Today, we have transitioned from being a private practice to a fully bulk billing practice for GP consultations, including skin cancer checks. Through the government initiatives and incentives, this has allowed us to bulk bill general practice consultations, including skin checks. Skin cancer is a very important, I guess, cause of morbidity and mortality in Australia. Early checks is the key to prevention. With bulk billing, there is no financial impediment in patients attending the surgery. Secondly, I expect that skin cancers, patients with skin cancer, will now be more compliant in attending follow up checks. This will translate into better health outcomes for these cohort of patients. Thank you.
KATY GALLAGHER, MINISTER FOR FINANCE: Thanks everyone for coming today, and thanks Dr Conrad for saying a few words, and to the Prime Minister and Minister Butler joining us here today. Anyone who lives on the north side of Canberra knows how important the Jamison Centre is, or Jamo, as it's commonly known. And the Jamison Medical and Skin Cancer Clinic has been a cornerstone of this shopping centre for the last 40 years. And it's so lovely to be able to visit here and know that this is a bulk billing practice. We know bulk billing hasn't been where we wanted it to be in the ACT. And seeing clinics like this come on board because of the Federal Government's investment shows that this investment not only is needed, but it will make a big difference to the lives of patients who come here and help support the work of these fantastic doctors who operate the Jamison Medical and Skin Cancer Clinic. So, I'm so pleased as a Canberran and as a local shopper to be here this morning, and very proud to hand over to the Prime Minister.
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much, Katy, and thank you to Dr Conrad for having us here. And thank you to the patients, John and Lucio, who told us, in Lucio's case, has been coming here for 40 years. John's been coming here for over a decade, and the relationship between a patient and their GP is so important. It's a relationship that allows people to get regular checkups, to actually go see their doctor, to get ahead of health issues, so that instead of an issue becoming an acute health event with a great cost to the taxpayer, but more importantly, a cost to an individual's health. The relationship between a GP and being able to go see a GP regularly to get those checkups is so important, and that's why bulk billing is so important. We put the strengthening of Medicare front and centre, where we're elected in 2022. In 2024, we tripled the bulk billing incentive for concession card holders, making an enormous difference there. That lifted up bulk billing rates to 90 per cent for concession card holders. And what we took to the 2025 election, of course, was the commitment to lift up bulk billing rates further by tripling the bulk billing incentive and therefore giving some 18,000 practices the opportunity to benefit them as well. The figures show that this tripling of the bulk billing incentive means that practices will be better off if they bulk bill 100 per cent of their patients. So, building in better health care, but better outcomes as well. Making sure that incentive is there. Making sure that when someone visits their GP, all they need is their Medicare card - this little piece of plastic, this piece of green and gold in Australia's national colours, says a lot about Australian values. It says that when you get sick, you'll get the care that you need, not on the basis of the size of your wallet or your bank balance. You'll get it on the basis of need. That is a fundamentally proud element of who we are as Australians. And as we - in the next week, we'll talk a bit about the Whitlam Government and Medibank and what happened there. And the fact that was, of course, gotten rid of by the incoming Fraser Government. But it took the Hawke Government to entrench Medicare, and it's taken another Labor Government, our government, to make sure that we're strengthening Medicare right across the board. And that is so important as we go forward. I said that after the May 3 election, six months ago today, when we're elected, I said on that evening, we wanted to concentrate on delivering on our commitments, and that's what we're doing, one by one, ticking off the commitments that we've made.
In the next period of Parliament, we want our environmental reforms to be delivered. We want 1800-Medicare will be delivered on January 1. We're opening the 50 additional Medicare Urgent Care Clinics, one by one, around the country, and we want that to be completed early next year also. And of course, on December 10, our social media reforms kick in as well, making sure we protect our youngest Australians from the harm that is being caused by social media. So, this is a government that I'm proud to lead. It's a government, after six months, that is delivering on the commitments that we took to the election. There's none of them are more important, though, than strengthening Medicare, because that is a core element of our values, reflecting Australian values, I'll turn to the Health Minister, and then we're happy to take questions.
MARK BUTLER, MINISTER FOR HEALTH: Well, thank you, Prime Minister, and thank you to the Jamison Practice for hosting us today, just one of more than 1,000 practices that last week were charging gap fees, and this week will be 100 per cent bulk billing. Bulk billing all of their patients, all of the time. We know that more people now are deferring going to the doctor because of cost than ever before, because bulk billing was in free fall when we came to government because of a six year long Medicare rebate freeze initiated by Peter Dutton and cemented in place by the then Health Minister Sussan Ley. So, all of the efforts we've made to turn bulk billing around for concession card holders, as the Prime Minister said, that now sits at 92 per cent, are really brought together by this record investment that kicks off this week. That number of practices moving to 100 per cent bulk billing will increase every single day, because we know it's in the interest of the vast bulk of general practices and individual GPs to take up this investment that we've put on the table this weekend. But most importantly, it's in the interests of patients. That's why our strengthening Medicare agenda focuses on four pillars: more bulk billing, more doctors and nurses, more Urgent Care Clinics and cheaper medicines. And we're delivering on all four of those pillars.
PRIME MINISTER: Happy to take questions.
JOURNALIST: Is an in-person meeting with the Turkish President on the cards to make sure you can secure the COP Summit?
PRIME MINISTER: I've written to the President Erdoğan. I'm available, and we want to talk these issues through. The UN provisions, as I have said, unfortunately, it's by consensus, so it's not clear how it can be resolved other by negotiation. I've said I'm certainly prepared to travel, including to Belém, if that makes a difference. But if there's not an agreement, then the default is that the COP will be held in Bonn. That's the way the rules have been written.
JOURNALIST: Have you received any response yet from an inquiry to the Turkish Government?
PRIME MINISTER: No, but I wrote, again, just last week.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, are power prices too high?
PRIME MINISTER: We want cost of living measures to be dealt with across the board. That's what we're doing right here. That's why we have in place energy rebates. That's why we put a cap on coal and gas prices. That's why we are here talking about being able to see the doctor for free. That's why we've introduced cheaper medicines as well. We know that cost of living pressures are real, that's why we act on them.
JOURNALIST: So, when can people expect to see power bills go down, or will they just not increase as fast?
PRIME MINISTER: Well as our friend's colleague, Phil Coorey, wrote so eloquently today in the Financial Review, what has occurred on power prices as a product in part of the dysfunction and chaos that's been there of the Coalition. 24 out of 28 coal fired power stations announced their closure. They had no plan to do anything other than fight each other, and that's continuing today. What we've done is put a cap on gas and coal prices. We did that in partnership with the Coalition Government of New South Wales and the Labor Government, then, of Queensland. What we've done is put in place energy rebates, and we know that the cheapest form of new power is renewables.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, the Opposition's polling continues to dive. What are you doing to make sure that the government doesn't, that complacency doesn't seep into your own government?
PRIME MINISTER: Doing real things which make a real difference for real people. That's what this is doing right here, now. This practice moving to fully bulk billing their patients. That wasn't the case last week. It is today. It is as a result of the changes that were put in on November 1. And there's 1,000 practices around Australia, just like this one, that today are going to be fully bulk billed, making an enormous difference to them. My government is focused, it's disciplined, it's orderly, and the Coalition - I'll leave them for their chaos and infighting.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, could I just ask - do you expect to have a universal child care model in place by the end of this term of Parliament? And if I could ask Finance Minister Katy Gallagher a question, if that's all right, you can you answer it, if you like. Do you expect that your forecast for public service wages will retain, will remain flat as they currently are in the budget? Or do you expect to see upward pressure on those in coming up?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, on the question I've been asked, what we're doing is rolling out the commitments that we've made. This year is our focus. We'll continue to focus, though, on the job of reform. I've said before, I think somewhat uncontroversially, that the job of reform is never concluded. We don't say, 'right, that's done. We'll pack up, and we're satisfied with that'. We are focused as a government, Minister after Minister, every single one of them, but also every single Caucus Member is focused on what we can do to improve the lives of Australians as we can go forward. How do we deal with the urgent issues which are immediate to make an immediate difference to people's lives? But how do we do it in a way that sets Australia up for the future? Now, one of those ways is in education, and we know that human brain development, 90 per cent occurs within the first five years, more than 90 per cent. So we know that early learning is important, and so we're focused on that as well as on, from this year, next year, when school starts again, will be a focus of our delivery of better funding for schools, making sure that that promise, which began with the Gonski recommendations more than a decade ago, is actually delivered. We signed up every state and territory to that commitment. That will be an important element that you'll hear a lot of from me next January and February. That's why our climate change action is real as well, looking to future generations. That's why Future Made in Australia as is important. That's what critical minerals, rare earths, new industries is about as well, making more things here in Australia, making sure we train people for that. My government, those two focuses - what do we do that make a difference to people's lives today while setting Australia's future up for not just one term of government, but for decades ahead, is so important. That is a laser like focus that my government has. I'll ask Katy -
MINISTER GALLAGHER: Thanks PM, thanks Ron for writing in the AFR as well, appreciate it. We spent the last three years making sure we're resourcing the Public Service properly and paying public servants properly. That wasn't the case under the former government, where they eroded capability, sacked public servants and didn't award pay increases. And our forecasts reflect those decisions, and they will be updated in the usual way, through Budget and MYEFO.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, just to, sorry, just to follow up Ron's question. Will we have universal child care system in place by the time of the next election?
PRIME MINISTER: I've given you the answer. You can ask me that -
JOURNALIST: Well, you didn't actually answer that -
PRIME MINISTER: You've got three years to continue to ask and follow up.
JOURNALIST: Do you believe that for-profit child care still has a place in the system?
PRIME MINISTER: You've got three years to follow that up.
JOURNALIST: That was a different question.
PRIME MINISTER: Well, you get the same answer. What we're doing in child care, we've made a significant difference. We've increased - we've saved a system like aged care that was suffering from the fact that people weren't paid properly. That's the first thing we need to do is to address issues of workforce. We inherited an aged care system, those changes came in on Saturday as well. That was summarised in the interim report of the Royal Commission by one word, neglect. We inherited a child care system that was under pressure because they were losing their workforce. What we've done is rescue that. What we do is put in place, measure by measure, element by element, over a period of time to improve the systems. Paid Prac for nursing, for early learning, for these issues as well, is another element that we have brought in that is making a difference already. So, we'll continue to focus. We won't get ahead of ourselves. We make announcements when we've gone through proper policy processes. That's what we do. We don't meet and have chaos and different, three or four different, announcements from different elements of the show, like the Coalition are doing at the moment. I'll make this point, though - Australians shouldn't pay the price of Coalition chaos when we are looking at the reforms, including environmental reforms, that are before the Parliament at the moment. Australians need all of the Parliament, whether it be the Coalition or the Greens Party, for that matter, we don't want to just return to the Noalition of the Senate, just saying no to sensible, practical, pragmatic, orderly reforms. We want to get things done in the interests of the nation.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, support for One Nation is continuing to grow. What do you think that says about Australians', you know, thoughts on issues like immigration and what do you have to do to ensure that that shift from centrist parties to the far right we're seeing around the developed world, doesn't happen here?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, what we're doing is putting in place good government. Good government that's orderly. We have an orderly system in Australia. That's a good thing. My government's been very disciplined about fulfilling the commitments that we made prior to the election. Go back and have a look at some of the front pages that were run during the 2022 election campaign and see how they measure up to reality and what my government has done. My government has done exactly what we said we would do. We'll continue to do that. We will continue to government, to govern as a party that is interested in reform but rejects extremes of the right or of the left. We reject those approaches, and we continue to put forward things that make a practical difference to people's lives.
JOURNALIST: On Optus, why should government departments continue to have contracts with Optus? And do you think that should be under review in light of the way they let people down with the Triple Zero outage?
PRIME MINISTER: Optus failed the common-sense test of delivering for their customers. And the committee inquiry today is an opportunity for those issues to be pursued. Thanks very much.
