Labor announces $135m plan to fund 50 urgent Medicare care centres

Labor is promising $135m to fund 50 bulk billing urgent medical care centres across the country – but the plan has been announced before and was costing taxpayers much more.

In a bid to take pressure off overworked hospital emergency departments, Labor is promising $135m to fund 50 urgent medical care centres across the country, which will bulk bill patients.

But it appears to be a watered-down version of a policy announced for the 2019 election.

Opposition leader Anthony Albanese will announce $135m for a four-year trial of 50 clinics, which works out at $2.7m per clinic, to treat sprains, broken bones, stitches, cuts, insect bites and minor eye and ear problems.

Labor leader Anthony Albanese will announce funding for urgent care medical facilities on Wednesday. Picture: Toby Zerna

They would run seven days a week from 8am to 10pm and will be based at GP surgeries and Community Health Centres.

But in 2019 the party was promising $17 million for a similar clinic at Bribie Island and $33 million for a clinic at Logan.

The Logan centre was expected to have 11 beds and see more than 15,000 patients a year.

Labor is yet to announce where the centres will go, how many people they expect them to see or how they will be staffed.

The clinics are expected to differ in size and structure, depending on local needs.

Mr Albanese will said they were based on a successful model adopted overseas, including in New Zealand which has the lowest emergency department attendance per capital in the developed world.

“Labor’s Medicare Urgent Care Clinics will mean more families will get top quality care from a nurse or a doctor without having to wait in a hospital emergency department,” Mr Albanese said.

“Medicare Urgent Care Clinics will take the pressure off emergency departments, so they can concentrate on saving lives.”

Opposition Health and Ageing spokesman Mark Butler. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dean Martin

Opposition health spokesman Mark Butler said the centres would be a practical example of Labor’s commitment to strengthen Medicare.

“Medicare is the bedrock of our health system and by using it to help take the pressure off hospital emergency departments we make can the whole system stronger,” Mr Butler.

The average GP wage is $300,000, while the average nurse wage is $75,000, so hiring four each to run a centre across seven days would take up more than half the $2.7m budget.