Transcript: Interview with Clinton Maynard, 2GB - 19 November 2025

TRANSCRIPT

INTERVIEW WITH CLINTON MAYNARD, 2GB

19 November 2025

Topics: Rising health out-of-pocket costs, Labor’s Medicare lies, hospital funding stoush  

E&OE…………………………………

CLINTON MAYNARD: I want to bring in Anne Ruston. She's the Shadow Health Minister. Thanks for joining us, Anne. Appreciate your time coming on the program. $100 for a blood test, that doesn't add up. 

ANNE RUSTON: Well, I think this just goes to the whole story that Australians are facing at the moment and that is the increasing unaffordability of healthcare across the board, which just flies in the face of everything that the Prime Minister and the Health Minister have been telling Australians over the last three years. And the cold hard reality is the story that we've just heard from Lyn is a story that we're hearing from so many Australians. They feel really let down because they feel like they've been misled. 

CLINTON MAYNARD: It doesn't make sense to me. Now I know the Prime Minister used his Medicare card and this is a little bit different. He was referring to GPs, but it's the GP who will order a blood test or a more complicated test. 

ANNE RUSTON: But it's across the board. I mean, we're seeing our GPs are being forced into having to charge out-of-pocket costs. So despite what the Prime Minister's saying about when you visit your GP it will be free, there's so many of these other things that are not part of his so-called bulk billing promise that people are actually having to pay so much out of pocket for, and the example is obviously here in relation to the blood test and the echoagram and the like. And so, what we're seeing is that people are going to the doctor believing that they're not going to have to pay out-of-pocket costs and they're not just paying-out of-pocket costs, they're paying them at the highest rate that they've ever paid them before. So it's an example of how, you know, GPs - the increasing costs on your family doctor running a business is the same as any other business and they just simply can't afford to be doing what the Government is telling every Australian apparently is the case. Well, it's frankly not. 

CLINTON MAYNARD: This one's been raised with me as well. The skin check for skin cancer. Of course, we know we have the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. It's probably usually around $140-150. Apparently the rebate for Medicare's $40. So if you were supposed to get a check every year, you're going to be out of pocket for $100 

ANNE RUSTON: Every single time. And this goes to that whole point that when you go to your GP, you get a skin check, that's not included in the bulk billing. And to a large extent, we can't be blaming the family doctor because, you know, they've got to be profitable as well. This is because of the ever-increasing cost that we're seeing on your family practice, whether that be your energy bills, your rent or your mortgages you're paying, your insurances and the like. All of these things go towards the unaffordability for the practice. And so, ultimately, at the end it is the patient who ends up paying these costs. 

CLINTON MAYNARD: Anne, while you're with me, a little more broadly - there has been a meeting of state and federal health ministers today, and I know the states have asked for more funding and that's part of the dispute. But after the meeting, they've received a letter from the Prime Minister asking the states to rein in spending on hospitals. But the states are saying, hang on, we've got too many particularly aged care patients that are using up beds because there are not enough spots in aged care homes. 

ANNE RUSTON: Look, this is something that we have been seeing increasingly that because of the failure of the aged care system - and the Government actively withholding home care packages - older Australians who otherwise might have been able to go home if they'd had the proper support in their home are being stuck in hospitals. But we also know that the Prime Minister made a promise to the States and Territories two years ago that the Federal Government would make a 42.5% contribution to the hospital funding by 2030. He now appears to be going back on that despite hospitals also feeling the impact of escalating costs, including healthcare costs. So the Prime Minister has got a lot of explaining to do about why he's quite happy to make all these big headline announcements, but the reality is that he falls short when it comes to delivery and Australians are feeling it in their hip pocket and now we're seeing the States and Territories pushing back because he's made them promises which he doesn't appear to be intending to keep. 

CLINTON MAYNARD: Appreciate your time. Thank you, Anne. 

ENDS