TOP STORIES

Time to get heavy on the levy

The tidal wave against the Federal Government's IBNR levy is gathering momentum.

Doctors around the nation are venting their frustration at what they see as a tax on patients.

In the ACT, doctors recently took their protest all the way to the source - Parliament House, Canberra.  And the trend is set to continue.

United strike on bad policy

AMA President Dr Bill Glasson says the Federal Government's policies on general practice still do not properly address two key issues: access and affordability.

Speaking at the recent GP summit in Canberra, Dr Glasson said patients increasingly have to search to find a doctor and when they do they pay more for their health care.

Dr Glasson told delegates - including representatives of the AMA, Australian Divisions of General Practice, RACGP and Rural Doctors Association of Australia - that Australian general practice has become a forgotten profession.

Huge pay boost for UK doctors

In an effort to increase GP numbers by 2,000 the UK Government will pay GPs 33 per cent more over the next three years.

In net terms, after adjusting for expected cost increases, GP incomes - or profits - are expected to rise on average by 46 per cent.  In addition, GPs who continue to practise to 31 March, 2006 will get an increase in their Government-funded pension of 54.6 per cent.

An average GP earning the equivalent of $180,000 who retires on 31 March, 2003 will get a pension of $160,000 and a lump sum of $476,000.

In recent years, the number of GPs and particularly the number of GP registrars, has fallen to critical levels in the UK.  The new GP contract is an attempt to redress the issue.

INSIDE

A Proud progress

In a proud milestone, the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps celebrates its centenary this year, with celebratory events taking place right up to the middle of December.

Topical issues surrounding the service of our doctors in various parts of the world have prompted publication of this special feature, which looks at Australia's role in military medicine past and present - and offers some insights for the future.

The author, Major General John Pearn AM RFD (retd.), served in the RAAMC for 36 years, including service as the Surgeon-General of the Australian Defence Force from 1998-2000.

FROM THE PRESIDENT - Dr Bill Glasson

Taxing times

Too true, Mr Barkis, nothing is truer than taxes.

And the Federal Government has introduced a new one.  It's called the IBNR levy.  It is not a tax on doctors.  It is a tax to be collected by doctors.  Yes, my friends, you are now tax collectors for the Howard Government.

The IBNR levy (sorry, tax) is a tax on our patients.  It is a tax on the health of many Australians.  It is unfair.  It is unjust.

I believe the IBNR tax will become a tax on the Government's credibility.  As voters begin to pay more for their health care because of the impact of the totality of the medical indemnity crisis - not just the IBNR tax - any goodwill towards the Government will erode.

The Government has made the mistake of defending its new tax on the basis of the UMP IBNR alone.  They have forgotten the bigger picture.

The IBNR tax is not the entire issue here: it is merely the catalyst that has re-ignited the medical indemnity debate.

What Health Minister Senator Patterson, and Assistant Treasurer Senator Coonan, are missing is that the whole system is broke.  It is being held together by glue and string and hope. 

Doctors are paying higher and higher indemnity premiums PLUS the 'call' PLUS they now have invoices for the IBNR tax.

Does the Government really think that payment of the IBNR tax is going to solve the medical indemnity crisis for all time?  Let's hope not.

For the AMA, the IBNR tax is the line in the sand.  If we give in meekly on this issue, there will be more taxes, more 'calls', and higher and higher premiums.  We will continue to pay and pay and pay. 

The Government will be pouring our livelihoods and our patients' household income into a bottomless black hole.  The rot must stop now.

We have been imploring the Government to look at long-term solutions.

Instead, the rhetoric from Senators Patterson and Coonan has been based on the old greedy doctors line.  'Doctors can afford to pay,' they say.  What about the patients, Ministers?  How much do you want them to pay?

The Senators are operating on bad judgement or bad advice . . . or both.  They can't ignore patient needs when talking health policy - any health policy - but especially this one.

At the end of the day though, the buck stops with the Prime Minister.

I have said it before and I will say it again - John Howard has far superior political antennae than any of his Ministers.

From my talks with him recently, I know he knows there is a problem with the IBNR tax specifically and with medical indemnity generally.

He knows, too, that the IBNR tax hurts patients and that it will compound the worsening medical workforce shortages.

We can only hope that commonsense prevails and the PM gets the Government to change tack on the IBNR tax and looks instead at fixing the medical indemnity system for the long term.

John Howard has said that the UMP collapse was not of the Government's making.  It wasn't.  But the repair of the medical indemnity system could be the Government's making.  Wouldn't that be a positive message to take to an election?

The AMA will continue to argue the IBNR tax case with the PM and his Government.  We must convince him that the IBNR tax will eat away at other parts of the health system like a cancer.

It will hit patient access.  It will hit patient affordability.  It will consume the Government's  'Fairer Medicare' package.  It will eat Medicare.

To borrow from Dickens again: it is not the best of times; it is the worst of times.  Taxing times indeed.

Dr Bill Glasson is President of the Federal AMA.