Yesterday in the Parliament Kevin Rudd explained what he meant by Tony Abbott stripping $1 billion out of the heath system.
We come to this question of the billion dollars. This is a really interesting point. We say he gouged a billion dollars out of the system. Who did we cite as our evidence? We cite that noted purveyor of untruths, Peter Costello and Peter Costello’s budgets of 2003-04, 2004-05, 2005-06, 2006-07 and the forward estimates for 2007-08. We have one figure after another of money being gouged out of the system. What is his defence on this? It goes to the question of indexation. Under the previous healthcare agreement, his predecessor had an indexation clause of 6.3 per cent. That was based on a calculation about the costs in the system. In the subsequent healthcare agreement, which this minister for health presided over—the now Leader of the Opposition—he reduced it to 5.3 per cent. He gouged a billion dollars out of the system. He pretends that that is not a gouge out of the system.
I say to the Leader of the Opposition: is he seriously arguing that the costs of the hospital system went down? The Leader of the Opposition, are you suggesting in that five-year period that the costs of the hospital system went down?
The argument seems to be that Tony Abbott, as Health Minister, reduced the indexation on Commonwealth health spending from 6.3 percent per annum to 5.3 percent per annum.
So Rudd is arguing that a reduction in the rate of increase in spending is stripping money out of the system. This type of thinking seems to permeate Canberra. Forecasts are not reality, and changes in the second derivative of spending are not reductions in spending. But let’s zero in on this aspect of Rudd’s speech in the Parliament.
is he seriously arguing that the costs of the hospital system went down? The Leader of the Opposition, are you suggesting in that five-year period that the costs of the hospital system went down?
This is a bit misleading. Nobody is saying the costs went down, but Rudd is saying that the rate of increase in Commonwealth spending went down. So we’re not talking about absolute values of money we’re talking about rates of increase. Now the rate of increase in health costs is called ‘Health Inflation’. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare report a Health Inflation measure and a general inflation measure.
Clearly the costs of the health system didn’t go down. Health Inflation has been somewhat volitile but did decline after 2003-04; nonetheless the health spending indexation of 5.3 percent was well in excess of the Health Inflation rate implying that the Coalition increased real spending in the health system.
No Sinkers if you deliberately draw up an agreement where you pay less you are stripping money out of the system.
whether this is a good or bad thing is entirely another question
Butterfield, Bloomfield & Bishop
19 Mar 10 at 12:55 pm
What “agreement”, you nimrod? What contractual agreement did he break that would ordinarily have stopped from lowering the rate of increase from 6.3 to 5.3% intellectual baboon.
Explain to us the agreement in place.
You ungrateful dunce.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:17 pm
well it would help if you could read but you cannot.
A perfect example of Forrest JCing himself
Butterfield, Bloomfield & Bishop
19 Mar 10 at 1:19 pm
What “agreement”, you nimrod? What contractual agreement did he break that would ordinarily have stopped Abbott lowering the rate of increase from 6.3 to 5.3%, you intellectual baboon.
Explain to us the agreement in place.
You ungrateful dunce, homer. Let us taxpayers know how much more of our money you want to keep you in a lifestyle you’ve become fashionably accustomed to.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:19 pm
Homer:
There is no “agreement”, you dishonest baboon. Provide evidence of this agreement or piss right off.
You nimrod.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:21 pm
a double example of Forrest JCing himself.
If you had reading and comprehension skills then you would know I have not supported extra money at all.
Butterfield, Bloomfield & Bishop
19 Mar 10 at 1:21 pm
You said there was an agreement, you baboon. Provide evidence he broke this ” agreement”, or STFU.
Where’s the evidence, you lying ignoramus.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:25 pm
Are you that stupid or you simply cannot read.
no you are that stupid and you cannot read.
Butterfield, Bloomfield & Bishop
19 Mar 10 at 1:27 pm
Where’s the evidence, you baboon. Show us the evidence of this agreement.
Where’s the evidence that Abbott broke a contractual agreement that he would not lower the rate of increase.
You lying, dissembling clown.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:32 pm
Hey, if you deliberately draw up an agreement where you pay for insulation, you owe it to the Australian people not to burn their houses down or kill people.
Right, Homer?
C.L.
19 Mar 10 at 1:34 pm
Sinc:
If this lying little weasel can’t provide the evidence he ought to be sin-binned for a week.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:35 pm
More to the point, how does Rudd get away with this misleading stuff?
I haven’t seen any MSM commentator point out what he has done to reach his conclusion.
ken n
19 Mar 10 at 1:36 pm
Ken:
The reason is that none of the journalists have really research the claim and that the only person to show us clearly Rudd-the-fake’s deception has been this piece, which if the Lib advisers are any way 1/2 decent will glom on to it and have Abbott throw it in the fake’s face at the debate.
Abbott should take the earlier graph Sinc prepared as well as this piece and present it as a slide and then ask the Fake where was a cut.
Ask the unadulterated little fake to show the slide is wrong.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 1:42 pm
My understanding is that the healthcare agreement bewteen 1998 – 2003 had 6.3 percent and the subsequence agreement had 5.3 percent, not that the Howard government reneged on an existing agreement.
Sinclair Davidson
19 Mar 10 at 2:18 pm
golly gosh I wonder where sinkers could have got those figures from.
Our Forrest isn’t known as the resident Catallaxy idiot for nothing.
Butterfield, Bloomfield & Bishop
19 Mar 10 at 2:34 pm
Sounds like Possum is doing the government’s books these days.
C.L.
19 Mar 10 at 2:52 pm
Homer and Possum teaming up to show us how stats are really done….
Hey Homer, are you going to tell your local member (in more ways than one), Maximus Mckew, you and Possum have figured out that more housing and faulty insulation causes less incarceration than before Lurchgate? I reckon she’d believe that.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 2:58 pm
oops incineration…
JC
19 Mar 10 at 3:05 pm
And here was me thinking that reducing the cost of health care (or reducing the rate of increase) would actually be a desirable thing. Mr Rudd has put me on the right track.
If Abbott’s containment of expenditure was an evil thing, this explains the philosophy behind Rudd’s new health initiative, which seems to actively avoid cost containment, and embrace its opposite.
Braddles
19 Mar 10 at 3:40 pm
Freudian slip there Joe
tal
19 Mar 10 at 3:59 pm
That was quite funny
JC outJCing himself
Hard to pick the winner
Abbot didnt break his own agreement
CL refers to another agreement
Two monkeys arguing over one nut
rog
19 Mar 10 at 6:35 pm
..or two nuts arguing over a chimp…whatever
rog
19 Mar 10 at 6:37 pm
here is another example of JC’s mental instability
JC doesnt have any research because he doesnt need it, he reads op-eds and his mother is a virgin.
rog
19 Mar 10 at 6:40 pm
Rog:
How did the tummy tuck go? Is Geoffrey pleased?
JC
19 Mar 10 at 7:06 pm
Rog, any takers yet for your exciting idea to combine the whale watching and whale slaughtering industries?
C.L.
19 Mar 10 at 7:43 pm
It would be “perfect harmony with nature, CL in Rog’s “See it and Harpoon It” business venture.
JC
19 Mar 10 at 8:18 pm
does the health price index take account changes in demographics or increases in population? real spending per capita is probably a better measure to lookup than just real spending.
drscroogemcduck
20 Mar 10 at 9:02 am
No. it is a price index that suffers from all the problems price indices have. Expenditure per person is also reported by the AIHW (table 2.6 in the link above) but no Commonwealth/State breakdown is given. over the period 97-98 to 07-08 real expenditure per person rose by 3.8 percent on average.
Sinclair Davidson
20 Mar 10 at 9:11 am