FAMILIES STILL PAYING $900 A YEAR MORE AFTER PRIVATE HEALTH INSURANCE ANNOUNCEMENT
The Turnbull Government’s private health insurance announcement is a package of recycled election commitments that won’t fix the hip pocket pain families are feeling from soaring premiums under their watch.
Families are paying an average of $900 more every year for their private health insurance under this Government. Today’s announcement will do nothing to address this hit on household budgets, and premiums are set to go up again in April.
Malcolm Turnbull will also break an election promise to protect Australians from junk private health insurance policies.
As confirmed today, the Government’s package will include:
– Classification of policies into gold, silver and bronze categories was already announced during the election. And this is just a rebranding exercise, as last year’s AMA Private Health Insurance Report Card shows, products are already categorised by top, medium and basic levels of cover.
– Updated web materials to help Australians navigate private health insurance: already announced during the election
Labor welcomes savings from the Prostheses List, and we acknowledge the constructive collaboration of device manufacturers and private health insurers in this package.
Private health insurance coverage has slumped to its lowest level in five years, after the Turnbull Government’s failure to do anything to help Australians with soaring premiums. This decline follows a 23 per cent increase annual premiums under the Abbott/ Turnbull Liberal Governments, seeing families paying around $900 extra in annual premiums.
This package is designed to help the Government stem the exodus of people dumping private health insurance on their watch. This Government’s history of inaction on private health insurance says it all, and Australian families grappling with soaring premiums are proof they can’t be trusted.