The 1984-85 Australian Doctors' Dispute

Abstract

Gq%*# HERE has never been much love lost between the medb ~ ical profession in Australia and Labor Governments, be 1 they State or Federal. The profession has viewed Labor as being obsessively controlling, while the Government e c) has had an image of doctors as being free-marketeere#*0 ing, laissez-faire entrepreneurs. When taken to extreme limits these stances have led to vitriolic exchanges which in 1984, in the most populous State of New South Wales, caused a mass withdrawal of services by specialist surgeons and others from the public hospital system. Since 1952, Australian medicine had functioned with a voluntary private health insurance scheme heavily subsidized by the Federal Government. This scheme matched the philosophy of successive Liberal (conservative) Federal Governments in that while putting the onus on the individual to insure, it recognized the responsibility of Government to assist to a limited extent and to provide care for those unable to afford insurance. However, by the early 1970S it was clear that some 1i per cent of the Australian population had no insurance cover, and the first Federal Labor Government in decades came to power in 1972 promising to introduce compulsory tax-supported health insurance for all Australians. The introduction of this universal health insurance plan (known as Medibank) was tempestuous and was opposed by the organized medical profession at every turn, despite the fact that, for many doctors practicing in poorer areas in particular, Medibank proved to be a financial bonanza. Following the fall of the Labor Government in 1975, the incoming Liberals set about dismantling Medibank, promising to resurrect the private insurance agencies and to return to the individual the responsibility for medical and hospital insurance. It was not until March 1983 that the Labor Party was returned to power in Canberra, again with a strong mandate for reintroducing universal health insurance. This time it was to be called Medicare and was to be supported by a 1 per cent levy on taxable income. Medicare was to be intro-