Mr LATHAM (1:47 PM) —I cannot resist responding to that lecture in Wilsonomics. I think the proposition developed in Wilsonomics runs something like this: you add up the pears, you add up the oranges and you add up the bananas, you divide by them three and wonder why you are talking fruit salad. I think that was the proposition that was developed in Wilsonomics—the idea that somehow HECS has gone somewhere outside the university system.

The member for O'Connor (Mr Tuckey) defeated himself in his own comments, because I can recall the numbers he used. He was pointing out that at the beginning of the Hawke government we were spending $3 billion on higher education and, at the end, we were spending $10 billion. That is pure evidence that every single cent and dollar of the HECS fees went into the expansion of university places around Australia, the historic expansion developed under John Dawkins. The member for O'Connor has defeated himself by his own words. He has done many silly things in this place but today he has defeated himself by his own words.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. G.H. Adams) —Order! I ask the honourable member to come back to the amendments before the House.

Mr LATHAM —He went on to talk about health care and was raising the point that Kerry Packer is down there being bulk-billed by the local Woollahra GP every second day. I dare say that Kerry Packer, like half the Howard cabinet, could afford his own private physician. He would be wealthy enough—

Mr Fitzgibbon —Or a trust.

Mr LATHAM —The member for Hunter (Mr Fitzgibbon) is right. They would have the trust income and the private wealth and affluence to move outside the public health system. But even if he were down there, he would be exercising his right as an Australian citizen—and, I hope, taxpayer—to draw on the services provided by universal health care. There is no prouder achievement of the Australian Labor Party than the establishment of universal health care in Australia.

You can go back—and your memory would go back to the time of the Gorton and McMahon governments—when up to 20 per cent of Australians had no insurance of any kind, public or private. Does the member for O'Connor want to go back to that system where we have less than universal health care in Australia? Is he seriously suggesting that we go back to a system where up to 20 per cent of Australians had no health insurance—public or private?

If any citizen draws on the universal system, then that is fine by the Australian Labor Party, because we stand first and foremost for universal health care. We do not want anyone left out of the public health system. Above and beyond that, of course, if they are wealthy enough to take out private arrangements—be they in the form of a private physician or private health insurance—then they can exercise that right as well, because they have the capacity to pay. These are the fundamentals in health.

The member for O'Connor's talking about the hypothecation of HECS payments to the health system just proves that he is so far off target. In fact, he is reminding the House of his record as a failed health shadow minister under the Peacock opposition and someone who totally failed when he had some responsibility in health. If he was off checking the HECS budget during his time as the shadow minister for health, it is no wonder that at the 1990 election the coalition had to put up the white flag and say, `We cannot develop a health policy. It is all too hard for us. We have been adding up the apples, the oranges and the pears and dividing them by three and we are afraid we cannot come up with any sensible health policy.' It was your Western Australian colleague, and you were his head research person at the time. He relied on your advice and, in the end, ran up the white flag.

On these matters, the member for O'Connor is totally misrepresenting the nature of the Commonwealth budget and totally misrepresenting what happened on HECS payments. Every single cent and dollar went into the expansion of university places. If he has a problem with universal health care, I say to Australian patients, `Beware.' If someone in the government side has a problem with universal health care, beware, because if you are of low income standing and they are going to wind back the public insurance that you can currently access, then you will end up on the streets. You will end up on the streets in an American-style health system where, if you cannot afford to pay, you do not get treated. That is the sort of market that you want to establish in health care.

We have had that in Australia, and that is why we ended up with Medibank in the early 1970s because of the Whitlam government. You were part of the shoddy crew that tried to dismantle it step by step, along with the current Prime Minister (Mr Howard) and, given half a chance, you would do it again. We are standing here defending public health insurance and arrangements in Australia and we will continue to do that until we drop.