Thursday, 31 August 2023

North-Eastern Metropolitan Region

Nicholas McGOWAN (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (12:53): (408) My question is for the Treasurer. This has already been asked today, and I will repeat it because it is an emerging issue and quite an alarming one. I want to quote one of the practice managers from a medical clinic in my electorate of Ringwood:

I am the practice manager at the clinic and am opposed to the State Government changing the structure of how general practitioners are paid. As a small business, we … have been forced to change from bulk billing to mixed billing to try cover the extreme costs of keeping the medical centre open for business. If the proposed payroll tax changes were to go ahead, there would be no choice but to close our doors, leaving a community already struggling to find quality health care when they most need it in an even worse state than it already is.

I ask the Minister for Health to urgently review this, but of course specifically because I can only do one minister, I ask the Treasurer to scrap the GP tax. To quote this constituent:

After everything we went through during the pandemic, providing immunisations, putting staff at risk on a daily basis, the everchanging rules and regulations, changing the way we treat patients, general practice has been through enough. Changes to the payroll tax will be the nail in the coffin for us.

Sitting suspended 12:54 pm until 2:03 pm.