Four days out from the 21 May 2022 federal general election Liberal MP for Kooyong & Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced that after the election a Morrison Government would continue applying the knife to funding of federal government services to the tune of $3.3 billion.
A total of $2.7 billion will be returning to the Treasury coffers by way of across the board annual savings it expects from increasing the current 1.5 per cent efficiency savings requirement to 2 per cent over the next three years.
The Guardian quoted Prime Minister Morrison on 17 May 2022: “That
is something that I think is entirely sensible and, frankly,
taxpayers would be demanding, that these types of sensible
efficiencies are achieved and that is part of the process of managing
a good budget,” the prime minister said while campaigning in Darwin
on Tuesday. “It doesn’t impact on programs or services at all. It
never has.”
According to Prime Minister Morrison and the Treasurer this increased cost cutting by way of efficiency dividends does not apply to the National Disability Insurance Agency, Safe Work Australia, Emergency Management Australia, the National Recovery and Resilience Agency, the ABC, the SBS, or small entities with fewer than 200 staff.
However it does appears to include in Morrison's own words "management of staffing arrangements" over the next three years.
On 17 May ABC
News reported
that: Prime
Minister Scott Morrison was asked what agencies would be forced to
tighten their belts and whether, given his praise for the public
service over the way it helped Australians during the pandemic, it
was a "mean spirited" way of rewarding people for their
hard work.
"This
is responsible budgetary management. We've made commitments in this
election and we ensure that we pay for them," he said.
"That's
how you manage your budget, you live within your means."
So where will this $3.3 billion be coming from? Especially the est. $600 million in savings which appears to stand outside three years of efficiency dividend savings.
It isn't hard to imagine that Scott Morrison, with another three years in front of him before having to face the national electorate again will return to his perennial favourites - further reducing the actual number of staff or hours worked in government departments and agencies by starving them of real funding increases, as well as further restricting eligibility for social service/welfare programs and removing more treatment items from Medicare rebates/bulkbilling & from the universal free public hospital system.
Individuals and families are already impacted by changes to eligibility and/or rebates for an
estimated 188
cardiac surgery, 150 general surgery, 594 orthopaedic items,
including
hip,
shoulder, hand & cardiac surgeries and a number of diagnostic imaging procedures.
According
to National
Seniors Australia
by 1 June 2021; Nine
procedures have been deleted from the MBS entirely, and other changes
may include tweaking the definitions of certain services.
Then
there is the possibility
of sudden
removal of bulkbilling or
enhanced bulking billing for certain specialist consultations,
such
as the one playing
out right now in a
mental health program
which inordinately impacts on regional and remote Australia.
ABC
News,
16
May 2022:
…..Psychiatrists
say the Medicare cut has forced hundreds of patients to cancel or
scale back their appointments, leading to the worst outcomes for
patients some say they have ever seen.
Ms
Pomeroy from Mackay had seen her psychiatrist on an almost monthly
basis for the last three years for chronic anxiety and Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder (PTSD).
But
like other patients across rural and regional Australia, she said she
was sprung with the news she would no longer have access to
bulk-billed psychiatry appointments over telehealth.
"I
went into shock," she said.
"It
put me in a tailspin where I thought, 'What am I going to do now?'"
'It's
almost like Noah's ark'
In
January, a 50 per cent loading — known as item 288 — for
psychiatrist video consultations for rural and regional patients was
cut from the Medical Benefits Scheme (MBS).
The
ABC understands about 45,000 patients claimed the item across
2020-21.
Brisbane-based
psychiatrist Dr Bawani Marsden said the last five months had been
devastating for patients as psychiatrists were left to choose who, if
anyone, they could bulk-bill without the extra loading.
"It's
almost like Noah's ark where you're deciding who you want to take
with you and who you don't mind sinking and drowning," he said.
The
option to bulk-bill patients remains. But without the extra loading,
practices say it is unviable to provide to everyone.
A
rebate for patients was still available, but Dr Marsden said about
half of her rural and regional patients had cancelled because they
now could not afford care.
"Almost
a decade we've had that support and within a couple of weeks there
was an announcement that it's going to be removed," she said.
"We're
talking about a peak time here, we're coming out of COVID … and
they've taken away a lifeline."…..
Credentialed
mental health nurse Michelle Eastwell shakes her head.
"For
our patients, it's gone from this seamless, private, de-stigmatised
way of accessing mental health services to now … 'what's
available?'" she said……
the
Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP)
has campaigned against the move and said the taskforce recommended
finding an alternative solution which had not been done.
"We
have put forward a number of solutions including a bulk-billing
incentive … for people with affordability issues," said
RANZCP's president Associate Professor Vinay Makra.
"Some
of our patients are the most vulnerable in society and the government
must look at that vulnerability factor."
"If
they do not receive that support from a psychiatrist … some will
become unwell, and needing admissions to hospital [would] put
additional impost on health and hospital systems that are already
stressed."
Labor
has pledged to reintroduce Item 288 if it gets elected on 21 May
2022.
In March 2022 it was reported that the Morrison Government is considering removing nursing home residents' access to professionally trained allied health services as a way of reducing Medicare costs.
In a media release on 17 May 2022 the ACTU estimated that the announced cost cutting would result in the loss of 5,500 public service jobs.
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