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The Broken Aged Care Complaint System

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I questioned the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission on the severe problems within the aged Home Care Package system, highlighting the specific case of the Smith family (with their permission).

The Smiths had $3,000 taken from their package and paid to a contractor for incomplete tree trimming. The Commission dismissed their complaint without explanation, leaving them out of pocket, which severely impacted their health and forced them to cancel necessary medical appointments.

Despite assurances from the minister’s staff that the issue would be resolved and funds reimbursed within five months, no contact was made with the family. Minister Chisholm and departmental officials agreed to follow up and contact my office regarding this breakdown.

I raised concerns that upcoming co-payment policies, with service costs potentially exceeding $100 an hour, would make essential care unaffordable for aged pensioners.

Departmental representatives responded that co-contributions will be a small percentage for pensioners (5% to 17.5% depending on the service category), and that the government is cracking down on unreasonable pricing while funding major care shifts.

The problem appears to be finally resolving but only after repeated interventions from my officers. This is not how it should work for the thousands of recipients being ripped off.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing again. It’s good to see you, Mr Comley. My questions are for the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission on problems with the aged Home Care Package, please. Late last year in Senate estimates, before this committee, I raised the case of the Smith family. Under their package, they’re entitled to some assistance in minor property maintenance. They needed some minor trimming of half a tree and a few branches of another on their property, which was not completed, yet they found that $3,000 had been taken out of their package and given to the contractor without discussion between the Smiths and the service administrator of the package. The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission closed off their complaint and refused to even discuss it with the Smiths, with no explanation given. Isn’t this elder abuse by a government agency that is supposed to help older Australians, not abuse them? What’s the cover up, and why was $3,000 paid for next to nothing?  

ACTING CHAIR: I’m not sure about the appropriateness of responding to individual complaints or issues. I think characterising them is one thing, but referring to individual cases is quite different.  

Senator ROBERTS: We have permission from the Smiths.  

ACTING CHAIR: We don’t have that, and the department don’t have that.  

Senator ROBERTS: How typical is this?  

Ms Hefren-Webb: Let me try and respond to you. Sometimes these cases are very complex. There is often miscommunication. There are different versions of events from providers versus older people. I appreciate—  

Senator ROBERTS: I’m sure you’re right.  

Ms Hefren-Webb: Sorry? What did you say?  

ACTING CHAIR: Let the official speak.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’m just backing her up. I’m sure you’re right; it would be complex.  

Ms Hefren-Webb: And so we do our best to understand the circumstances—what’s happened, what’s gone wrong—and look at what we can do to restore people to make up for what’s happened to them and find an equitable solution. We do our best efforts. Obviously, I won’t speak about the individual case, because I don’t have permission from those people to speak. But cases like this, where people are quoted different amounts for different pieces of work and then may misapprehend what was going to be done, what’s happened with their package et cetera, are not unusual cases. And we do try and reach a sensible resolution. All our complaints are subject to review and appeal, so if people aren’t happy with where we’ve resolved a matter, they do have an opportunity to first ask for an internal review and to then seek external review if they’re still not comfortable.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. And I’m not pretending some of these cases are simple, but it’s badly affected the health of the two innocent senior citizens, who deserve an answer and for money to be put back into their package. A staff member of the minister contacted my office and assured us that the issue would be resolved and that money would be reimbursed quickly. The result, though, was that nothing happened, not even contact with the family. Five months have passed since the promise was made. Because of the depleted funds, the Smiths had to cancel some medical appointments that they could no longer afford.  

ACTING CHAIR: Again, Senator Roberts, the department is not going to be able to respond to this individual case in this setting.  

Senator ROBERTS: Well, if I’m told by the minister’s staff that they’ve contacted the Smiths and they haven’t—  

Ms Hefren-Webb: I’m not aware of what the minister’s staff may have said, but I’m happy to go away and provide you with what advice I can about what engagement there has been in this particular case.  

Senator Chisholm: Just to add to that, we don’t want to be dismissive of the issue, and I’m happy to follow up with the minister’s office to see what’s gone on there. But I think we’re just uncomfortable responding to a couple’s circumstance in this forum. But I assure you that we’ll do what we can to follow up appropriately and ensure that we can do what we can, where possible, to resolve it. But that’s knowing that some of these cases can be difficult.  

Senator ROBERTS: That’d be great, Minister. Thank you. Could you contact my office?  

Senator Chisholm: Yes.  

Senator ROBERTS: The concept of co-payments is to be instituted into the aged-care packages. That will mean the cancellation of many services needed by package holders, because they’ll become unaffordable. The proposal is that many services will need to be paid for at more than $100 an hour—often more than twice the market labour rate. An aged pensioner cannot afford that. What are you doing about this situation?  

Ms Hefren-Webb: The department might wish to speak about the policy on contributions. But we are undertaking extensive work around unreasonable pricing. We’ve been in contact with a number of providers where we have concerns that their pricing is unreasonable and we’ve asked them to provide us with an explanation for how they’ve reached their prices. In some cases, they’ve agreed to adjust their price and have even provided refunds. So, certainly, we’re dealing with those cases on an individual basis, but the question of contributions is a policy question, so I don’t know—  

Ms Stewart: I’m happy to start. Thank you, Ms Hefren-Webb. In terms of the policy on co-contribution, that was a recommendation that was made by a taskforce to set co-contribution rates at a level where people who could afford to contribute would contribute to their aged care. We work very closely with Ms Hefren-Webb, and under the new legislation providers are required to be transparent in their prices, as well as reasonable. Older people can go and compare prices, and when they feel that they are not reasonable they can come to us. The last thing I’ll say before handing to my other colleagues is that the government has recently made an announcement for about $1 billion of funding to enable a change in the policy settings so that government will now pay for a category of service, which includes showering and assistance with dressing and continence. That’s been a significant announcement. I’ll hand over to Ms Trainor to talk in more detail. 

Ms Trainor: The other observation there is that there is a difference between the service price—so when you talked about the $100 per hour—and the co-contribution, which is the proportion of that service price that the participant rather than the government pays. So, when you talk about a pensioner, for a full-rate pensioner, those rates are five per cent of services that are in the independence service list category, and then 17.5 per cent of everyday living, which are our cleaning- and gardening-type services. So whilst you may have a service price of $100 an hour what a person pays out of pocket is a very small share of that actual amount.  

Senator ROBERTS: I get that. Thank you for your patience. I look forward to you calling our office. 

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Empowering Terminal Patients

When someone is facing a life-threatening illness and all standard treatments have been exhausted, waiting shouldn’t be a barrier to hope.

That’s why One Nation will be introducing legislation for the “Right to Try.”

If a patient’s condition is terminal and existing measures have failed, they can request, or a doctor can suggest, an alternative therapy or unlisted drug.

Patients enter voluntarily, creating a safe pathway that expands the market for pharmaceuticals, drives down drug prices and ultimately saves lives.

With nothing to lose and everything to gain, it’s time to give patients and doctors the freedom to choose.

Transcript

One Nation will introduce legislation in the next parliament for the right to try. This means that, if a person is being treated for an illness the outcome of which could be death and all existing measures have failed, the patient has a right to request from their doctor, or a doctor has a right to suggest, a drug not listed for that condition. It may be an alternative therapy or an unlisted drug. To put this simply, the patient has nothing to lose and everything to gain. This may expand the market for existing pharmaceutical products—who knows? That’s the point. It’s a free clinical trial that a patient has voluntarily entered into, reducing drug prices and saving lives.

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Infected Blood Scandal Inquiry – CONFIRMED

One Nation’s motion to seek justice for the victims of the Infected Blood Scandal has been passed

Good news! The Senate has passed One Nation’s motion to hold a Senate Inquiry into Australia’s Infected Blood Scandal.

During the 70s, 80s and 90s, up to 20,000 people were caught up in a scandal that resulted in serious injury and death.

Hundreds of people died.

Others have endured life-long severe illness.

This terrible chapter in Australia’s medical history is attributed to the Australian Red Cross blood banks and the CSL.

Blood contaminated with Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, and HIV was collected and then knowingly and recklessly given to healthy individuals via blood transfusions and blood products.

Those who received tainted blood, and contracted these diseases as a result, have been seeking compensation for decades.

And been ignored.

Similar situations in Canada and the United Kingdom have led to official investigations and appropriate compensation.

Commonwealth bodies have been avoiding responsibility for too long.

One Nation has been pursuing justice for the victims of Australia’s infected blood scandal for many years, and last week, we have finally unlocked the opportunity to put right this horrific chapter.

Our motion was passed on the voices, with support from the Liberals and Greens.

What will happen next?

This issue has gone to the Community Affairs Committee. They will start the process of opening up submissions. When this closes, public hearings will be organised and individuals will be called to give their testimony.

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Restoring the NDIS to Its Core Purpose

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During Estimates in June I questioned the government on its proposed $38 billion cuts to the NDIS.

Officials admitted the savings come from tightening eligibility, slashing participant budgets, and reducing key supports like community participation by 50% and capacity-building activities by 10%. They also confirmed a new “objective test” that will narrow who can access the scheme in the first place.

Minister McAllister clarified that disrupting fraud does not translate into government savings because recovered funds are returned to participants’ plans to secure legitimate services. She noted that while tackling fraud is a key priority, reducing total expenditure requires separate structural measures.

Department officials outlined the specific areas targeting budget reductions:

✅ Cutting social, community, and civic participation budgets by 50%, and capacity-building daily activity budgets by 10% ($13.2 billion).

✅ Replacing general disability-type lists with an objective test for “substantially reduced functional capacity” to restrict who enters the scheme ($9.3 billion).

✅ Restricting unscheduled reassessment requests and stopping plan roll-overs ($3.1 billion).

✅ Applying stricter guidelines on the level of support granted to existing participants ($2.9 billion).

✅ Commissioning changes to plan management and support coordination ($1.4 billion).

✅ Requiring registration for providers of high-risk supports such as intimate personal care or respite settings ($200 million).

The government’s target of slowing NDIS growth to roughly 5% annually relies on tightening eligibility thresholds, restricting core participant budgets, and narrowing the scope of “reasonable and necessary” supports.

Although it’s good to hear that steps are being taken to keep the NDIS sustainable, it’s vital that the priority remains stopping fraud, not cutting legitimate services.

Transcript

ACTING CHAIR: Welcome back, everybody. We are on outcome 4, and we will start our questioning with Senator Roberts.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing again today. What is the amount forecast to be saved by the proposed cuts to the NDIS program?  

Mr Comley: The number in the budget is $37.8 billion over the forward estimates.  

Senator ROBERTS: Is that for four years?  

Mr Comley: Yes.  

Senator ROBERTS: Shouldn’t the priority be to stop wasting money and stop the criminals defrauding the service?  

Senator McAllister: We had quite a long conversation about this earlier in the day. To put it briefly, our priority is to stop the criminals defrauding the NDIS. The budget contains very significant investments in the capability of the agency to disrupt fraud, including continuing funding for the Fraud Fusion Taskforce that we’ve spoken about before. The point I was making earlier is that we see some savings to government when we disrupt fraud, but, historically, we’ve seen the vast majority of the money that we identify as going to bad actors returned to people with disability. So, yes, our priority, absolutely, is intervening to stop fraud—non-compliant claiming and other integrity leakage—but whether that is a source of savings to government is a different question.  

Senator ROBERTS: What is the answer to that one?  

Senator McAllister: The answer is that historically, when we have disrupted providers who are defrauding the NDIS, they are taking money from disabled people. We disrupt it. The money goes back to that person who acquires the services that they need from a legitimate provider. So it’s not a source of savings to government, but it does improve the functioning of the scheme. I’ve said it on many occasions: this scheme has to operate with integrity. Over the period that we have been in government, we have made very substantial investments to lift the capacity of the NDIA and the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission to make sure that that is so. There is still more to do, and it’s why there is significant investment—further investment in the budget—that we’ve just brought through.  

Senator ROBERTS: So rather than cutting services, you’re cutting fraud?  

Senator McAllister: The reform package as a whole seeks to make sure that the scheme is sustainable. Minister Butler has talked about stopping runaway cost growth. He has talked about tackling fraud. He’s talking about reshaping markets so that they deliver good value services and quality services to people with disability. The whole package is about making the NDIS stronger and better so it is here for the long term. It’s not a choice between dealing with runaway cost growth or tackling fraud. We actually have to do both.  

Senator ROBERTS: Who are the people whose services will be cut then, if it’s not just fraud?  

Senator McAllister: I’ll ask officials to talk you through some of our expectations in terms of the approach that we are taking.  

Mr Comley: Perhaps the easiest place to draw from is the public disclosure of information and the lines there where it runs through the composition of the reductions across the forward estimates. I also note in reply to your earlier comment, Senator, that that production of documents includes—as does the budget—the savings measure on both a fiscal balance and underlying cash balance basis. I gave you the underlying cash balance. The equivalent number on fiscal balance is $38.1 billion, so they’re both around $38 billion. There are 10 aspects outlined in that production of documents.  

Ms Long: That’s correct.  

Mr Comley: I’ll hand over to Ms Long.  

Ms Long: The reforms cover a range of areas. That includes addressing fraud, compliance and integrity, but it also includes measures around eligibility and participants’ budgets. Would you like me to go across—  

Senator ROBERTS: Yes, please.  

Ms Long: As Secretary Comley said, the total impact of the reforms is $38.1 billion over the forward estimates. That can be broken down into a number of components. The first component is around strengthening guidance on what is reasonable and necessary, and that has an impact of $2.9 billion over the forward estimates.  

Senator ROBERTS: Is that tightening up on who should get it? I’m using that word ‘tightening’ constructively.  

Ms Long: It’s around what is considered reasonable and necessary and how that is applied in terms of the determination of budgets.  

Mr Comley: To be clear, that measure is for people that are in the scheme, once they’re in the scheme, on what is considered the right level of support. There are other measures Ms Long will come to that go to the question of who should be in the scheme in the first place.  

Ms Long: There’s another element around resetting social, community and civic participation and capacity building budgets, which has an impact of $13.2 billion over the forward estimates.  

Senator ROBERTS: What do you mean by that?  

Ms Long: There are two particular budget categories. The first one is the social, community and civic participation budget. That’s a type of support that is provided. Another type of support is capacity-building daily activities. Those two types of supports, through a ministerial determination, will have budgets reduced. The social and community budgets will be reduced by 50 per cent. The capacity-building daily activity budgets will be reduced by 10 per cent.  

Senator ROBERTS: What do you mean by community activity? What is the scope of that?  

Ms Long: It’s quite a broad support category. It provides supports to participants to go out and engage in the community. It might involve having a support worker take them out to engage in some form of community activity, for example.  

Mr Comley: It could be as simple as going to a park, maybe having a walk around or feeding the ducks, or it could be a sporting event. It could be a whole range of things. That’s community participation.  

Ms Long: Another element of the reforms is around commissioning plan management and support coordination, which would deliver an improvement of around $1.4 billion over the forward estimates. Also, there has been quite a lot of plan inflation that has been observed, so there are a series of reforms that are aimed at addressing that plan inflation. That includes tightening the criteria around unscheduled reassessment requests and ending plans rolling over and funds being rolled over alongside. The total impact of those reforms is $3.1 billion over the forward estimates. There are also a range of access changes, as Secretary Comley referred to. In particular, in introducing an objective test of substantially reduced functional capacity, that would look to tighten eligibility for the scheme in order to focus that back on significant and permanent disability but also to have a focus on substantially reduced functional capacity rather than disability type. That change would have an impact of $9.3 billion over the forward estimates.  

Senator ROBERTS: So it’s going to tighten and be more specific?  

Ms Long: That’s correct. There will need to be a range of consultation and engagement on how that’s applied in terms of the threshold, the definition and how that’s done in practice, but, yes, the intent is to focus in eligibility on significantly reduced functional capacity. To date, access to the scheme has commonly been done through access lists that relate to your disability type. This would mean that we would no longer need to use those access lists and instead eligibility would be focused on a substantial reduction in functional capacity. If you’d like, I could keep going through a number of the other elements of the reform package, if that’s helpful.  

Senator ROBERTS: How many more are there?  

Ms Long: There are probably a couple more that I could mention if you like. Another one that might be worth highlighting is there’s a measure for mandatory registration for high-risk providers, which is around, obviously, having registration. That would deliver savings of $0.2 billion over the forward estimates.  

Senator ROBERTS: High-risk providers?  

Ms Long: That’s correct.  

Senator ROBERTS: How do you identify high risk?  

Ms Long: I might need one of my colleagues to talk to the detail of how that will be applied.  

Ms Alisa Chambers: High-risk supports as imagined through the budget is an extension of mandatory registration that we’re moving through at the moment with supported independent living and platform providers, in the new category of advanced registration. Those high-risk supports relate to daily activities—things like catheter care or really intimate personal care—and closed settings, like respite settings, where we see really significant risk to people with disability, particularly people with significant support needs.  

Ms Long: Overall, as a result of the reforms, it’s projected that average growth in the NDIS will be 1.7 per cent over the forward estimates and five per cent over the medium term. Five per cent per annum growth for the NDIS is broadly in line with Medicare and aged-care growth rates. It also means that the scheme will remain steady at around 1.6 per cent of GDP over the medium term on the current projections that we have.  

Senator ROBERTS: I had a question about how those people whose services will be cut will be identified. It’s basically through tightening up the eligibility criteria, which is something that we’ve been talking about for a while. That’s good to see, Minister.  

ACTING CHAIR: You’ve got about another two minutes, Senator Roberts.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’ve got questions for quality and safeguards. We’ve identified several fraudsters who need to be investigated and moneys chased down. Is this where most effort should be used to seek restitution?  

Mr Comley: I think the Quality and Safeguards Commission is dealing more with participant safety. The NDIA and Mr Dardo’s area are more in the area of fraud and misuse of funds. Mr Dardo might want to comment.  

Mr Dardo: Overwhelmingly, our focus is on preventing the money going out in the first place so we can prevent the money leaving the system when it shouldn’t be. The beauty of that is you’re not trying to chase a debt. You’re not trying to chase the money after it’s gone. That’s our overwhelming focus, and we’ve done a really, really good job in identifying problematic providers and stopping the funds leaving before they should. When the money has gone, there are different ways that we might recover it. Raising a debt might be one way. Asking the courts for reparation, like an order to repay, might be another. Another way that we’ve done it is we’ve worked with state or federal policing authorities to seize assets or freeze assets. In one recent case, we froze $5 million in assets and had them confiscated by the Commonwealth. In another case, we’ve frozen $40 million in assets. In a recent case, we’ve frozen another $4½ million to $5 million. It’s really important that we send the message that, even if the money has gone and somebody thinks they’ve gotten away with it, we will actually pursue the assets. There is another avenue that we’ve been using, which is to get the tax office to go after them from a tax perspective and raise taxes and attack the problem from that direction. Overwhelmingly, designing a system to stop the money going out in the first place is our mission, but we do have avenues to try to recover money when it gets to the serious end of fraud.  

Ms Wade: Secretary Comley mentioned that the commission’s focus with respect to fraud is firmly on the behaviour of providers in the market. In addressing that, in addition to penalty frameworks for providers, we have the registration scheme, and we’ve strengthened our approach to the registration scheme to ensure that it detects fraud in more sophisticated ways through recent reforms. As those registration groups grow, which we just spoke about, that strengthened response for fraud detection continues to be enhanced as well.  

Senator ROBERTS: It’s multipronged.  

Ms Wade: Yes, absolutely.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’ll ask my last question for this bracket. I’ve still got more when we come back. How many cases of fraud are being reported? You said that, if you took them all to court, they’d be clogged.  

Mr Dardo: The way we look at it is that it’s about stopping the integrity leakage whether it’s accidental, it’s sharp, it’s malicious or it’s organised crime. We’ve got to stop it all because any one of those vulnerabilities that are open allows money to leak out of the scheme. We get a significant number of tip-offs every year. We get 29,000 tip-offs every year. They are not all fraud. We’ve got to be really careful in assuming. They’re not all fraud. As you go up the spectrum, there are several thousand ABNs that we’ve already got some controls on through manual payment reviews, and we have been building more systems in the last few weeks that are now turning on. We will put a couple thousand more ABNs into those reviews in the next few weeks. Then you go up the spectrum a bit more, where we’ve got Fraud Fusion Taskforce investigations. There are about 660 investigations, but 400 of those related to the NDIS are either with the commission or with us—or both. Then you get to the ones that are in the prosecution phase. There are a few dozen in the prosecution phase, so they’re in front of the courts or we’ve got briefs of evidence with the CDPP to prepare them for the courts. That’s the spectrum. And it’s really important to note that there is no regulatory system in the world that thinks that every single non-compliant thing is going to end up as a prosecution. That is not the way the world works.  

Senator ROBERTS: How many convictions have there been?  

Mr Dardo: There have been 25 convictions since the Fraud Fusion Taskforce started, and those sentences have resulted, in some cases, in custodial sentences up to six years. There are more cases where there has been a guilty outcome—either pled guilty or found guilty—but they’re awaiting sentencing. We don’t control the dates of the court, so some of those have been sitting there awaiting sentencing for six months or a year. There are cases that are currently scheduled for sentencing in July. They may happen in July; they may happen in December—we don’t know. But there are more cases sitting there right now where they’ve been found guilty awaiting sentencing. 

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Responsible Oversight, Not Cuts to the PBS

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The New England Times published a hit piece falsely claiming One Nation plans to remove medications from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). This is an outright lie. One Nation will defend the PBS, just as we defend Medicare.

Here is the truth.

Our 2025 policy promises a sensible review of medications fast-tracked during COVID to ensure safety and efficacy. We are looking specifically at just three drugs — Paxlovid, Remdesivir and Molnupiravir — to examine safer, cost-effective alternatives.

No Australian will be left without medication. We are not changing PBS charges, altering existing government payments, or tearing up legally binding contracts.

Society benefits when the sick are healed quickly and cared for with dignity.

Financial barriers shouldn’t stand in the way of care and One Nation will protect the 40-year legacy of the PBS against Labor and Big Pharma’s attempt to spin sensible scrutiny into fearmongering.

Transcript

Senator Roberts: Tonight I discuss the heart of Australia’s future: whether our higher education system is identifying and supporting excellence or whether elites have captured education to reward size, history and established reputation. How many Australians know that some of the highest rated higher education institutions in our country, in terms of student satisfaction, are not the sandstone Group of Eight universities or any public universities? They’re smaller, independent universities, one of which, Alphacrucis University College, records student satisfaction rates of 90 per cent for overall educational experience when the national average sits in the mid-70s. The national regulator recognises Alphacrucis as delivering superior quality education and granted it unlimited self-accrediting authority, in part because students studying a postgraduate teaching degree at Alphacrucis graduated with a job 100 per cent of the time. Until recently, I didn’t know that tertiary education institutions with this level of success existed. Australians need to know there are exemplary institutions leading our country, yet we’ve never heard of them. 

We need to reassess how our tertiary institutions are supported, because, if we don’t, we’re reinforcing the status quo, and that’s not working. Our universities have governance issues, financial issues, confidence issues and efficiency issues, yet there are higher education providers achieving excellent outcomes for students without the hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars in funding that our public universities receive, including grants and commercial activity. If institutions like Alphacrucis do not become well known, students who might have thrived in such a place will miss the opportunity. Students will be less satisfied with their education than they might otherwise have been. Students might be less likely to graduate into employment and less likely to leave their mark and their legacy on our society. Philanthropic foundations need to know that outside of the G8 there’s great teaching and research, and it’s worthy of support. Foundations need to be looking for opportunities to fund teaching and research institutions like Alphacrucis, because that’s where our future may well be. 

Government has set lofty aspirational targets for tertiary attainment through the Australian Universities Accord and has already acknowledged that public universities alone cannot achieve these targets. The system needs provider diversity and rewards for excellence. Our tertiary funding must move to a level playing field. We must allocate funds on actual performance, not past reputation. The government makes much noise of diversity, yet where’s the funding for real diversity in higher education? The G8 sandstone universities would benefit from increased competition. We must do all that we can to remove barriers from lesser known institutions to enable them to compete. Part of that is to raise their profile, and part of that is to shift funds from the sandstone G8s to institutions already delivering. 

One Nation is committed to greater scrutiny of tertiary institution funding and wants to know why funding favours established universities over new entries. I’m focusing on Alphacrucis, yet the issue is larger than one university college. It’s about whether Australia rewards performance or prestige. These are not the same thing. Reward is about working for today’s students. Prestige is about what’s been done for students in days past. It’s about whether new institutions with fresh ideas are given the opportunity to compete or whether the system remains tilted towards those who have always held advantage. 

Alphacrucis University College is a test case, an institution achieving outstanding student satisfaction, national recognition for quality and a growing reputation for excellence, yet most Australians have never heard of it. If we’re serious about innovation, competition and value for taxpayers, then institutions should be judged on what they actually deliver, not on how old they are, how large they are or how well connected they are. Australia’s future depends upon identifying excellence wherever it’s found and giving it the opportunity to flourish. The Australian people deserve a higher education system that rewards achievement, encourages competition and invests in results. That’s beneficial for students, for taxpayers and for Australia’s future. 

Tonight I address media misrepresentation of One Nation’s policy to review some drugs on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the PBS. The New England Times newspaper flagrantly lied to readers in a story just published last Saturday, giving the false impression that One Nation will be removing medications from the PBS. Author RK Crosby’s hit piece was titled ‘Concern brewing as buried Hanson policy threatens affordable medicines’. Only last week, I included the PBS in a list of social welfare institutions that One Nation would defend in government—not tolerate or be afraid to touch but defend. This pathetic piece of journalism shows the lack of research the New England Times conducted for its story. I understand that, like many regional newspapers, the New England Times is short of staff. This leads them to accept a hit piece that Better Access Australia most likely prepared. It’s quoted extensively, and its mission statement is to transfer as much taxpayer money as it can into big pharma’s pockets. 

One phone call would have cleared this up. The story stems from a two-line election policy promise in 2025 which said One Nation will review all medications fast-tracked during COVID to ensure safety and efficacy have been proven. It’s perfectly sensible and responsible. In fact, most of the drugs that were given emergency use authorisation, officially known as the provisional use pathway, have already been withdrawn or had their use reduced to insignificance. Only three remain of interest to One Nation, and these are the drugs we will review: Paxlovid; remdesivir, or ‘Run—death is near’; and molnupiravir. With each of these, there are alternatives which anecdotally carry a lower cost and better safety and efficacy outcomes. No Australian will be left without medication—not one Australian. This is actually a small promise that the pharmaceutical lobby has deliberately taken out of context. During COVID, big pharma benefited to the tune of billions of dollars and is terrified of any scrutiny. 

To open their story, RK Crosby offered a vignette suggesting One Nation will remove asthma medication from the PBS—an outright lie; a fabrication, pure and simple. One Nation threatening affordable medicines is an outright lie. One Nation will not change PBS charges nor change the amounts government pays under the existing arrangements. Contracts signed will be honoured. If we start tearing up legally-binding contracts, confidence in government will never recover. We’re not going to tear up contracts. Negotiate? Yes. Tear up? No. For clarity, no PBS contracts are in our sights. 

The COVID vaccines will be looked at in our terms of reference for a royal commission, although these were not supplied through the PBS. Perhaps the pharmaceutical industry didn’t want to mention their COVID products and instead chose to lie about our PBS policy. For the record, here’s the philosophy behind our policy. As I said last week in the Senate, One Nation supports the PBS for the same reason we support Medicare. Society benefits when our sick are healed quickly and returned to looking after themselves. For those with permanent conditions, the basic laws of humanity require society to care for those people with love and respect. The financial cost of medication and related devices should not detract from this care. 

Last week, Minister Butler made similar comments. On this, we’re in alignment. Over the last 40 years, the PBS has balanced prices paid to pharmaceutical companies against product benefits. Sometimes negotiation has delayed drugs, and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee displayed a sensible balance, making our PBS the envy of the world. We will defend the process of negotiating drug prices to ensure no compromise on the principles that have informed the PBS for 40 years. 

I’ll discuss two more policies. One Nation will introduce legislation in the next parliament for the right to try. This means that, if a person is being treated for an illness the outcome of which could be death and all existing measures have failed, the patient has a right to request from their doctor, or a doctor has a right to suggest, a drug not listed for that condition. It may be an alternative therapy or an unlisted drug. To put this simply, the patient has nothing to lose and everything to gain. This may expand the market for existing pharmaceutical products—who knows? That’s the point. It’s a free clinical trial that a patient has voluntarily entered into, reducing drug prices and saving lives. 

The other policy is to introduce an eight-year wait for new arrivals to access the PBS, unless you’re a citizen or a permanent resident. Under One Nation, there’ll be an eight-year wait for citizenship and for permanent residence. This will not be backdated. You can’t be unmade as citizen. This will not deny medical care for new arrivals, who will pay for that care themselves. Anyone on prescription medication can vote One Nation without fear of losing access to or paying more for their medication. I trust that’s clear.

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Stopping the Latest “Mediscare” Lies

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One Nation supports the sensible reforms to let trained registered nurses prescribe common PBS medications — a practical step that will ease pressure on doctors, strengthen rural healthcare and improve access for everyday Australians.

This isn’t a thought bubble; it’s the result of decades of professional evolution in nursing.

I also put an end to the latest round of “Mediscare” nonsense. One Nation will defend Medicare and the PBS — full stop. We’ll crack down on the $3 billion in fraud the government refuses to confront, protect patients from bureaucratic roadblocks, and ensure no Australian pays more for a prescription under a One Nation government.

Our healthcare system must serve patients, not criminals, not fraudsters and not political spin.

One Nation will keep Medicare strong, keep the PBS fair and keep pressure on a government too timid to clean up its own mess.

Transcript

One Nation will support the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025. It amends the National Health Act and the Health Insurance Act 1973 to enable approved registered nurses to prescribe certain pharmaceutical benefits under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the PBS. Australia’s health system is experiencing increasing demand due to an ageing population and rising prevalence of chronic disease, something we do need to better understand. Improving access to safe and effective medications is essential to meeting the health needs of everyday Australians. 

Registered nurses comprise around half the Australian health workforce and are the most geographically distributed health profession. They’re the best placed to prescribe certain common medications, taking the pressure off doctors while reducing travel and inconvenience to patients. This will support rural pharmacies. Registered nurses must complete a three-year bachelor’s degree in nursing. Nurse practitioners must hold a master’s degree in nursing and complete 5,000 hours of advanced clinical practice. 

The history of the idea of allowing nurses, suitably trained, to write prescriptions is quite long. It began with a trial in New South Wales between 1991 and 2000—a generation ago. This went national in 2001 with the advent of the national Nursing and Midwifery Board, designed to bring regulation of nurses closer to the system used for doctors. It was at this time that the pathway to nurse practitioner was introduced. In 2010, nurse practitioners were approved to write prescriptions under the PBS, although only while working in collaboration with a registered medical prescriber. Then, in 2024, the government removed the need for collaboration with a registered prescriber, allowing nurse practitioners to prescribe most medications under their own Medicare Benefits Schedule prescriber number. Finally, in 2025, the government introduced the ability of registered nurses to prescribe. There are suitable checks and balances. Nurses must meet specified qualifications, complete the course and maintain endorsement. The first cohort were enrolled and have now completed their training. 

This legislation will enable these health professionals to prescribe certain medications. Perhaps this could have been done the other way around, with the heads of power to allow registered nurses to prescribe written into law before we started training them, disrupting their careers and offering them a career path which didn’t yet exist. Maybe that’s just a sensible One Nation thing. 

This legislation is being supported across the chamber and could have been supported a year ago. The point of this history lesson is clear. The move to allow registered nurses to prescribe is not a thought bubble. It’s the result of a generation of evolution in the education and professional certification of and skill base within the nursing profession. 

The system they’ve put in place appears fit for purpose. Not all drugs can be prescribed by registered nurses, just certain ones: birth control; repeat prescriptions across a wide range of conditions. There are lots of opportunities to take the pressure off our doctors. This is particularly beneficial to regional and remote areas. 

For those who may be concerned about this measure—and One Nation is not concerned with it—I reference the PBS auditing framework. The PBS has excellent audit routines which scan all the prescriptions written across the system and zero in on any patterns out of the ordinary. These are then followed up with a phone call or, if necessary, a visit. Misuse will be detected. One Nation does contend medical professionals are given insufficient discretion to use their wealth of medical knowledge. In this case, it will provide an additional check. The initiative in part stems from the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce. One Nation is pleased to strengthen Medicare with this initiative. 

Next, I must address ‘Mediscare’ 3.0, which disreputable media have been promoting in the last few weeks. I say ‘Mediscare’ version 3 because the last two elections saw the Labor Party, or their supporters, smear the Liberals with a false ‘Mediscare’ campaign. Now it’s One Nation’s turn to be smeared, and Labor is smearing One Nation. They must fear us. While it has been only one week since the last time I defended Medicare and the PBS in a Senate speech, it seems I need to do it again. Very well. One Nation will defend the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and Medicare. Both are part of a social-welfare safety net which maintains a healthy population and contributes to Australia enjoying a high standard of living. Medicare and the PBS are why people pay taxes—and don’t forget it, government. 

Taxes are, of course, not the government’s money. Taxes are the people’s money and should only be spent accordingly. Hardworking Australians do not deserve to have their money wasted or handed over to fraudsters. One Nation will work with and better resource the Benefits Integrity Division and the Fraud Fusion Taskforce to ensure every cent of money spent through Medicare and the PBS goes to people who need it and who qualify for the benefit. 

It’s intolerable to me that new drugs, drugs that could save lives, are held back, despite agreement between the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee and the drug maker, because of the cost, because billions are being taken out of the system in fraud. And, yes, some prescribers are complicit, although a tiny amount. No patient with a legally obtained Medicare card should ever be afraid of using that card under a One Nation government. No Australian will have to pay more for a prescription under a One Nation government. We will support and maintain the system of the Medicare urgent care clinics, and we will work constructively with all stakeholders to extend operating hours for service delivery to take further pressure off public hospital emergency departments—which we will be able to afford because we will remove the criminals and fraudsters from the system and ensure everyone who uses a Medicare card is entitled to use that card. The government knows who these people are—yes, you do. The government knows where the $3 billion a year in fraud is coming from. Their own integrity division said as much in Senate estimates recently. The fraud figure is the government’s, not One Nation’s—we didn’t cook it up; the government’s own agency told us. The Albanese-Burke government doesn’t have the guts to do anything about it. 

I’m concerned that the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 could create a two-tier health system. Rural, regional and poorer suburbs would get registered nurses and nurse practitioners. Richer suburbs would get doctors galore. In fact, I’m sure that’s going to happen because it’s happening now. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the federal department of health track their workforce using a framework called the Modified Monash Model. Their data shows a stark imbalance. Roughly 84 per cent of private hospital medical practitioners and the vast majority of medical specialists operate exclusively within major capital cities and metropolitan centres. Small, regional, rural and remote towns classified as MM4 to MM7 contain the lowest number of healthcare workers per capita. In these areas, access to medical care drops drastically. In these areas, GPs provide primary care and act as emergency doctors and hospital doctors, making up 60 per cent of the entire available hospital workforce because there are so few dedicated specialists. The bill before the Senate will help take the weight off those GPs, yet will not solve the issue of doctors gravitating to wealthy suburbs and cities. What may solve that problem is to do more to assist children from the bush to take up medicine as a career. One Nation’s health policy, to be released later this year, will add more detail to that statement. 

Finally, I’ll be moving amendments to this bill on behalf of Senator Lambie, who’s recovering after recently herself quality-testing our healthcare system. As it currently stands, properly qualified podiatrists and podiatric surgeons can prescribe specific medicines to their patients, although these prescriptions are not recognised under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. Patients either have to pay the full price or meet with the GP to get the same medicine prescribed under the PBS—or, worse, go without and suffer the consequences. That’s ridiculous. Podiatrists require a university degree, must maintain membership of their professional association and are affiliated with Ahpra, like other medical associations. Their medical expertise in their area of care is well capable of supporting improved prescribing rights. The focus of our healthcare system must be what’s best for the patient, and what’s best for the patient cannot include bureaucratic roadblocks and financial pain. The amendments I foreshadow do not reduce safeguards. They do not give podiatrists greater prescribing powers. They will ease GPs’ workload and make things easier for patients. They are commonsense amendments, and they should be supported. 

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Avoidance on Rising Breast Cancer Rates

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In February I questioned the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) on the surge in early-onset breast cancer, with diagnoses in women in their 20s, 30s and 40s rising sharply over two decades.

When I asked whether they’d cross-referenced these cases with lifestyle factors, or with COVID vaccination status, they admitted they haven’t done that work.

To me, that’s a glaring failure.

COVID injections were the biggest health intervention in our history, yet no one is checking for possible links to adverse outcomes. Australians deserve transparency, not avoidance.

If there’s no connection, proper research would reassure thousands of worried people. Instead, all we get is deflection.

I will continue to push for answers.

— February | Senate Estimates

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. The Cancer data in Australia 2025 report emphasises that cancers, including breast cancer, are being diagnosed more frequently in people in their 30s and 40s, with the share of all breast cancer diagnoses rising about 50 per cent over the last 20 years, which is stunning. Breast cancer is now the most commonly diagnosed cancer for women aged 20 to 39 and 40 to 59, which is surprising as well. Have you undertaken any analysis to cross-reference breast cancer in this younger cohort with lifestyle factors—drinking, prescription medications and so on? 

Dr Bolevich: We do indeed produce the report you’re talking about and have a unit within the institute that specialises in cancer data—its collection, national consistency around it and various types of analysis. We often make the data available to researchers. For the specific question you’re asking, I will defer to my colleague.  

Ms Gates: As you said, we produce that information about cancer. We sometimes look at lifestyle factors. Specifically, it depends on what information we have around the connection between having a lifestyle factor, such as risk factors around smoking or other risk factors—I haven’t got to hand anything directly that we’ve done in relation to breast cancer.  

Senator ROBERTS: Could you take it on notice, to give us a range of what you provide in terms of lifestyle factors like drinking, prescription medications and so on?  

Dr Bolevich: We can take that on notice.  

Senator ROBERTS: We’d just like to see what you’ve got available; thank you. The American Cancer Society call this ‘early onset breast cancer’. Specifically, have you cross-referenced breast cancer in this younger cohort with COVID vaccination status?  

Dr Bolevich: No, we haven’t done that kind of work.  

Senator ROBERTS: Why not?  

Dr Bolevich: I think we have provided updates to this committee on previous occasions about the work we’ve done to create some data infrastructure that will enable various types of research to occur. That infrastructure is now largely in place, and we would expect that over time people will undertake various types of analyses using that data and other data that’s available to them. But the institute itself has not undertaken that specific type of research.  

Senator ROBERTS: You’re more the constructor of the database and the ability to cross-reference, but it will be up to someone else who wants to do that to do it?  

Ms Hermann: Cancer Australia is undertaking a piece of work at the moment, directed by the minister, to look at the impacts of early onset cancer, including looking at lifestyle factors and other factors that may be influencing earlier rates of cancer in Australia.  

Senator ROBERTS: What about COVID vaccination status?  

Ms Hermann: I don’t think that’s included in what they’re looking at.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’m surprised, given what’s in the public domain about that. Have you cross-referenced COVID vaccination status with any health outcome and any demographic?  

Ms Gates: We have looked at vaccination status in terms of rates and that sort of thing, but, no, we haven’t looked at that in terms of any associations.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’m surprised, because of the news that’s travelling around about that, including from many scientists. COVID injections were the most significant health response in Australian history, coming at a significant cost to the taxpayer and involving a significant level of coercion which, in hindsight, was not justified by the risk. The news about AstraZeneca and even the Pfizer shots, and the concerns, came out very early. There’s a widely-held belief that the vaccines caused adverse events, and nothing but denials has come from the government—and not just this government but the previous government as well. If you have nothing to hide, Minister, why are you not doing the research which would confirm or disprove the link between COVID vaccination and adverse events, which would put a lot of people at ease?  

Senator Green: The department and the officials have explained to you that there is work being undertaken on a range of research projects that look into trends in health care. Whether or not that’s post COVID-19, there’s a lot of time still to go before we see what that research might be. But the systems are being set up, and I’m sure that if there are any updates they’ll give them to you first and foremost.  

Senator ROBERTS: That’s most unlike you, Minister, because it sounds like a lot of fluff. Is your government afraid of confirming that COVID shots cause early onset cancer? To me, people who have got cancer have got that thought in their mind; it’s right through the community. People are worried, and if there is no connection it would be wonderful to take that off their burden. It sounds like, ‘Bugger the people; just get on with the job and keep hiding it.’ Senator Green: I think the most important thing to do is to listen to the experts.  

Senator ROBERTS: And common sense and what people in the street are saying.  

Senator Green: And the health experts—particularly the health experts.  

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Every Australian Was Lied To

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The media tried to smear me to weaken One Nation and they failed.

Their pile-on was nothing more than a distraction from the truth now spilling out in the United States. Anthony Fauci’s — a primary face of the federal COVID-19 response in the US — own dairies and phone records expose the lies, the cover-ups, and the man-made origins of COVID.

These documents show exactly what I’ve been saying for years. COVID was engineered, the public was misled, early treatments were suppressed, and the injections were pushed despite known failures and risks.

While the media called me a “conspiracy theorist”, Nobel-willing scientists and US defence officials were confirming the same facts.

Every Australian was lied to, jabbed or unjabbed. Every one of us!

This is why we need a full royal commission into COVID.

No more cover-ups. No more corporate influence over public health.

Justice for those harmed and accountability for those who orchestrated this scandal.

Transcript

In the last few weeks, the media have tried to drive a wedge between me and Senator Hanson. The journalists’ plan was simple—take statements I’ve made over many years out of context, misrepresent them, falsely portray me as a conspiracy theorist, tell blatant lies about me and invite Pauline to sack me, thereby weakening One Nation and returning power to the Liberal-Labor uniparty, who have exercised that power to advance and enrich their benefactors for decades. They failed. In my adjournment speech last week, I detailed the reason why the media would behave in this manner. I invite everyone to catch up with that speech. I note Karl Stefanovic and now Kyle Sandilands have apologised for being sucked in with the COVID scandal. I thank Karl and Kyle for their honesty in apologising and note it only came after they ceased working for the mainstream media propaganda machine. Honesty is easy when it carries no cost. 

The timing of this failed media pile-on was designed to distract from revelations in the United States relating to the COVID scandal. This includes the role of former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci. The worm has turned against Anthony Fauci. His formerly private work diaries have been subpoenaed and released. His government-issued phone has been subpoenaed, and the contents have been released. The result is a very clear picture of his lies to hide the man-made origin of COVID. Even worse, it proves a criminal conspiracy to cover up adverse events from the COVID vaccines, the injections. Note that in order to call these injections ‘vaccines’ they had to change the definition of ‘vaccine’. Changing the name doesn’t change the outcome. Death, injury, misery—crimes which may never see Fauci before a court of law, given that President Biden granted him a full pardon for all the crimes he committed going back to 2014. There are, though, many others who could and should be charged. 

The Fauci papers prove COVID-19 was a man-made virus whose development commenced in the United States against the law and then moved out of the public eye to China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, with American funding from Fauci. The final product, SARS-CoV-2, combined the original and man-made SARS virus with elements of the AIDS virus and a bat virus that was previously unseen in humans. The zoonotic origin of COVID—suggesting a bat virus somehow jumped to humans in the wet market in Wuhan—was made up to mislead the public, frontline health officials and professionals. This was known publicly almost from the start. Many scientists rejected the theory including the late Luc Montagnier, a Nobel Prize winning virologist, who sequenced the COVID DNA in April of 2020. He concluded the presence of a furin cleavage site and the inclusion of segments from the AIDS virus could only be the result of human intervention. 

For those without a crash course in virology, I’ll explain. Furin is the name of the protein used to cut a DNA sequence in order to insert a new piece of DNA. A furin cleavage site is the location of the cut. These can occur naturally. Montagnier, though, concluded the nature and location of the cut and of the material inserted was not natural. He’s right, and I was right to call COVID man made from the start. The number of lowly qualified health professionals and journalists with no medical training who did no research of their own and who tried to debunk the theory is a frightening indictment on the medical profession and on journalism. They ignored the work of a man who won the Nobel Prize for discovering the AIDS virus. I listened to the one man on the planet most qualified to sequence and analyse the COVID DNA. Why didn’t our health professionals and the media? 

The man-made nature of the virus was proven when the US defence department released a report into COVID in August 2021. The author was Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Murphy. He was formerly a fellow at America’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, DARPA, and was the inspector-general of the department of defence at the time—someone else that I listened to. The report states the virus is an American created, deliberately humanised virus that was developed at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, with the developer being American Peter Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance, who received financial grants from Anthony Fauci. For saying exactly that and for telling the truth the media called me a conspiracy theorist. 

The report shows why non-medical interventions like masks and medical countermeasures—that is, vaccines—do not work well against coronavirus. That’s something else I’ve been criticised for saying. America’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, DARPA, rejected funding this project for ethical reasons, so Anthony Fauci funded the research, and the rest is history. The US military document confirms the date of the COVID virus’s escape: August 2019. This was prior to three researchers at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology presenting to Wuhan hospital with a previously unseen respiratory virus. I was right about COVID being a lab leak and about when it escaped. 

What that means is that Bill Gates and the World Economic Forum ran Event 201 in October 2019 to simulate the outbreak of a deadly virus three months after the virus escaped. That’s something they must have known. They lied about that and still do. Plus, it’s interesting to see the defence report, inter alia, say: 

The reason the disease is so confusing is because it is less a virus than it is engineered spike proteins, hitching a ride on the virus part of the disease. 

COVID-2 was a delivery mechanism for spike proteins. The report continued: 

COVID is readily resolved with early treatment that inhibits the viral replication that spreads the spike proteins around the body. 

Those spike proteins cause a harmful interactive overactive immune response to try and clear the spike proteins from the ACE-2 receptors. 

The spike protein in the COVID virus and in the deadly vaccine stop the ace 2 receptor from doing its job, which is fighting cancer. So they leave us vulnerable to cancer. The source of the spike protein can be from the virus or from the injections. The more injections there are, the more spike protein there is in your body and the lower your defenses are against cancer. It’s no coincidence that Pfizer released a new cancer drug in 2020 and then engaged in a massive scale-up into cancer and cardiovascular portfolios, with the $43 billion acquisition of Seagen in late 2023. They created the problem; they created a solution from the same bloody company. What a great business strategy. It’s a shame about the ethics. It’s a shame about the people who died—who had their health destroyed and their lives destroyed. 

And the report clearly states Daszak knew in 2018 that ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine and interferon inhibited viral replication. Did our health authorities promote these treatments from the start of the outbreak? No. They banned these safe drugs they knew to be effective treatment. When doctors around the world used ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine to successfully treat COVID, they were threatened and many had their registrations revoked and their livelihoods taken away. In Australia, these included courageous doctors Mark Hobart, My Le-Trinh, David Currie and Paul Oosterhuis—doctors of courage who put their patients’ welfare ahead of their own. Their hero, Anthony Fauci, explained the reason our health officials took a decision that can only be described as criminal malfeasance. According to his diary at 12.30 pm on 27 July 2021, Fauci advised President Biden: ‘The level of virus in the upper throat of vaccinated people with a serious infection was the same as the level in unvaccinated persons.’ The only conclusion from that statement is the vaccine did not stop ‘serious breakthrough cases’ any more than natural immunity did, and they knew it in July 2021, based on research from Israel. Nonetheless, Australian health authorities kept lying to you. On 25 August 2021, Fauci secretly admitted the truth—mRNA COVID jabs failed against hospitalisation and not just infection. Why was this failure not made public? Fauci’s diary from 13 August 2021 states: ‘The CDC’s statement the vaccines were not effective at all in preventing infection and transmission must be rescinded because it would undermine the Department of Justice’s efforts at mandates for vaccines.’ There you have it. The CDC then actually wound the statement back. 

So there you have it. They lied and they covered up a vaccine which at the time they publicly accepted caused myocarditis and was killing people—in order to prevent critical scrutiny, to enable compulsory vaccination and to protect their power, their credibility and their jobs and to avoid the inevitable legal action for malfeasance. There’s so much more to the Fauci papers. They’re public and I’ll put the link on my website. The world suffered because of our health professionals’ self-interest. Jabbed or un-jabbed, we’ve all been lied to. This is why we must call a royal commission into COVID, to ensure public health is never again sacrificed on the altar of corporate profits and industry self-interest. Those who died and those harmed or bereaved must be granted justice. 

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The Bureaucracy of Bias

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During my second session with AHPRA, I asked their representatives about their neutrality, bureaucratic overreach and entanglement with radical ideological and political advocacy groups.

When I pressed Mr Untersteiner on whether AHPRA caseworkers even possess the basic competence to distinguish between a psychoanalytic view of psychosis and a genuine psychotic disorder, or whether they’re weaponising ignorance to take unwarranted action against doctors, he could not provide an answer and took it on notice.

More importantly, I am extremely concerned about AHPRA’s institutional alignment with politicised organisations such as ACON and its Pride in Diversity program, including their active membership and participation in the Australian Workplace Equality Index.

Despite admitting that no formal assessment has ever been conducted to evaluate whether these ideological partnerships create actual or perceived conflicts of interest, Mr Untersteiner hid behind procedural bureaucracy and evasive talking points.

When asked how AHPRA can possibly claim to be an independent, unbiased regulator while paying to participate in programs designed to push progressive inclusion agendas, they dodged my questions, basically admitting they have no defence for the exorbitant legal costs hardworking Australian doctors face when forced to defend themselves against unaccountable regulators.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: I’m going to skip a lot of my questions, Mr Untersteiner, and go straight to general questions. Would an AHPRA caseworker understand if a doctor were referring to a psychoanalytic view of psychosis rather than a psychotic disorder?

Mr Untersteiner: I’m happy to take that on question on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: If they don’t understand, are they in a position to take action against such a doctor?

Mr Untersteiner: Again, I’m happy to take that on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Given Ahpra’s affiliation with the Rainbow Tick scheme and ACON, a high-profile gender identity organisation, how can a doctor be sure that AHPRA is neutral and not biased against them?

Mr Untersteiner: I go back to an earlier point that I made, which is that we regulate one million health practitioners, and those one million health practitioners will see many millions of Australians as well. We have a paramount responsibility of public protection within the legislation. In order for us to fulfil that duty, we need to be engaging with all sorts of communities to understand their experiences in the health system and to understand their experiences with the regulator as well, and so we meet with many different organisations, including Australian Disability Network, for instance, Diversity Council Australia and many, many others. I could go on. We also work with Pride in Diversity for the exact same reason.

Senator ROBERTS: Can AHPRA confirm all formal and informal relationships it maintains with ACON and its programs, including Pride in Diversity.

Mr Untersteiner: I’ll take it on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Is AHPRA currently a member of Pride in Diversity or participating in the Australian Workplace Equality Index?

Mr Untersteiner: We do have a membership with Pride in Diversity.

Senator ROBERTS: At what cost, and when did you join?

Mr Untersteiner: I’m happy to take that on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: What due diligence was undertaken before entering into these relationships, particularly given ACON’s explicit advocacy role on gender identity policy?

Mr Untersteiner: Again, I’m happy to take that on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Has AHPRA conducted any formal assessment of whether these relationships create actual or perceived conflicts of interest in its regulatory functions?

Mr Untersteiner: I’m confident that they aren’t creating any kind of conflict. Again, as I mentioned, we use a range of different partnerships and memberships to ensure that we’re hearing different voices from the community. At the end of the day, our regulatory role is founded in the legislation and in the codes of conduct. Again, I’m very comfortable that we fulfil that duty without a conflict of interest.

Senator ROBERTS: Have you conducted any formal assessment of whether these relationships create actual or perceived conflicts?

Mr Untersteiner: No formal assessment.

Senator ROBERTS: How does AHPRA reconcile its statutory obligation to act as an independent regulator with participation in programs designed to influence institutional behaviour toward progressive inclusion strategies?

Mr Untersteiner: Again, I think I’ve answered that.

Senator ROBERTS: Not specifically.

Mr Untersteiner: Again, we apply legislation and codes of conduct in our investigations. To go further, ultimate decisions are made by professional boards under the legislation. Members of the professional boards are not employees of AHPRA. They are statutory appointees appointed by every state and territory health minister and the federal health minister, so they are independent of AHPRA in that sense. Again, there is an arm’s-length arrangement in decision-making. Beyond that, there is a right of appeal through to tribunals and even the higher courts. Again, there is a very robust regulatory and legislative framework that ensures that there isn’t a conflict of interest that occurs as a result of us listening to different members of the community to understand their experiences.

Senator ROBERTS: Do you know what it costs to go to court?

ACTING CHAIR: Senator Roberts, we’re going to have to rotate the call. This is your last question.

Senator ROBERTS: Has AHPRA received advice, internal or external, on whether alignment with advocacy organisations risks regulatory capture or bias?

Mr Untersteiner: I’ll take that on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you, Chair. Thank you Mr Untersteiner.

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The $5M Vaccine Grant With Zero Accountability

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I questioned the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) on why taxpayers are funding a new $5 million vaccine-adjuvant research centre when Australians still haven’t been given clear answers about the safety of existing adjuvants.

Their written response to my questions confirmed the project was funded simply because peer reviewers ranked it highly, saying that “there are only seven adjuvants used in license vaccines which limits the choice” and the NHMRC’s Centres of Research Excellence aims to “discover novel adjuvants to improve vaccine development.”

That’s not oversight – that’s the NHMRC waving through millions without addressing the real issues.

I asked directly whether concerns about aluminum-based adjuvants or neurological conditions played any role and they couldn’t give me an answer.

I also confirmed that any new vaccine technology developed with Australian taxpayer money WILL NOT be owned by Australians.

This is simply not good enough.

Taxpayers should not be funding research that lines the pockets of big pharmaceutical companies. Any intellectual property generated through these grants must belong to the taxpayers. Handing over valuable IP to entities to monetise at our expense provides zero return to the taxpayers.

This has to stop!

For a billion-dollar grant body, Australians deserve better than vague justifications and no clear outcomes.

Australians deserve accountability that matches the scale of the spending.

— February | Senate Estimates

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Could I turn to the National Health and Medical Research Council, please. In 2025, the National Health and Medical Research Council funded the Vaccine Adjuvant Discovery and Development Centre of Research Excellence—CRE—led by Professor Katherine Andrews at Griffith University, with $5 million as part of a $72 million CRE package. This grant focuses on discovering new adjuvants to enhance vaccine efficacy, safety and related purposes. First question: Why do we need new adjuvants? What’s wrong with the existing adjuvants?  

Prof. Wesselingh: We assess grants through a peer review process. Through that process, we utilise experts from around Australia to assess all of the grants that come to us—whether it’s for a centre of research excellence, an investigator grant or an ideas grant. The way that CRE would’ve been assessed would’ve been through that peer review process. Through that peer review process, they would’ve been elevated to the top of that scheme and would’ve been funded on the basis of their peers indicating that this was high-quality research that was likely to have a significant impact on health in Australia. We would take that on board; therefore, if they were ranked accordingly, we would fund them.  

Senator ROBERTS: So you don’t know the reasons why their peers elevated it to No. 1?  

Prof. Wesselingh: I would have to go back and look at all of the assessments by those peers. Obviously, I don’t have that directly in front of me at the moment.  

Senator ROBERTS: Could you do that on notice, please? We’d like to know why that research was approved, why we need new adjuvants, and what’s wrong with the existing adjuvants? 

Prof. Wesselingh: I’m very happy to look back at the peer review. But what I can guarantee you is that they would have been regarded as excellent research likely to produce significant impact.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’d like to know what they are.  

Prof. Wesselingh: Sure.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Adjuvants and vaccines are there to enhance the body’s immune response to the antigen. Common adjuvants include aluminium hydroxide, aluminium phosphate, amorphous aluminium hydroxyphosphate sulphate and potassium aluminium sulphate. These have been widely linked to neurological conditions spontaneously occurring after vaccination. Is this program an admission that there might be a level of truth to the link between aluminium in vaccines and autism? I guess you wouldn’t know, because you don’t know the—  

Prof. Wesselingh: So you’re asking us if the fact that we funded the CRE is an admission? We, again, funded the CRE on the basis of the scores that the CRE obtained. Those scores would indicate the quality of the science and the likelihood of obtaining high-quality evidence to improve the health of Australians.  

Senator ROBERTS: Right, and you’re going to find the reason anyway, so perhaps you could check if there is any aspect of truth to the link between aluminium in vaccines and autism as part of the reasons for developing a new adjuvant?  

Prof. Wesselingh: We can certainly look at the arguments that the CRE made and the peer review of that CRE.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. If research is successful and you find an effective adjuvant that is not neurotoxic, who will own the intellectual property the taxpayers just funded?  

Prof. Wesselingh: The way our granting system works is that the intellectual property developed by—the people who get the grants from us, which are normally medical research institutes or universities or members of those organisations, own the intellectual property. So the intellectual property would be assigned according to a university’s intellectual property rules or a medical research institute’s rules. I’m not sure, with that CRE, where they were.  

Senator ROBERTS: A $5 million synergy grant was awarded in 2024 to a multi-institutional team, including Monash University, to optimise vaccines for respiratory viruses, like influenza and RSV. This includes evaluating safety profiles to improve protection while minimising risks. If that develops new technology which achieves that objective, who will own that IP?  

Prof. Wesselingh: Again, the IP would be organised according to the rules developed by the organisations as part of that synergy grant. Synergy grants tend to have a number of organisations from around Australia, so I imagine there are multiple universities and MRIs involved in that synergy grant, and they will have developed an IP policy and the IP will be owned according to that policy.  

Senator ROBERTS: But not by the Australian government?  

Prof. Wesselingh: Not by NHMRC or by the government.  

Senator ROBERTS: We’re very concerned about the level of spending in this government. Professor Bette Liu from the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance received a $2.79 million investigator grant in 2024 to study adult vaccination programs. This explicitly includes assessing vaccine safety, identifying risks in high-risk groups and informing safer program designs. What was the outcome of that grant?  

Prof. Wesselingh: Again, if I knew the outcomes of all of the grants that I fund—we fund a billion dollars worth of grants every year—I think I’d be pretty good. I can’t tell you the outcome of that grant, but we can take that on notice.  

Senator ROBERTS: But you still think you’re pretty good?  

Prof. Wesselingh: Do I think I’m personally pretty good or the NHMRC is very good?  

Senator ROBERTS: Both! Okay, thank you very much. 

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