The election hasn’t even been announced and already Anthony Albanese is throwing money around like Kevin Rudd in a New York strip club. On top of big-spending promises already unveiled in recent weeks, now Albanese is throwing billions more at trying to shore up Labor’s sole remaining narrative.
Anthony Albanese will lower the cost of medicines to no more than $25 in an election-eve play for millions of votes, as the government lifts its cheaper medicines funding to almost $10bn since 2022 on top of tens of billions of dollars spent on hospitals, pharmacists and Medicare.
In addition to pre-election announcements including $644m for new urgent care clinics and the $8.5bn Medicare package, the prime minister will spend $689m over the forward estimates in next Tuesday’s budget to lower scripts under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme to $25.
Labor are desperately hoping that the perception that Labor are ‘better at public health’ will stop voters deserting them in droves. But the reality is that this will do little to ease the cost-of-living crisis that is crippling Australian households. Supposedly cheaper medicines – only apparently so because voters’ own money is being used to subsidise them – are cold comfort when mortgages, rents, electricity prices and groceries are all through the roof.
It’s more of the tens of billions of other people’s money Anthony Albanese is throwing around in a frantic attempt to save his career.
With up to 20 million Australians eligible for PBS scripts, the cut to medicine costs adds to Labor’s big health spends in the budget, including a record $33.91bn on state and territory public hospitals in 2025–26 after the Albanese government in February lifted commonwealth funding by $1.7bn.
As the nation faces a decade of deficits, the government has spent a combined $9.1bn on cheaper medicines packages in Jim Chalmers’ last three budgets.
That’s on top of three billion dollars shovelled last year into a ‘five-year community pharmacy agreement’, already costing $26.5 billion.
Government analysis claims that Labor’s cheaper medicines measures have saved patients $1.3bn since July 2022 across 178.2 million cheaper scripts. The analysis says new patient savings from the $25 co-payment would be $786m.
So… two billion dollars in ‘savings’ to taxpayers, but more than $10 billion in more taxes to pay for it? Tell me this isn’t a socialist Labor government.
Anthony Albanese has rejected criticism that his election promise to lower the cost of medicines to no more than $25 is artificially bringing down inflation by lowering the cost of medication.
Spruiking the announcement that will save Australians $200m that is due to be unveiled in next week’s budget, the prime minister said Labor was looking to introduce “cost of living measures that help people under pressure, whilst putting that downward pressure on inflation”.
Except that out-of-control government spending is driving inflation – along with its demented ‘Net Zero’ policies that are driving household power bills into the stratosphere and crippling Australia’s remaining heavy industry. Not to mention out-of-control mass immigration, importing nearly a million people per year.
It’s bad enough that we are governed by venal, corrupt creeps – do they have to be such complete and utter numpties as well?
