TRANSCRIPT
As New South Wales Premier Chris Minns points out, it's rare to see premiers across states and territories are united.
"Look, right across Australia, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, the Northern Territory, different states, different political parties run those states, we can't all be wrong."
The state premiers and territory chief ministers have teamed up to accuse the federal government of back-flipping on its promise on public hospital funding.
Back in 2023, the federal and state governments agreed a new funding model for public hospitals, which would see the Commonwealth increasing its share of public hospital costs to 42.5 per cent by 2031.
But according to Mr Minns, the latest offer from the federal government is just 37 per cent of of the costs, which he says is a massive decline.
"The federal government's got a lot of far deeper pockets than the states do, but we are responsible for service delivery, and we need a new deal here, because what's being offered is just not good enough."
The changing position of the federal government occurred in September, when the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese reportedly issued a letter to Premiers and state health ministers.
In the letter, Mr Albanese reportedly urged the state governments to cut hospital spending, if they wanted a new funding deal to be reached.
Speaking from Western Australia along with WA Premier Roger Cook, Mr Albanese says he and the premiers are working through the issue.
"What we have on the table is an increased amount of funding, and indeed people talk about the agreement, what was on the table at that time was $30 billion, we currently have $20 billion on the table, we were working those issues through, $20 billion is a substantial increase in health funding for hospitals."
The National Cabinet will meet again this week to discuss the issue, but the Opposition leader Sussan Ley says the Albanese government's backflipping is a sign of failed budgeting.
"Isn't' it extraordinary that the Prime Minister is mismanaging the economy so badly, that he is now forced to write to health ministers?"
The dispute comes to a head as experts point to a public hospital system under mounting pressure, from ambulance ramping to overcrowding in hospitals.
The situation has been worsening, despite a surge in public hospital spending in recent years.
Peter Breadon is the Health Program Director at the Grattan Institute.
In a new report, his team suggest that state governments can cut back billions of dollars of avoidable hospital spending.
"We found that conservatively there's about 1.2 billion a year in the system that isn't helping patients and could be better spent. That includes shorter hospital stays. We spend longer in hospital in Australia for many surgeries where a lot of people could go home the same day compared to other wealthy countries."
His report is also calling on the Commonwealth to increase its contribution to hospital funding in line with growing demand for care.
"It's really about governments getting together and reaching a deal on funding, but adding new policies to make that funding more productive."
