Medicare, you should be paying more
#31
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
To go against the grain, its only my personal experiences but I've got nothing but good things to say about the Aus Healthcare system.
The Private Insurance thing is stupid, I only signed up for the tax break, but I've claimed back more than I've spent every year.
A close family friend was just diagnosed with cancer and had 7 weeks of intensive chemo/radio therapy straight away for free.
Know lots of people who have had kids through the public system for free and had great service.
Sounds like I've been lucky.
The Private Insurance thing is stupid, I only signed up for the tax break, but I've claimed back more than I've spent every year.
A close family friend was just diagnosed with cancer and had 7 weeks of intensive chemo/radio therapy straight away for free.
Know lots of people who have had kids through the public system for free and had great service.
Sounds like I've been lucky.
Great public care and taken more out of insurance than we have put in
#32
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
With the system as it is, you have to play it that way - claim for stuff when you know you won't have a huge bill, but go public otherwise.
S
#33
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
We should be spending more on defence and healthcare and less on welfare and civil servants - the real economy killers
#34
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
Yes, but government jobs are a significant form of employment in Australia - Imagine if you made the medicare claiming process completely electronic - retrench all those people working at the centres, and sell up all the CBD real estate for Medicare centres.
Huge saving there I suspect, while also nullifying the need to go and queue with the masses for somebody to check your claim form and enter the numbers manually.
Why not merge all the vehicle licencing agencies while we're at it - make that a federal responsibility. Do we really need 6 licencing authorities for 23m people? I don't think so. The UK manage to administer far more drivers from a shitty office building in Swansea...
S
#36
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
Yes, but government jobs are a significant form of employment in Australia - Imagine if you made the medicare claiming process completely electronic - retrench all those people working at the centres, and sell up all the CBD real estate for Medicare centres.
Huge saving there I suspect, while also nullifying the need to go and queue with the masses for somebody to check your claim form and enter the numbers manually.
Why not merge all the vehicle licencing agencies while we're at it - make that a federal responsibility. Do we really need 6 licencing authorities for 23m people? I don't think so. The UK manage to administer far more drivers from a shitty office building in Swansea...
S
Huge saving there I suspect, while also nullifying the need to go and queue with the masses for somebody to check your claim form and enter the numbers manually.
Why not merge all the vehicle licencing agencies while we're at it - make that a federal responsibility. Do we really need 6 licencing authorities for 23m people? I don't think so. The UK manage to administer far more drivers from a shitty office building in Swansea...
S
#37
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
They seem to be when they are the same party as the federal government too.
Yes, abolishing state governments would be a great move - all of those worthless state politicians out on the street with nothing but futures as lobbyists ahead of them. Very satisfying I should suspect!
But in seriousness, there is a lot of duplication and replication of roles throughout the state system. The problem I would surmise is that the number of redundancies required by abolishing the states would cause mayhem on the federal budget.
I have no issue with defence spending - but it has to be the right spending, as defence has to be able to defend. My issue with the current spending plans is that they are severely limiting defence capabilities in favour of, well, I'm not really sure. The Collins 2 project will doubtless see some jobs in SA retained, but the JSF is just a huge white elephant that nobody seems able to walk away from, and is costing quite literally billions.
S
#39
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
Yes, but government jobs are a significant form of employment in Australia - Imagine if you made the medicare claiming process completely electronic - retrench all those people working at the centres, and sell up all the CBD real estate for Medicare centres.
Huge saving there I suspect, while also nullifying the need to go and queue with the masses for somebody to check your claim form and enter the numbers manually.
Why not merge all the vehicle licencing agencies while we're at it - make that a federal responsibility. Do we really need 6 licencing authorities for 23m people? I don't think so. The UK manage to administer far more drivers from a shitty office building in Swansea...
S
Huge saving there I suspect, while also nullifying the need to go and queue with the masses for somebody to check your claim form and enter the numbers manually.
Why not merge all the vehicle licencing agencies while we're at it - make that a federal responsibility. Do we really need 6 licencing authorities for 23m people? I don't think so. The UK manage to administer far more drivers from a shitty office building in Swansea...
S
Australia, like the UK (thanks to messrs Blair and Brown) and many other countries, has far too many civil servants. The conservative government in the UK has made a start on rectifying this but has hardly made a dent and also lacks the political will to make it really happen. Here, Campbell, Barnett, Abbott and co have also made a start but hardly scratched the surface. Campbell has done the most good work but needs to go much, much further
Last year, Medicare scrapped cash refunds yet the large office they had in central Perth is still large and looks overmanned. Ridiculous. Canberra is the wealthiest state/territory in Australia. Why? Madness
Scrap the states. Federalism was a system for before telecommunications and flight. Time to go
#40
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 14,040
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
Seriously though, state governments need to go with only 20 million people. The UK does fine without them and 60 million.
#42
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Dec 2010
Posts: 14,040
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
I actually have no problem with a $6 GP fee. It will help curb addictive GP abuse.
#44
Re: Medicare, you should be paying more
I have no issue with defence spending - but it has to be the right spending, as defence has to be able to defend. My issue with the current spending plans is that they are severely limiting defence capabilities in favour of, well, I'm not really sure. The Collins 2 project will doubtless see some jobs in SA retained, but the JSF is just a huge white elephant that nobody seems able to walk away from, and is costing quite literally billions.
S
12 of those would get the Chinese and Indonesians thinking
I'm not sure about JSF. Yes, it all looks bad now but some of the greatest aircraft ever built - Lancaster, Mustang, B-17 - started off as real lemons. Even some aircraft that started off great - Spitfire, Mosquito, Phantom, Mirage - only got better and better with time and techological innovation
Biggest problem with JSF is that it's all eggs in one basket and is meant to be the last significant manned fighter