MARTIN:
The Prime Minister, John Howard, is with us live. PM, thank you for being with us.
PRIME MINISTER:
Okay.
MARTIN:
Now, you know just how reluctant Australians are, probably better than anyone, about paying higher taxes. Our phone poll on the crisis in the health system has produced what I think is a quite startling result. We asked this question – Would you be prepared to pay more tax to improve the health system? And we had it over two days, out of thousands and thousands of calls it was almost a dead heat. The No vote just winning, but a staggering, I would have thought, a staggering 49 per cent of callers volunteered to pay more tax to get a better health system. Does that surprise you?
PRIME MINISTER:
Not entirely, Ray, because when people are concerned about an issue, phone polls normally reflect the concerned people rather than the people who are not so concerned because…
MARTIN:
So, [inaudible].
PRIME MINISTER:
Yeah, a phone poll is a voluntary thing. It';s a spontaneous thing. If you don';t have a particularly strong view, well you don';t ring up, so…
MARTIN:
Do you know any issues? I mean, I would have thought it would have been 80 per cent against…
PRIME MINISTER:
Phone polls are different. I mean, I';m not mocking them … they';re a great institution…
MARTIN:
You use them regularly.
PRIME MINISTER:
… television stations but they are different from the normal surveys.
MARTIN:
Alright. But do you know any other issue in which Australians would agree to pay more tax?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I can';t think of one. But health is a very important issue and I respect that and…
MARTIN:
Is there a crisis do you think? I';ll come back, but do you think…?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I think crisis is the wrong word. I think there are problems and I think there are issues to be addressed and many of them are being addressed. But I think we do the whole system a disservice if we call it a crisis because for all its faults, our system is better than any in the world.
MARTIN:
Alright.
PRIME MINISTER:
It';s better to get ill in this country than in, say Britain or America.
MARTIN:
At least these emails wouldn';t suggest that, but let me come back…
PRIME MINISTER:
Sure.
MARTIN:
Please stay with us, I want to get Paul Barry involved now. He';s been travelling the length and breadth of the country from Cairns right down through to Tassie and everywhere he';s been hearing the same long list of complaints from people who expect a whole lot more from our health system, people who deserve a whole lot more from our health system, too, I guess, patients and doctors alike. Have a look at this story.
[SEGMENT]
MARTIN:
PM, leadership is that word. These are the emails we got today, I was showing you earlier and I give you my word that they';re from all around the country and, you know, many hundreds have just arrived today on that one. You showed leadership on gun control and on tax reform. Why not on this?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Ray, I think there are some weaknesses in the system and I think it';s wrong to say it';s in crisis – I think that is an overstatement.
MARTIN:
Look, John, they say…
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Ray, I';m not pretending that there isn';t a problem. But I think it';s a question of isolating the areas of difficulty. The biggest single problem, as far as GPs are concerned, is that we have too few of them in many areas of the country. It';s the shortage of doctors, particularly in outer metropolitan and country areas. You mentioned Kyogle, Paul mentioned Kyogle. Kyogle is in an area that has a bulkbilling rate of about 47 per cent – that';s about 21 per cent below the national average and I think what that indicates is that where you have too few doctors the bulkbilling rate falls because… and where you have more doctors you have a higher bulkbilling rate. So, one of the things that our package has done is to bring in measures, practice nurses, more bonded scholarships for doctors who are practising in the country to try and get more doctors, and there are some other measures I';m looking at the moment to get more doctors into areas of shortage.
MARTIN:
We obviously don';t have time to go to all the details and that sort of thing. But it comes down to the fact that… do you think that, for example, what people are saying here in these emails is that the national health scheme is worse today than it was in the 1970s. Would you agree?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I don';t. I wouldn';t agree with that. I think there are some… well, I thought we had a very good system in the very early 1970s, before there were some changes made that I don';t think it made it better, I think it made it worse. However, that';s 30 years ago, we';ve got to worry about now and the future. I think the strength of the present system is it';s a combination of public and private. I think private health insurance has helped to take the load off public hospitals because over the last four years there have been 3,000 more beds generated in the private system, yet 3,600 have disappeared in public hospitals. So, I think if you hadn';t have had that, that cushion from private hospitals, which is a direct result of our support for the private health insurance rebate, there would have been even greater difficulty in the public hospitals.
MARTIN:
With respect, obviously if you';re Prime Minister you get bumped to the front of the queue.
PRIME MINISTER:
Sure.
MARTIN:
If you';re a federal politician, you don';t have to do what we saw last night with ordinary people having to wait years for a knee operation or for a back spasm or for some other problem….
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I mean, everybody';s got their own situation. I mean, people take out private health insurance and not just politicians do that. I mean, I don';t think you should personalise it in that sense. Look, there are obviously weaknesses in the system and as far as our responsibility is concerned, the shortage of doctors, we are endeavouring in our latest package to address that. And we';re obviously trying to provide, we are offering to provide more incentives for doctors to maintain levels of bulkbilling. We have increased by a lot the money going to public hospitals, which we don';t run…
MARTIN:
What about this national reform? I mean, I can hear people saying, all of them, what you';re saying now, saying but he hasn';t been to Blacktown Hospital, he hasn';t been to Cairns.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I am very familiar with many of the difficulties in public hospitals and this is not a cop out…
MARTIN:
How do you fix it…?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well…
MARTIN:
You talked of a national reform and then you offered it and then you walked away.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, they walked away from it, they walked out. I mean, I don';t… I mean, you raised the question of Commonwealth and the States, I don';t want to get into buck passing. But, you know, be it remembered that those State Premiers, all of them, every last one of them, walked out of that Premiers conference…
MARTIN:
They say you ringbarked the Medicare system.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, hang on, so that they could put on their football jerseys and have a photo shoot. Now, nobody loves footy no more than I do, but looking after the health system of Australia was the number one responsibility for all of us that day, not some kind of photo stunt.
MARTIN:
No, the trouble is, you know, one of these emails. It';s funny you say that… the one on the top says the members of the medical profession blame everybody. The State Government blames the Federal Government, the Federal Government blames the State Government…
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I don';t… I accept responsibility fully for those areas which the Federal Government controls – that';s private health insurance and Medicare. We have no control over the public hospitals, we don';t administer them, we don';t run them, we contribute more to their operation than the States, but we have absolutely no control over. Now, that is not a copout, it';s just a statement of fact.
MARTIN:
But you know the pharmaceutical industry, the AMA, the hospital association, the consumer groups, all say the Federal Government is responsible for…
PRIME MINISTER:
Well everybody says the Federal Government';s responsible for everything because it';s the national government and at the end of the day everybody understand….
MARTIN:
Who';s going to fix it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, we are… well, when you say fix it, that assumes that everything about it is bad – now that';s not right.
MARTIN:
I bet there are people looking at this TV set tonight and saying you';re wrong, Prime Minister.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, well some of them would be saying that – I accept that. And on everything they';ll be some people who will…
MARTIN:
But these doctors and the nurses and the surgeons…
PRIME MINISTER:
Yes, I know there are…
MARTIN:
I mean, John O';Dwyer…
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, yes, I know. But it is also the case that the affordability of basic medical services in this country is way ahead of that in other countries. If you get…
MARTIN:
Not if you';re a pensioner. If you';re a pensioner, why do you have to wait 10 or 12 years to get your teeth fixed?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, that is obviously an example of where the system hasn';t worked effectively. But on the other hand, if you get ill in the middle of the night in a city in the United States, if you don';t have insurance which costs you thousands of dollars a year, somebody won';t come and treat you. I mean, you have to keep a sense of proportion about these things.
MARTIN:
But honestly, I mean, I could obviously pass them on to you. But here…
PRIME MINISTER:
Yeah, I know, I…
MARTIN:
There';s a registered nurse saying, you know, one nurse with 23 patients in a Brisbane hospital here, it';s impossible to look after 23 patients there…
PRIME MINISTER:
I…Ray….
MARTIN:
It';s in crisis everywhere.
PRIME MINISTER:
Ray, I understand that with 20 million people, there will always be a very large number of people who legitimately have concerns about the way the system operates. Now, as far as our responsibilities are concerned, we have dramatically increased private health insurance by giving a 30 per cent tax rebate and it would be under threat if Labor came to power because they';re not sympathetic to that tax rebate.
MARTIN:
But we had, if I had a poll tonight I bet people would say…
PRIME MINISTER:
No hang on, I mean, could I just… I mean, you asked me, can I just finish this point – our responsibility, the private health insurance system, we';ve boosted dramatically, we are very very strongly committed to Medicare, we';ve just brought down a package of almost a billion dollars of measures which is designed to make Medicare more accessible and more affordable. I am very concerned about the lack of doctors in certain areas and my prime concern at the moment is to get more doctors into those areas of workforce shortage.
MARTIN:
Can I suggest, we';re out of time, but can I suggest that most Australians, a great many, if not most Australians, think that the health system is dysfunctional and a disgrace.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don';t agree that it is a disgrace. And I think to be fair to the thousands of health professions who work in the system, that is an outrage.
MARTIN:
[Inaudible]
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no, I know. But it';s a very harsh criticism and to say a system is a disgrace implies a failure of everybody responsible for it and I think that is invalid as a criticism. I do accept that there are a number of very serious weaknesses and I';m not trying to walk away from our responsibilities, but I just point out very gently that we do not run public hospitals, we have no control over them.
MARTIN:
You';re not passing the buck?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I';m not. I';m stating the fact…
MARTIN:
We have…
PRIME MINISTER:
And I accept my responsibilities in areas such as Medicare and private health insurance and we have done a great deal to address those issues, but I do agree that there are more areas that need to be addressed and I think you will find that the Government will respond to those.
MARTIN:
Alright, we thank you for your time, PM.
PRIME MINISTER:
You';re welcome.
[ends]