nine in ten GP visits bulk billed by 2030, in $8.5 billion Medicare injection
- Written by Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
The Albanese government on Sunday will pledge $8.5 billion for Medicare, declaring this would enable all Australians to have access to bulk billing by 2030.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will announce the policy at a rally in Tasmania, where the Labor seat of Lyons and the Liberal seat of Bass are in play.
Under the plan, Labor would extend the bulk billing incentive to all Australians, and also create an extra incentive payment for practices that bulk billed all their patients.
The changes would mean an extra 18 million bulk billed GP visits annually, the government says. Nine out of ten GP visits would be bulk billed by 2030. On the government’s figures, this would increase the number of fully bulk billing practices to about 4,800, triple the present figure.
The government says its plan would produce patient savings of up to $859 million a year by 2030.
It says this is the single largest investment in Medicare since it was created more than 40 years ago.
The promised big health spend is designed both to focus the election campaign on an area of traditional strength for Labor, and to address the serious erosion of bulk billing rates in recent years. The rate is currently down to about 78%.
The health package also promises to boost the number of nurses and doctors in the system. Four hundred nursing scholarships would be provided. By 2028 2,000 new GP trainee places would be funded each year in federally-funded GP training programs. The number funded in 2025 is 1600.
The government has peviously tripled the bulk billing incentive for pensioners, concession card holders and families with children. From November 1, that would be widened to all Australians.
Also from November 1, in addition to the bulk billing incentive, practices that fully bulk billed would receive an extra 12.5% loading on their Medicare rebates.
“The combined investment means around 4,800 practices will be in a better financial position if they adopt full bulk billing,” Albanese and Health Minister Mark Butler said in a statement.
Albanese said the plan “will make Medicare even stronger, help with cost of living pressures and ensure every Australian receives the best health care that they deserve”.
Butler said people would be worse off if Peter Dutton became PM. “Peter Dutton tried to end bulk billing with a GP tax and then started a six-year freeze to Medicare rebates that froze GP incomes and stripped billions out of Medicare.”
The table below shows how total Medicare payments for common visits would increase from November 1, with the expansion of the bulk billing incentive to all Australians and the new incentive payment for practices that bulk billed every patient.
The bulk billing incentive is scaled according to how far a general practice is from a major city or metropolitan area, with larger Medicare payments as communities get more remote.
The total cost of the bulk billing initiatives over the forward estimates is nearly $7.9 billion.
The costs year-by -year are: 2025-26, nearly $1.2 billion; 2026-27, nearly $2 billion; 2027-28, $2.3 billion, and 2028-29, $2.4 billion.
The government said most of the cost of the Medicare package is accounted for the the December budget update and the rest would be in the next budget update.
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners this month called for the extension of bulk billing incentives to those under 35. It said this would boost the national rate to 85%.
The Greens have called for tripling the bulk billing incentive for everyone with a Medicare card.
Authors: Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
