Mr CADMAN (8:00 PM) —It is a great pleasure to see you in the chair, Mr Deputy Speaker Mossfield. I know that many of your constituents will find that the Taxation Laws Amendment (Medicare Levy and Medicare Levy Surcharge) Bill 2002 fits the bill for them. It will be just perfect for your constituents, many of whom I know. For those whom I do not know, I know you will be advocating the attributes of this tremendously thoughtful government. The bill is only 19 lines long but it does some important things: it changes the limits for people who do not have to pay the Medicare levy and it increases the Medicare levy low-income thresholds for individuals, married couples and sole parents. The dependent child/student component of the family is important in the way in which those assessments are made. The bill applies to people who are below pension age so that they do not have a Medicare levy liability where they do not have an income tax liability. It allows a family income threshold to apply to a taxpayer where the taxpayer is entitled to a child-housekeeper rebate or a housekeeper rebate.

There we are, Mr Deputy Speaker: it is a very comprehensive piece of legislation that is only 19 lines long but it has attached to it two schedules that set the levels of the levy that will be applied under this government in 2002. The increases are set out in schedule 1. The minister made a speech of about 20 lines when he introduced the bill but we are giving it too little attention, bearing in mind what it achieves. The bill grants concessions for people who deserve concessions. The thoughtfulness in the way in which this is to be applied, due to the changes in the tax system, indicates the heart of this government for Australian families.

The bill provides that no Medicare levy is payable for low-income individuals, as I have said, and families where taxable income does not exceed a certain threshold. The documents show that for an individual taxpayer this year no levy is payable if the taxable income or family income for the current financial year does not exceed $14,539. There is a reduced levy if taxable income or family income is within the range of $14,540 to $15,717. A pensioner under age pension age is relieved from paying any Medicare levy if their taxable income is below $16,570, and that is an increase of about $600 per year. The levy is reduced if there is an income range of $16,571 to $17,913. A married taxpayer with children or students has this benefit: with a family income of $24,534 or less there is no levy. If their income ranges from roughly $24,500 to approximately $26,500, they will get a graduated payment opportunity.

What I like, what your constituents will like, Mr Deputy Speaker Mossfield, and what the people of Mitchell will like is that where there are children the levy goes up— there is increased income without the levy being paid—and the amount rises. Regrettably these days, not too many families have six children, but a family with six children can have a family income of $38,052 and not pay the levy. It is then graduated from $38,053 to $41,000-odd. There is a real advantage for families. That is what the government has been on about. Nothing better illustrates the commitment of this government than the Medicare levy or the Medicare levy surcharge. There we have it in a nutshell: all the levels have increased from about $500 to a couple of thousand dollars per year for families with several children. That makes quite a difference per week for the average family. Throw in the other benefits of the changed tax scales—low inflation and low interest rates—and it is evident we are trying to do a better job for families.

I would be the first to admit that you are going to identify problems and find individuals who fall outside the range of what governments do. Whilst this is very significant and laudable, there will always be more that we can do for families. The trouble with government from such a distance as Canberra is that it is so generalised in the application of its formulas that people fall between the cracks. That is where we need to support and rely on non-government agencies to pick up on what governments cannot do. Governments cannot do everything, but they should assist those agencies which have the ability to assist families. They should be supporting those agencies to fulfil a total delivery.

The financial impact of this process and the changes are valued at $42.8 million in the coming financial year, $21 million in the following year and so on. In each year there is a cost to the tax revenue, as the tax commissioner puts it, but I prefer to say that there is a concession for families that is well warranted. I am delighted that we are passing this legislation through the House tonight and I am delighted at its impact on Australian families.

However, I am not so pleased about some aspects of the amendment moved by the Australian Labor Party. One aspect is completely and absolutely dishonest. Paragraph (4) of the opposition amendment makes the claim about:

That is absolutely, grossly wrong. If you think that you are going to run that line out there with the community and frighten them as you tried to with the GST, you are going to fail again with this one. The fact is that medicines have not risen by 30 per cent. A product like a Ventolin CFC-free inhaler with 200 doses costs $17.20 and the price will stay the same for a non-pensioner; it has not increased. The only changes are at the margin where the benefit level changes from $22.60 to $28.60. That is an increase of $6. Some items are no longer within that previous range and some items will cost slightly more. However, no item, even at that top range, will cost more than $6 in addition to the $22.60. Some of the items that are subsidised by the government cost hundreds of dollars per prescription. Many of them are in the range of $60 to $80 per prescription. Nobody who is part of the national health scheme will pay more than $28.60.

There is a slight change for people who are not eligible for pension benefits under this scheme, but let me repeat: to say that medicines have risen or will rise by 30 per cent is an absolute lie and the Australian Labor Party ought to be ashamed of itself for trying to run this line in its amendment. It will not work because people out there will find that there is no change for all low-priced medicines. They will go into chemists and will be amazed to say, `I thought this was going up,' and the pharmacist will say, `There's no rise. It's under $28.60 so there's been no change to it, and anything that's priced over $28.60 will not cost more than $28.60 because that's the way the subsidy program works.' For elderly people, pensioners or those on benefits, there has been an increase of $1—from $3.60 to $4.60. They will not pay more than $4.60 for anything. The 30 per cent increase just is not there. I do not know what you think you will achieve as an organisation by trying to run this line.

The other line the Australian Labor Party has tried to run on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme is that the changes mean that all prescriptions are going to increase by $6.20, and that is not right either. On both accounts you are wrong and have been misrepresenting the case. If it is so bad, you do not have to misrepresent it. Through this process I feel that you are cooking up something that you can manufacture as a reason for having a go at blocking this measure in the Senate.

Whilst it would be most desirable that all pharmaceuticals never changed in price and the price always stayed the same, the fact is that the costs of the most beneficial products are increasing rapidly. There are high research costs and high costs to the taxpayer who subsidises them. In 10 years, the cost of this scheme has risen from a shade over $1 billion to over $4 billion. We need to take some action now, considering the population's age, and modify the process. The user needs to pay a little more and that is what this is about. The user will be paying a little more than previously.

You can run through product after product, the commonly used products if you like. I will repeat some of the things that have been said in the House today, because they bear repeating. I will say again that a CFC-free Ventolin inhaler with 200 doses costs $17.20 today; with these changes, it will cost $17.20 tomorrow. There is no change in the cost of a product like Ventolin. If we take sleeping tablets, Normison, for instance, the cost for 25 tablets is $7.58 before the changes; after the changes it will be $7.58. No misrepresentation will add 30 per cent to that, and you will endeavour to fit the figures around it—I know you did not, Mr Deputy Speaker Mossfield, but members of your party did prior to the introduction of the GST—to try to scare people. But, see, it just did not work. They did not believe you.

You will not do it with this either, because the fact is that Normison, after these changes, will stay at $7.58. It will stay the same price before the changes as after the changes. Sleeping pills, antibiotics, Ventolin—you have consistently as an Australian Labor Party tried to mislead the people of Australia, and they are not going to accept that. They are not going to believe it, because that is not the way it is going to turn out. When they do see the impact of it they will be surprised by how little change there really is, and what change does occur is a necessary change.

I conclude my remarks tonight on a related medical issue, which is partly referred to in the amendments by the opposition, and that is the problem of indemnity insurance for the medical profession and for specialists in particular. It is a huge worry for all Australians, and it is something that in my mind is much bigger than the Ansett crash, because it does affect everybody and the solutions are not particularly easy to find. I have a friend who is a neurosurgeon, a brilliant surgeon who is paying for insurance to protect himself and his family from any litigation. He is paying something like $96,000 a year. To join the fund he has paid $11,000. So you are looking at $110,000 before he opens the door. He is saying to me, `I can't go on like this, and not knowing whether I am going to be covered.' He said, `I don't expect the Australian government to pick up the total bill, but we have got to find a certainty through this.'

One of the things that has disturbed me most in the process over the last few weeks is to hear the CEO of the Doctors Fund come out and so strongly endorse the fund and encourage doctors to continue to support it and then within a month it was in liquidation. That, to me, is a huge worry: that somebody can so, I would say in this place, misrepresent the situation of their company. It is totally unfair, totally unwarranted and totally inept. I wish the government well in the gradual process over the next few days of clearing up step after step in a methodical way. I wish to compliment the Minister for Revenue and Assistant Treasurer on the way in which she has been able to approach this. But it is a huge worry and it is going to be expensive for all Australians.

I just hope that we do not find that we have a system where the only safe haven for doctors to practise is in the public sector and that we continue to have a thriving private sector, and that the insurance factors—the litigation, the greed in some ways of people wanting to demonstrate that they can grab some of the insurance companies' money by using clever lawyers or by having judges who seem to make very inconsistent decisions—support them when they go to court. We will all be aware of the case of the surf club and the man at Bondi Beach who received $3.75 million. I quote from the Daily Telegraph of 15 May—where that gentleman who received $3.75 million said that he would have been happy with half a million; he did not really need the extras—where it is claimed by Sir Harry Gibbs:

Sir Harry Gibbs is a very distinguished former Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia. I think his comments are sensible. There is case after case of a similar nature. (Time expired)