MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE

Mr BIRRELL (Nicholls) (15:33): When Labor asks us to be helpful, what they're really saying is: 'When we attack a cohort of Australians, don't call it out. Ignore the people who come into your office and say: "Do you realise that my private health rebate is being cut? It's going to affect me badly." Yes, but we can't go into parliament and say anything about it, because we're not being helpful to the government.' We're not here to be helpful to the government with policies like this.

The baby boomer generation has helped build this country. They absolutely have. They were born in the postwar period.

They took the opportunities of education in the late sixties. They had to endure the deprivations of the Whitlam government, which must have been very difficult when they were trying to get ahead. They endured the economic transition of the eighties.

They endured unfathomable interest rates in the late eighties and early nineties. And they've really worked hard, paid taxes and done a lot to try and build this country. They're now getting to their retirement periods—where they're over 65, and some of them are much older than that—and we have an obligation to make sure we look after those people and honour what they have done to build this country and build this economy.

One of those things is to make life a little bit easier with a private health insurance rebate, and Labor is now cutting that. For the minister to come in and say, 'The insurance company lobby groups are saying that this is $11 billion or that this is how many people are going to be affected'—it's actually National Seniors, a respected group representing the interests of older Australians.

It's clear, under this government, the interests of older Australians need some very serious advocacy, because the government's showing that it doesn't care about them. It's very difficult. We are sitting in electoral offices, and we have people who are probably about my age coming in and saying: 'I can't get a care package for mum and dad.

It's been ages. What can be done about it?' We come in and ask the minister for aged care, who I must admit is very good at deflecting questions from the dispatch box—it's impressive to watch, but it doesn't deliver the aged-care packages that should be getting out to people. We heard from the member for Bowman, who got up and spoke about John and Cheryl in his electorate.

He's saying they're going to be about $1,000 worse off. Now, $1,000 out of their budget, when they really need that health care—it's pretty tough for a lot of people, particularly in this cost-of-living crisis that we're still talking about four years after the election of the Albanese government. When is something going to be done about that?

To take away some of the protections that were there—a small thing in a health insurance rebate for people who have served this country and paid their taxes—is really mean spirited. What's going to happen? That's the next thing.

We say that we're going to do it, and we're going to do it because we need to push money to somewhere else in the aged-care sector. If we really got the economy firing with some good policies, we'd probably have more money to put to all sorts of things. How about that for an idea?

But what's going to happen? Older Australians will drop their private health insurance, and they will be forced onto the public system. I can tell you the public health system does not need any more pressure.

I'm sad to report that I'm a Victorian, but that state is going to make a comeback after 28 November, I'm sure of that. At the moment, the public healthcare system is straining under huge pressures—ambulance ramping and people sitting around in EDs for far too long. If we force a whole heap of older Australians onto that system, it's going to mean poorer outcomes for those older Australians, who don't deserve it, because they've done a lot for this country.

It's going to mean poorer outcomes for people who are trying to access that service at the moment. It's probably too late, but I really ask you to rethink this. Think about the people you're affecting.

Think about what they did for this country, and show some compassion towards older Australians. If you want to get some home-care packages out in the meantime, that would be great too.