General practice ‘front and centre’ this Federal Election

Issues facing GPs and general practice look set to shape the 2025 Federal Election, with Medicare expected to be central to Labor’s election pitch.
 
According to news reports, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is preparing to make a range of health commitments before Australians head to the polls later this year, including raising the bulk-billing incentive paid to GPs.
 
Last week, Federal Health and Aged Care Minister Mark Butler said while he had no official announcement to make, ‘of course, we’d like to do more in bulk billing’.
 
‘We’re focused on getting more doctors into the system, we’re focused on more bulk billing, and we’re focused on more options for urgent care,’ he said.
 
‘There’s more we want to do to deliver more doctors, more bulk billing and more urgent care.
 
‘I don’t have any announcements today, but the Australian people can be very, very assured that a Labor Government will always do what it can to strengthen Medicare.’
 
RACGP President Dr Michael Wright welcomed the increasing focus on general practice from the Government.
 
‘It’s clear that all sides of Parliament recognise that access to healthcare and specifically affordable access to general practice is going to be central to this election,’ he told newsGP.
 
‘We need substantial investment in Medicare, we need to support bulk billing, but we also need to reduce out-of-pocket costs for people who aren’t being bulk billed – both of those things are crucial.’
 
‘We need more GPs across the country, and we also need to make significant investments in Medicare, and particularly for longer consultations and more complex care.’
 
The Federal Labor Party has also flagged a potential overhaul of funding models, designed to help manage complex needs.
 
‘There’s been a long argument that we should blend that with more general payments or bundled payments to GPs,’ Minister Butler said.
 
‘What they do now is not deliver single episodes of service, but they are more and more involved in delivering wraparound care for people with complex chronic conditions.
 
‘I don’t think we’ll ever see a situation where there’s only annual payments and no fee-for-service, but I think we will see an increasingly blended future.’
 
According to a new 40-year analysis of Medicare data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW), the national GP bulk-billing rate has increased over time.
 
‘At the start of Medicare in 1984, the annual GP bulk-billing rate was 51% before increasing to a 40year high of 89% in 2020,’ the AIHW said.
 
‘Since then, it decreased to 77% in 2023 before increasing slightly to 78% in the first 10 months of 2024.’
 
This follows the tripling of the bulk-billing incentive, which was rolled out in November 2023.
 
In 2025, Dr Wright said governments must continue raising more support for general practice, prevention, and health promotion.
 
‘General practice is the front door to the health system for most Australians and a broad range of conditions,’ he said.
 
‘If we’re not accessible, or patients delay seeing us, their conditions can get worse and they end up needing to use more expensive downstream services like emergency departments. That’s bad for their health, and a waste of our limited resources which would be better invested in general practice.’
 
‘We can see that Medicare is going to be front and centre of this election and will hold all sides of Parliament accountable for their promise to reinvest in general practice.
 
‘We need to grow the GP workforce, we need to reduce the barriers for going into general practice and the administration and bureaucracy that takes us away from seeing patients, and we need to get more money into patient rebates, particularly for more complex care.’
 
A date for the Federal Election is yet to be set, but is required to be held in the first half of 2025.
 
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