Senator TROOD (Queensland) (4.20 p.m.)—I rise to oppose this motion of disallowance. In doing so, I cannot help but think that Senator Wong might feel somewhat embarrassed about having to come into this chamber today and move this motion in relation to what is essentially a policy train wreck for the Labor Party. Various elements of the party are at odds with each other as to precisely what should be done in relation to this issue. Senator Wong gave an account of some of the decision making, but I will take the opportunity to inform the Senate a little more fully as to the circumstances surrounding this issue.

Interjection

Senator Wong interjecting—

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Senator TROOD—I think it would be quite instructive, Senator Wong, if you would listen. Senator Wong made the point—accurately—that this decision is a result of a COAG meeting last month. What she neglected to inform the Senate was that it was essentially a COAG decision which resulted from a specific request made of COAG by the Premier of Queensland, Mr Beattie. Mr Beattie came along to the COAG meeting desperate to find some political cover for the maladministration of health in Queensland and desperate to get some sort of joy from the COAG meeting so that he might take something back to Queenslanders to try to explain the shortage of doctors which exists in Queensland and move himself some way down the track where he might be able to say, ‘I have got the health problems in Queensland under some sort of control.’

Mr Beattie asked the COAG meeting whether there might be some support for an increase in the number of doctors educated in Queensland. The COAG meeting was, as Senator Wong said, obliging—it offered that support. Indeed, Premier Beattie came out of the COAG meeting enthusiastic about the results of the COAG meeting. He said in a press conference later: ‘I’m happy. I’m very happy. These COAGs just get better and you get happier too.’ He was in full enthusiastic puppy mode. Enthusiastic about the decision, he said: ‘I fully support this and I express my appreciation to my colleagues for supporting this proposition from Queensland because we do have a doctor shortage,’—as we indeed do.

So here we have the Premier of Queensland enthusiastic about the results of the COAG meeting but what happens next? The shadow minister for education in the other place, the member for Jagajaga, goes into the public domain and, with her usual and well-known obsessive ideological opposition to full fee paying places in relation to education, comes out and says, ‘We oppose this decision from COAG’— putting herself at odds with a decision which the Premier of Queensland was specifically interested in securing from the COAG meeting. One wonders how this came about. It turns out that this seems to have been a decision taken independently of any decision-making within the Labor caucus.

Interjection

Senator Wong—For three elections we have run the same line.

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Senator TROOD—Taken independently, Senator Wong, of any decisions made within the Labor caucus —Ms Macklin standing there on her own making this decision. Not surprisingly, she found some opposition among her colleagues in the caucus about the decision. So what happened next? The interesting thing was that various senior members of the caucus came out in opposition to the decision taken by the shadow minister for education. The member for Lawler, the shadow minister for health was quoted as saying:

The only body that can determine this is federal caucus ... Currently there is not a federal Labor Party position on this matter.

As far as I know, there is still no federal Labor Party position on the matter.

This might have been an occasion where we might have expected the Leader of the Labor Party to invest himself on the matter and become involved in trying to sort out the confusion which exists between the Premier and the Labor Party caucus here in Canberra. What did he do? He certainly did invest himself in the whole matter, to the point where, rather than take what might have been a logical course of action, to assemble the caucus and try to sort out the matter and sort out the differences between Canberra and Queensland, he decided to support his shadow minister for education. In some respects, that might have been regarded as a useful and loyal thing to do, but it of course put him at odds with the Premier of Queensland, who specifically requested this kind of decision. Hence we find ourselves in this rather bizarre situation where a decision specifically sought by the Premier of Queensland is opposed today by Senator Wong—coming into the chamber and asking for a disallowance of this particular declaration. That is the reality of the decision-making in relation to this situation.

The reality is that the Premier of Queensland is desperate to find some new doctors. And one can sympathise with him, because there is a need for new doctors in Queensland—indeed there are shortages across the country. This COAG decision is designed to do provide the opportunity for more people to be trained in the medical schools across the country so that we can increase the number of doctors who are available to treat people—in this case, the citizens of Queensland in particular.

As Senator Wong said, the decision is to increase the cap on fee paying places from 10 per cent to 25 per cent. The expectation is that, if this opportunity is taken up, there would be an increase of around 400 new places in medicine in public universities by 2007. The decision to increase the cap may not necessarily be taken by all universities. Universities will not be forced to make that decision. They will make choices about whether they increase the cap. Some universities across the country at the moment choose not to have full fee paying students. Universities such as the ANU, the University of Western Australia, Flinders and, I understand, James Cook University do not have full fee paying students, and they may decide to continue with that policy and not to implement this decision. But if the university system were to accept this opportunity, there would be in the vicinity of 400 new places, new doctors, for the country.

Senator Wong said in her remarks that there was only one way the Howard government would ever be prepared to increase the opportunities for medical training in Australia, and that would be through full fee paying places. She seems to have neglected the fact that, during the press conference after the COAG meeting, the Prime Minister made it clear that, if there is a need for additional Commonwealth places in medicine, that would be considered at the next COAG meeting later this year. So there will be an opportunity, Senator Wong, to specifically address this question later in the year when COAG meets again—and there is a likelihood that there may be further places made available later in the year.

The important thing to note is that this decision does not represent a decline in or the removal of some of the places already existing in medicine. This means that an additional number of people will be able to train in medicine. In a couple of years from now, there will be something in the vicinity of 2,195 new Commonwealth supported places, as Senator Wong wanted, in medicine in Australian universities. That is a very considerable number. It represents precisely the policy that Senator Wong is happily advocating.

There are other aspects of this matter which I think should encourage Senator Wong. For example, there is an increase in the fee help loan limit available to students, which rises to $80,000 as a result of decisions taken by the government. So those students who choose to take this course from the full fee paying places will have an opportunity to get access to a loan scheme which will make that easier for them.

The point has been made, again by Senator Wong, and by others in this debate that people should only be allowed into medical schools—and indeed, people should only be allowed into universities as a whole —by maintaining standards. Merit is important; I agree with that proposition. I agree and I particularly agree with it in relation to medicine. I am not the person who would look with enthusiasm upon being operated on by yet another Dr Patel in Queensland, whose particular medical talents perhaps are better suited to a knackery or an abattoir than an operating theatre.

There is no sign, there is no indication, there is nothing which suggests that this decision is going to result in a decline in the standard of people entering medical schools. There is nothing, Senator Wong.

Interjection

Senator Wong—There are lower TE scores for full fee payers.

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Senator TROOD—Nothing says that. In fact, you also know as well as I do that medical admission policies are strict. You also know, Senator Wong, that there is a range of tests which students are subject to for access to medical schools—the Undergraduate Medicine and Health Sciences Admission Test, the Graduate Australian Medical Schools Admission Test, and often universities ask students to go through interviews and the like. This is a rigorous process and nothing I have seen—and Senator Wong has not provided us with any evidence this afternoon—indicates that these standards are likely to fall as a result of this decision. So some of these claims are just nonsense. They have no foundation other than a reflection of the ideological expectations that exist on behalf of the Labor Party in this matter.

Interjection

Senator Wong—And yours is ‘buy your way into university’.

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Senator TROOD—Senator Wong, it is not a question of buying your way in—it is giving an opportunity to students to get access to universities who would not otherwise have it, and I would have thought you would have been enthusiastic about that. I thought you would have been particularly enthusiastic given the fact that your comrades in Queensland are desperate to increase the number of people involved in medical education—which is precisely what this decision does and will do over the next couple of years.

Let me go a little further, because the problem in medical education in this country is not just about students getting into universities. There is a wider problem and it is a problem which needs addressing and, sadly, it is a problem which cannot easily be resolved. Sadly, it is one which is an affliction of the Queensland health system and all the troubles that now beset it. It is all right to increase the number of medical places in universities, and that is desirable, but students in medical schools of course need inhouse training. They need training in hospitals—they need the opportunity, as it were, to get their hands dirty. If they are not given that opportunity within medical schools, and also to be involved in teaching and in learning expertise within universities, then they are no good to the community.

That is the task for the Beattie government—it has to provide those opportunities not just in medical schools. We do not just have to have the opportunities in medical schools, we have to have the opportunities in hospitals and, until such time as those opportunities are available—not just for doctors but also for the allied health professionals: the nurses, the physiotherapists, the radiographers et cetera— then we are not likely to have a fully functioning medical system. That is a need which the Beattie government needs to address. It is a problem which will exist as long as there are hospitals across the state which are at excess capacity and where there are insufficient opportunities for medical students to gain training. So, the case in relation to this disallowance collapses at every level and I assert the fact that the government opposes this motion of disallowance.