South Wales to minimise the administrative burden of the health fund organisations as they are, by and large, administering their ACT operations from New South Wales. Currently the levy is calculated using a formula which was identical to the one under the New South Wales Health Insurance Levies Act 1982.
Madam Speaker, the New South Wales Government recently changed the formula used under their Act after identifying a loss of revenue through an inherent weakness in the formula. The earlier formula was based on a notional number of contributors to a fund, calculated by dividing the total revenue received per month by the highest contribution rate offered by funds to clients for basic health benefits. New South Wales found that, because the old formula, which is the current ACT formula, was based on the highest contribution rate, funds which offered a range of health insurance packages, including ones for lower rates and discounted premiums tied to specified payments, were able to reduce the average levy paid by contributors to less than the relevant rates set by the legislation.
With the growth of these types of policies, New South Wales recognised that it was facing a reduction in revenue from the levy and increased subsidisation of the Ambulance Service from its budget. New South Wales has overcome this problem by replacing the notional number of contributors with the actual number of contributors at the commencement of a return month. New South Wales anticipates that persons currently contributing less than the relevant rate - 53c per week per single, and $1.06 per week per family - will be required by their fund to increase their contributions by an estimated $4.16 per annum for single contributors and $8.32 per annum for family contributors.
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