President's update: Budget wins and missed opportunities

Happy Friday, and happy budget week!  

Canberra (well at least the Parliamentary region) really did have a buzz about it this week, with all the lobby groups in town, ready to react to the federal budget.  

But it was a bit of a mediocre budget from our perspective — the drizzly, cool weather here in Canberra matched the lacklustre health announcements.  

It wasn’t all bad news. I was very excited to see $120.9 million allocated for the introduction of GP health assessments for three-year-olds. We’ve advocated for the reintroduction of a childhood check since the axing of the 4-year-old Healthy Kids Check back in 2015. It took over a decade, but the check is back! No one said advocacy was an easy road.

General practice is central to the care and well-being of young families. These early, comprehensive assessments are critical to the early identification of developmental and other health issues, and connection with supports.  We’ve been advised this will be implemented through an expansion of existing health assessment items, so another bonus is no new MBS numbers to remember!

The announcement of a digital child health record (a digital baby book) will of course take some time to deliver, but is also a positive step towards better coordination of early childhood care. Of course, we need to make sure it’s not one more disconnected web platform widget with clunky logins!

As expected, the additional $25 billion for public hospitals is locked in following signing of the NHRA, and our long-running campaign to Clear the Hospital Logjam. This funding is much needed, but our modelling shows this won’t be enough, and there’s still a $9.6 billion deficit. Public hospitals care for some of our sickest patients and need the resources to grow and deliver timely care. With the funding now locked in, we need cooperation between all governments to get that funding flowing as quickly as possible to clear the hospital logjam.

And that’s about where the good news ends. This budget was a missed opportunity to undertake meaningful structural reform to modernise Medicare and to support provision of private healthcare more broadly.

In general practice, with an ageing population and more chronic disease, we need structural reform of consultation items to better support longer consultations. We won’t give up the fight, and opportunities for reform still exist through current reviews into time-tiered items.  

The budget was mostly silent on private healthcare. We are concerned that the government’s cut to private health insurance rebates for people aged 65 years and older will result in them ditching private health insurance, putting more strain on already overstretched public hospitals. We need a private hospital authority to drive broad reforms to deliver better value for money for Australians with private health insurance.

The budget touched on non-GP specialist fees, something Minister Mark Butler has been vocal about in the media. We have repeatedly called out this commentary and said it is time for the government to stop the blame game and recognise that many factors influence out-of-pocket costs for patients, with inadequate Medicare rebates being a very significant factor.

The government has set aside $2.1 million in 2026–27, with budget documents saying this modest commitment will target improved informed financial consent and standardised fee disclosure, building on previously announced upgrades to the Medical Costs Finder.  

The government chose yet again not to introduce our practical prevention measure of a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages. Such a tax would be a win/win because it would reduce annual sugar consumption by about 2kgs per person and raise $3.6 billion over four years to improve public health across Australia. They’ve kicked the sugary can down the road yet again.

Australia’s pressing health needs won’t go away. We will now redouble our efforts post-budget to keep pushing for overdue reforms and influence the many reviews still underway.

You’re probably by now sick of hearing about the budget from everyone, including us. A range of the changes to investments are likely to affect doctors and I’m sure your inbox is full of accounting and financial updates. We will keep you up to date with the finer health portfolio details as they emerge. But in the meantime, enjoy your weekend!