Mark Butler

About half of the people who are going through these clinics are saying they otherwise would have gone to a hospital emergency department.

So that really is often the comparator we should be looking at.

Well, it's an intention.

It's not the whole intention.

It's certainly an important part of the reasoning, though.

Well, the problem with that comparison, Priya, first of all, is that these consults are bulk build.

So $42 is not a bulk build consult, as you know.

The other problem with the comparison, as I said, is that so many of these patients say that they otherwise would have gone to a hospital ED.

You know, about a third of these consultations, 30% of the consultations at urgent care clinics are happening on the weekend.

Another 25% or so are happening after hours when most practices are not open.

So really, I think some of these comparisons that this is just standard general practice work, which is generally open during the day, Monday to Friday, there's some exceptions to that, obviously, just not the proper comparisons, I don't think.

Well, it was calculated on the operating cost and our assumptions around Medicare billing in those practices, in those clinics.

That's a process that is a pretty standard process for our budget preparation in a portfolio that is many, many, many hundreds of billions of dollars over the course of the five years we've talked about.

Well, budget hasn't been delivered yet, so I'm not in a position to comment on anything other than the announcements that have already been made before budget.

Minister for Health, Mark Butler.

Part of the challenge that we face is that the NDIS has become a soft target for shonks and rortas, as well as the worst elements of organised crime.

I want to be very clear about this.

When we talk about fraud in the NDIS, we're not talking about people with disability.

We're not talking about families who've been put on a plan and offered support.

They're not doing anything wrong.