Who here remembers that Peter Dutton was once health minister?
Don’t worry if you don’t. Events of the week suggest that he doesn’t seem to, either.
It’s a historical detail relevant to note in the wake of Labor’s landmark half-billion-dollar commitment to women’s healthcare, announced on 7 February.
In this policy arena, as in others, historical accuracy in the stories political movements like to share about themselves can be somewhat slippery.
In an information environment where our physical brains are struggling not merely to discern disinformation but to remember things we already know, the tangible political record on women’s healthcare may be worth revisiting.
Labor’s health package is big, and visibly practical. New contraceptive pills will be listed on the PBS for the first time in 30 years. There’ll be bulk-billing for the insertion and removal of long-term contraceptives (like IUDs and implants). There’ll be funding for women’s health skills training, which will include specialist training for treating perimenopause and menopausal health. Pelvic pain and endometriosis clinic networks will be expanded – and hormone therapies for menopause will also get PBS listing. Contraceptives and treatments for uncomplicated UTIs will be made available from pharmacies in a national trial.
The aim is to make treatment for common health issues uncomplicated, informed, accessible and affordable. The new cost regime for menopausal therapies alone is expected to lower costs for 150,000 women a year, by between $290 to $577, and remove an economic disincentive to pursuing expert care.
The package has been received with overwhelming, broad-based applause from women. The Australian Medical Association called it “a significant step forward for women’s health”.
This is no doubt why Dutton’s Liberal confrere Anne Ruston pumped out an immediate press release pledging to support the package and claiming it was “an expansion of the historic work undertaken by the former Coalition government in supporting women’s health”.
Whirr! Let’s get in the time machine and check, shall we? First destination, 2020!
In what was then the Scott Morrison iteration of the nine-year Abbott-Turbull-Morrison Liberal-National government – one in which Peter Dutton was a senior cabinet minister throughout – a pledge was made by the Coalition to renew the National Women’s Health Strategy.
How awesome they finally decided to continue a policy initiative begun by Labor’s Bob Hawke (in 1989) and restarted by Julia Gillard in the Rudd Labor government (2010).
Fair play to the Liberals’ Greg Hunt, who as health minister in 2021 earmarked $354m for various women’s health initiatives. It’s a shame that the government of which he was a part had already cut billions of dollars in planned health payments to the states and over a billion dollars for preventative health programs and research. Women somewhat rely on those services.
The health minister responsible for some of those cuts was Peter Dutton, by the way. Historic work indeed.
But let’s fast forward to 2022, when in the dying days of Morrison’s government the Coalition pledged an additional $58m to a $22.5m they’d committed to endometriosis treatment back in 2018.
How many of the pledged clinics were under construction by the time they lost government? That would be zero. It’s Labor who’s built 22 of them since coming to government three years ago.
Dutton was somewhat quiet on women’s healthcare. He did authorise a pamphlet about breast cancer. He also opened a specialist clinic – for men.
Information overload fragments the memory and shortens attention span. Disinformation creates or reinforces false memories. Digital amnesia afflicts those who don’t retain information that they know they can easily look up online.
With an election facing Australians in a couple of months, there is one piece information worth writing down somewhere so it stays remembered.
Maintain accurate records of medical history.
Forgetting it can endanger your health.
Van Badham is a Guardian Australia columnist
