August 13
Edition
Budget Night was
May 12, 2015. We now await economic and
activity data reporting to see how successful it was. Interestingly
there are some early indications the small-business stimuli might be working.
Parliament has
come back on 10th August - so we can expect things to warm up at from
now! Even better Spring is just around the corner - you can tell as the birds are
waking up earlier each day!
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Here is some other
of the recent other news and analysis.
General Budget Issues.
- Aug 2 2015 at 3:34 PM
- Updated Aug 2 2015 at 9:47 PM
Reform spending not taxes
The response to increasing spending on health costs should not be raising the GST, but in reforming expenditure and making individuals pay more of the health services they consume.
by Greg
Lindsay
The public policy debate
surrounding tax and government spending has travelled a long way since the
Abbott government came to office committed to ending the "age of
entitlement" – but in a direction that will sooner or later be proven
unsustainable. A small step away from the entitlement mentality was the now
scrapped Medicare co-payment. This proposal would have required those who could
afford it to make a small contribution to the cost of their own healthcare out
of their own pockets.
Opponents of the co-payment
successfully argued that applying the principle of user-pays to health was
unfair. Yet many of the same critics would now support tax increases to fund
health services, or rather to fund a financial bailout of state health systems.
Those who said no to a GP Tax six months ago, say yes to a Public Hospital
Tax today and one considerably higher than a $7 per GP visit part-payment.
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No, Kouk, Bozo Joe will not be smiling
at 7:33 am
on August 4, 2015 | 7 comments
The federal budget is less than
three months old and already Treasurer Joe Hockey and Finance Minister Mathias
Cormann must be smiling like Cheshire cats with several of the key economic
parameters stronger than assumed by Treasury in May.
The budget bottom line will be
getting a revenue wind-fall from the fact that the iron ore price is 10 per
cent higher in Australian dollar terms than was assumed in the budget.
The iron ore price has been
hovering around $US52 in recent weeks, compared to a budget-time assumption of
$US48, while the Australian dollar has been fallen below 74 US cents, under the
77 US cents that underpinned the budget estimates.
According to Treasury modelling,
this difference in the iron ore price is worth about $4 billion to the budget bottom
line over the four years of the forward estimates.
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Is Tony Abbott's regime the worst federal government ever?
Date August
4, 2015 - 9:03AM
Sally Young
In addition
to heading an ineffective, unpopular government with a lame legislative record,
Tony Abbott could yet lose office.
The Abbott government has been in
power 686 days and, in the wake of a turbulent half year capped off by the
Bronwyn Bishop expense scandal, it is a valid time to ask a question that is
often debated online and among political scientists. Is this the worst federal
government ever?
I'm talking here about the
effectiveness of the Abbott government. Can it pass legislation? Perform
administration? Do Australians judge it to be effective? I'm not trying to make
value judgments about whether it is a morally "good" government
or whether its policies are good or bad (readers will have their own views).
The unexpectedly harsh budget of
2014 is likely go down in Australian political history as the worst received
federal budget and especially because, unlike 'horror' budgets of the past, all
of the pain inflicted didn't even achieve what it was intended to do – it
didn't reduce the deficit.
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Health Budget Issues.
New plan to overhaul patient care
- By Belinda Merhab
- AAP
- August 04, 2015
A SHAKE-UP of the way Australians
visit their doctors could be on the cards.
IN a discussion paper handed to
the federal government, the primary health-care advisory group led by former
Australian Medical Association president Steve Hambleton says the Medicare
system is failing to deal with chronic and complex health conditions.
It says the
current system is fragmented, with unco-ordinated care resulting in duplication
of services, frustration for patients, and a bigger financial burden for
taxpayers.
Every two to
three hours in Australia there's an amputation that could have been prevented
with better management of diabetes, the paper says.
One possible
option for shaking up the system would see patients enrol with a single
health-care provider who would become their first point of care and co-ordinate
all other services, like hospital or specialist appointments.
Doctors to be paid by performance under radical reforms to Medicare
- August 04, 2015
- Sue Dunlevy
- News.com.au
AUSTRALIANS would enrol with a
single GP practice that would get an annual budget to keep them well under
major reforms to Medicare.
Instead of being paid a fee for
each service, doctors could also be paid for performance on reducing
hospitalisations or better blood sugar, blood pressure or cholesterol readings
in patients.
And patients would be encouraged
to take a greater role in managing their own health care through online
education courses, wearable technology and smart phone-linked blood glucose,
and other monitoring devices.
Health
Minister Sussan Ley is asking
the public to comment on the radical strategy that is central to government
plans to rein in the cost of Medicare.
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Jane Halton missed her choppergate chance to set public service's ethical bar high
Date August
3, 2015 - 10:06AM
Public Eye
A few hours before this column's
deadline, Bronwyn Bishop resigned as House
speaker, as was
inevitable, though not before the snowballing tales of her profligacy had badly
smeared Parliament. Yet one of the scandal’s sideshows – the matter of whether
Finance Department secretary Jane Halton should be investigating Bishop – still
poses questions.
The first of the
"choppergate" stories broke on July 15. As journalist Chris Wallace
noted in The Saturday Paper, Halton had
spoken later that day at a women’s cocktail party hosted by the Commonwealth Bank.
Wallace wrote: "Halton used it [media coverage of choppergate] as an
example of sexist double standards: she dismissed its significance, suggesting
that had Bishop been a man the helicopter claims would probably not have been a
story. At the time it had not occurred to Halton that choppergate could,
depending on how Bishop claimed the expense, give rise to a possible offence,
let alone that her department would end up ruling on it."
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- Aug 5 2015 at 4:43 PM
Coalition calls expenses truce as more claims emerge
Prime Minister Tony Abbott and
Education Minister Christopher Pyne have effectively called a truce by failing
to criticise Labor's Tony Burke for taking his family on a trip to Uluru on the
taxpayer's purse.
Mr Burke, who was strident in
attacking former Speaker Bronwyn Bishop, was forced to defend taking his family
with him to Uluru, flying business class, during school holidays in 2012, a
trip that cost the taxpayer $12,707.65.
Mr Burke said the claim was
within the rules and he met with managers and rangers of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta
National Park and members of the Mutitjulu community in his capacity as
environment minister on the same trip.
While Mr Abbott simply declined
to attack Mr Burke on Wednesday, Mr Pyne has said increasing scrutiny of
politicians use of expenses has become a "Salem witch trial".
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Fels says mental health spending is wasted
- August 05, 2015
THE federal government is wasting
billions of dollars funding a mental health system that doesn't work, renowned
economist Allan Fels believes.
THE chair of the National Mental
Health Commission says mental health is a more significant problem for the
economy than tax reform, costing the economy about $60 billion a year.
In a speech
to the National Press Club in Canberra on Wednesday, Professor Fels said the
current system was failing patients while providing the government with poor
returns on its investment of about $10 billion every year.
"The
commission's view is that much of the funding from the Commonwealth is neither
effective nor efficient," he said.
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Reform tax system before the wheels fall off
- Editorial
- The Daily Telegraph
- August 06, 2015
ACCORDING to the maxim, if it
ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But what if something is destined to surely break
unless something is done? What if breakage is inevitable and can be clearly
foreseen?
That is the current situation
with Australia’s taxation system, which is headed for a destructive showdown
with the forces of inflation. And this showdown will take place sooner rather
than later.
As Business Council of Australia
CEO Jennifer Westacott explains today in The Daily Telegraph, our taxes are
destined to increase significantly by 2018, even if no changes are made to the
taxation system. This is due to the phenomenon known as bracket creep, which
sees inflation and wage rises push people into ever-higher tax brackets.
This is not a problem solely for
those on larger incomes. In fact, because of the way the tax system is
structured, bracket creep actually impacts much harder on those earning lower
incomes.
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Health Insurance Issues.
Health insurance reforms next for Health Minister Sussan Ley
- The Australian
- August 03, 2015
Sean Parnell
Health Minister Sussan Ley has
agreed to look at private health reforms to make insurance less expensive, amid
concerns rising premiums have undermined the sector and threaten to put further
pressure on public hospitals.
One area being examined by the
federal government is whether the longstanding cap on excess levels — $500 for
singles and $1000 for a family policy — should be lifted to discourage
unnecessary treatments and thereby reduce costs to both the insurer and the
policyholder.
Excess levels were capped in 2000
to prevent people taking out policies with high front-end deductibles to
avoid the Medicare Levy Surcharge, which requires wealthier Australians to pay
more tax if they do not have a compliant health insurance policy.
Health funds have also lobbied
the government for changes to rules on expensive devices and prostheses, along
with changes to hospital fees and charges, arguing that the Coalition’s move
to address health inflation should extend to both the public and private
sectors.
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NIB boss backs Medibank in battle to rein in costs
- The Australian
- August 03, 2015
Sarah-Jane Tasker
Australia’s health insurers are
joining forces in the increasingly heated debate with private hospitals on
affordability and quality, with NIB the latest to enter the fight.
NIB chief executive Mark
Fitzgibbon said there had been an outbreak of industry consensus and
co-operation on several fronts, as there was a general sense something had to
be done about controlling costs.
“Part of that is about empowering
consumers to make better decisions and part of it is about ensuring we only pay
for quality care and at efficient prices,” he said.
The debate recently intensified
after Medibank Private cut its contract with Calvary Hospitals because the two
could not agree on payments. A key sticking point was a list of 165 “highly
preventable adverse events”, which Medibank has labelled mistakes it will no
longer cover.
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Some Calvary Hospital patients face hefty charges after contract talks with Medibank Private fail
August 5,
2015
Private
hospital provider Calvary Health Care is warning it will be forced to turn away
patients or charge them hefty out-of-pocket fees, after mediation over a
contract dispute with Medibank Private failed.
Medibank Private insures 70,000
Tasmanians, but it is refusing to cover what it says are "preventable
events" including falls in care and readmissions.
The company said new terms would
be introduced when Calvary's existing contract expired at the end of the month.
Calvary chief executive Mark
Doran said the company may have to refuse Medibank Private clients.
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AMA president Brian Owler slams Medibank Private as out of touch
Date August
7, 2015 - 6:08PM
Henry Belot
Canberra Times Reporter
Australian Medical Association
president Professor Brian Owler says Medibank Private had used aggressive
behaviour to negotiate new contracts with private hospitals. Photo: Andrew Meares
Australian Medical Association
president Professor Brian Owler has labelled Medibank Private as out of touch
and offered to brief the Prime Minister on its dispute with Calvary Health
Care..
His comments come after
a last-gasp effort to renew a contract between Australia's largest health
insurer, Medibank Private, and Calvary Health Care failed at mediation on
Thursday.
The breakdown in mediation means
thousands of ACT patients may be forced to pay more for hospital care unless
the two parties can reach a final agreement before August 31.
In July, Medibank Private
initiated termination proceedings after months of unsuccessful negotiations and
a disagreement about quality criteria and market rates.
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Pharmacy Issues.
6CPA review coming soon
The planned review of 6CPA
remuneration and location rule arrangements will kick off next month (September
2015), the health minister has announced.
Speaking at PSA15 in Sydney,
Federal Minister for Health Sussan Ley (pictured) said the “independent, public
review” would be completed by July 2017 “at the latest”.
“I am sure that all professional
pharmacists as well as pharmacy owners will also take great interest in the
review of pharmacy remuneration and location rules,” Ms Ley said.
“It will give us insights not
only in relation to the location of pharmacies and the impact of the current
location rules.”
Meanwhile, Ms Ley also revealed
the first tranche of 6CPA pilot professional service programs will commence in
2016.
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Getting their cut
Concerns are growing that the
failure to gain an increase in wholesaler remuneration during 6CPA negotiations
could impact community pharmacy services.
While funding for many pharmacy
services increased and was CPI indexed in the 6CPA, CSO funding remains
unindexed and static.
George Tambassis, national
president of the Pharmacy Guild of Australia warns that wholesaler service
standards may change as a result of the 6CPA.
“The CSO has not been indexed,
the wholesaler mark-up is unchanged. So service standards may change.”
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Damning auditor's report over Pharmacy Guild agreement results in little action
Date August
5, 2015 - 6:16PM
Harriet Alexander
Health Reporter
The Department of Health has
taken no action against staff whose negotiation of an agreement with community
pharmacists resulted in administrative errors and failed to deliver $1 billion
in expected savings.
A withering audit of the
2010 deal struck between the federal government and the Pharmacy
Guild found it lacked transparency and was messy in its implementation.
The fifth Community Pharmacy
Agreement committed the government to paying $15.4 billion to the Pharmacy
Guild to dispense medicines listed under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme to
the public over five years.
The Australian National Audit
Office reported in March that there were "shortcomings in key aspects of
Health's administration at the development, negotiation and implementation
phases" of the agreement.
These included the department's
failure to keep official records of its negotiations with Pharmacy Guild
officials, which was "not consistent with sound practice", and its
re-allocation of money between programs after the contract had been signed,
without ministerial approval.
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Tambassis gives glowing endorsement
Sweeping reforms proposed for the
primary health care system have been endorsed by the Pharmacy Guild of
Australia.
A federal government appointed
advisory group has presented its discussion paper “Better outcomes for people living Chronic and
Complex Health Conditions through Primary Health Care” saying the
Medicare system is failing to deal with chronic and complex health conditions.
The paper says the current health
system is fragmented, with unco-ordinated care resulting in the duplication of
services, frustration for patients, and a bigger financial burden for
taxpayers. The paper included enrolling people to a single provider who
would coordinate the multi-disciplinary care the patient received rather than
the patient coordinating their care, set chronic disease payments for a defined
package of care rather than individual services and international methods of
best practice.
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Medicine exports fall 30 per cent, sparking calls for policy change
Date August
8, 2015 - 12:15AM
Judith Ireland
National political reporter
Ian Macfarlane's office has said
pharmaceuticals ''is a key economic area in which Australia has the best
potential to compete internationally''. Photo: Wayne
Taylor
Australia's drug
exports have slumped, falling 30 per cent over the past year, to put
manufactured medicines way behind the ailing car industry.
An analysis
of Australian Bureau of Statistics trade figures released this
week found that Australia's pharmaceutical export industry is now
worth about $2.5 billion a year, a significant drop from 2012 when it was
worth more than $4 billion.
The latest figures, which
Medicines Australia says should be "ringing alarm bells" in the
federal government, show drugs have fallen behind car exports, which
are worth more than $3 billion. Pharmaceuticals are also on
track to drop behind the wine export industry, which is worth just over $2
billion a year.
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It is going to be very
interesting to see what happens to the polls and consumer confidence over the
next 2-3 months. With the pollies back will be interesting to see what makes
the big news. We are seeing reasonable
consumer confidence now so I hope the pollies coming back does not kill it!
Enjoy.
David.
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