PM: Well it's good to be back in Lismore, and it's good to be here with Janelle Saffin, our local Member, as well as of course with Justine Elliott, the Minister for Aged Care. We're here to talk about the future of health reform, health and hospitals reform, FOR this important and growing part of Australia. It's been good to sit down together with the local health community in all of its branches and talk about their response to the recommendations which have been put forward by the Health Reform Commission. Recommendations which go to the future of preventative healthcare, primary healthcare, acute hospital care, sub-acute care, and of course we've also had discussions concerning aged cares services, mental health services, and dental care.
Here, of course, at Lismore Base Hospital, we have also been seeking to invest over a period of time since we've been in office. Today I'd like to announce that we're investing $8.3 million to fund the establishment of an eight bed medical assessment unit here at the hospital.
These eight extra medical assessment beds will take pressure off the emergency department by moving patients to a dedicated area to receive medical diagnosis and treatment. I am advised through my consultations elsewhere in the health and hospital system that this is a very useful way of taking pressure off the emergency departments. I was only last week at Nepean Hospital in Sydney, where they introduced me to the impact this has on the overall efficiency of the emergency department. And there, their particular service was calibrated particularly around the needs of older Australians, and we're adding to that service here.
So here in Lismore, and here in this part of Australia, adding to this ability to support the emergency department at Lismore Base is one step forward, we've still got many steps to take for the future. This funding also is in addition to the over $600,000 recently provided to the hospital for new surgical equipment under stage two of the Government's elective surgery program. The funding comes from the Government's $750 million commitment to take pressure off our emergency departments, some $248 million of which is going to various hospitals in New South Wales.
On top of that, we have also been making earlier investments here at Lismore Base. I'd like to emphasise in particular the investment we are making over two years, the establishment of the University of Western Sydney's new rural clinical school both in Lismore and at Bathurst. And we've had discussions with representatives of that school this morning.
Furthermore, we have also our investment in Lismore's integrated cancer centre. This is a $15 million investment which Janelle and I had a look at this morning. I think they said to us they hope to have it up and running next year? And with a throughput of patients not long after that.
This is going to be an important addition to the proper provision of cancer care in communities like this, in important and growing regional centres across Australia. In the Budget we indicated a very large investment in integrated cancer care nationwide, $1.3 billion, Sydney, Melbourne, the large centres, but most critically, also having a network of integrated cancer care centres across Australia's regions as well. And this is part and parcel of that process. So adding that ability to receive proper oncology services in major centres like this, is again one step forward.
Finally, making sure we get it right for the long term on health and hospitals is really important, which means getting it right also for regions like this. This will be a tough process, hard decisions to be taken, and none of these decisions for the long term future are going to be cheap, or inexpensive. Therefore, as a community and as a country, we're going to have to engage in a debate which is realistic about the direction we're going to go, the reforms which need to be undertaken, but also about the cost implications which flow and how they are to be funded. Enough from me folks, and over to you.
JOURNALIST: Mr Rudd we had a case here last week I believe it was, of a doctor who has just set up practice in Byron Bay. He moved here from New Zealand when he was fourteen. He didn't become an Australian citizen until after he'd studied. He's now been told that he has to go to the outback for up to a decade before he can practice back here on the coast. Are you aware of that situation, and is it a loophole in the provision of Medicare provider numbers that you'd like to see perhaps addressed, because doctor numbers here on the north coast aren't that flash either?
PM: Ah, no. And I'm advised that we've got challenges in this region and in other regions in terms of overall numbers of medicos. I, in a presentation before indicated where that trend line is going for the future, unless we intervene nationwide. On the individual circumstances surrounding this case, you won't be surprised to know that I'm not aware of them. However, I'm sure the Health Minister can now look at the circumstances surrounding that case and see if there is any problem in the system which has caused that to occur, and we'll take that up with her.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) I know there's a general perception though on the far north coast that, being a regional area, often it gets quite overlooked in terms of funding. (inaudible)
PM: One of the reasons I'm here today is because Janelle Saffin has said loud and clear that I needed to get here to look on the ground at the needs of this fast-growing region. I'm from Queensland, and I understand the growth pressures which are on South East Queensland, and this part of New South Wales. They are huge. It's not just a growing population in New South Wales, but it's also, over time, the ageing of the population as well. And getting these two things right for the future, as our colleague just reminded us also, the challenges for providing workforce for the future, medicos, nurses, specialists, surgeons, across the categories.
So, in the presentation to the health community representatives here today I made a particular point of saying that we need to get right the better access to healthcare services across the nation. Not just the large cities, across the nation. And that means there are important regions as well. But I get back to what I said before - none of this will be for free. Whatever reforms we embrace will cost, and as a nation we've got to have that debate as well.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) should have tax free charity status to attract sponsorship to build a memorial on the Sari club site?
PM: I believe that when it comes to the future of that site, we shouldn't have anything which allows people to trample on the memories of those who tragically lost their lives in Bali, tragically lost their lives through that terrorist attack. Secondly, you refer particularly to the tax status of that particular facility. I am advised that the Treasurer will be obtaining a response from the Treasury in the course of the next week or two ahead. And this will have gone through the normal processes. The Treasurer will be receiving advice soon.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: Look, I think one of the big challenges with the proper (inaudible) of, let's call it health funding across the board, is making sure that you've got state and territory governments working together in partnership with the Australian Government.
In the past, for the last Australian Healthcare Agreement, you saw the Australian Government pull out a billion dollars from public hospital funding across the nation. That has implications for regions like this, and that's despite the fact that the population is going up, you're having increased ageing of the population, yet under the Howard Government you actually had the overall allocations for public hospitals go down by a billion in real terms. That's a real problem.
Therefore, the alternative for the future is us partnering with state and territory governments to make a difference. It's what the Health Minister has done in Phase One through the new Australian Healthcare Agreement. My presentation here today indicated that compared with the last Healthcare Agreement, that represents a 50 per cent increase in funding. And that's not just for the acute hospital system. It's across all the categories as well.
Phase two is getting the response right to this thing, that is, the long-term Health Reform Commission recommendations for the long-term future. And getting also the balance of responsibilities right with state and territory governments. This is going to be a very tough reform process, hard decision to be taken, tough funding decisions to be taken, but I believe the mood of the country is that we have this debate rather than just avoid it.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) describe the mood as people have had a gutful of the responsibility shifting. And it sounded like, perhaps you had as well?
PM: No, I've been consistent on this, ever since I became Leader of Opposition. My colleagues may remember that when I stood up on the first day in the House of Representatives I think, having been elected as leader of the Parliamentary Labor Party, I held up a report on aged care, which was entitled, it was a bipartisan report of the parliament, entitled ‘The Blame Game'. And I said Australians are fed up with this. They actually want us to get past this sort of mindless game of it's his fault or her fault because they are from a different level of government. I mean, people just want a real debate about the problems in the system, how to fix them, and how much it will cost. And that's what I'm trying to do.
I don't underestimate the complexity of this debate. It's going to be very hard. And everywhere I go, the needs are infinite and the resources are finite. But unless we have this debate, we're simply going to allow what the Commission has described as a system at tipping point to fall over, and I don't intend to be around and simply say ‘well, that's a problem, isn't it?' I want to at least have a go, and we intend to have a go.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, there's a new report apparently released saying that women's pay lags behind men's pay. Is there anything that you can do to address this imbalance between men and women's pay, and are you worried that women are feeling and bearing the brunt of the economic crisis?
PM: I think we do need to see the income gap between men and women close over time in Australia because of the critical contribution which women in the workforce make to the economy overall, across the whole range of professions and occupations.
The second thing though, can I just draw your attention to the impact of the repeal of WorkChoices. WorkChoices and Australian Workplace Agreements, the biggest impact, or at least a really big impact, was with women in particular categories of employment. The data I saw a year or so ago about the impact on women employed under AWAs, Australian Workplace Agreements, on the one hand, and those not employed under AWAs was huge. Not just tens of dollars, but in fact high tens of dollars.
Therefore, we've changed the industrial relations system, therefore, for women in those categories of employment, the new arrangements put in place by Julia Gillard I believe will have some effect, but we're going to have to always lift our game on that.
But I just made mention of WorkChoices and I notice there's a debate about the Liberals and Liberal policy for the future and leadership alternatives as well. Can I say that it's really important that we are absolutely clearly focussed on not just leadership alternatives for the Liberal Party, but policy alternatives as well.
One thing about the Liberals is that they seem to have this deep addiction for WorkChoices and this deep addiction for nuclear power. It doesn't matter where you turn. So I think one of the challenges we'd like to see an answer to is for any candidate for the leadership of the Liberal Party to stick their hand up and say they are not either a supporter of WorkChoices or not a supporter of nuclear power. It seems to be part and parcel of the Liberal National Party DNA.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) Surfers Paradise (inaudible)
PM: Well, first of all, in terms of what the Premier has done in terms of bans on particular categories of products, I am not fully briefed. Can I say that the Gold Coast in general, Surfers Paradise in particular, has got its own challenges in terms of the health and hospital system, and health policy generally. That's why the Health Minister is there in the latter part of the day, and I'm sure she'll listen long and hard to what the local community has to say.
You see, more broadly, as a nation also we need to, this is no particular reference to Surfers or to the Gold Coast, but the nation at large, we do have a challenge to deal with when it comes to teenage binge drinking. It's just real. If you speak to the coppers, as I do quite often, Sydney, Melbourne and elsewhere, this is a real problem. And dealing with this effectively means that the whole community has to get engaged, because the roll-on consequences for our men and women in police uniform, the roll-on consequences for the health and hospital system is huge unless we're dealing with this, but I'm sure that will be part and parcel of the Minister's consultations up there today.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible)
PM: You know something, I've been to the Gold Coast many, many, many times over the years, and I like it a lot. And even though I grew up on the Sunshine Coast, which if you know anything about South-East Queensland, they, sort of, have views of each other. My views are somewhat beyond that. Both have their great strengths. I love the Gold Coast and I'm sure I'll be back there again.
JOURNALIST: (inaudible) my business colleagues in Canberra want to know did you consider joining the Liberal Party as a youngster?
PM: Um, no. And can I say-
JOURNALIST: What about the Nationals?
PM: No. No to either possibility. But I've got to say the challenge for the Liberals and Nationals is to find a single leadership alternative for the future who doesn't have a deep addiction to WorkChoices or a deep addiction to nuclear power. It seems to come up all the time. Got to run, folks.
(ends)