New Poll Confirms Opposition to Medibank Private Sale

The Health Services Union today called for the Federal Government to abandon plans to sell Medibank Private after a national survey confirmed there was overwhelming public opposition to a sale going ahead.

HSU National secretary Craig Thomson said a Newspoll survey of 1200 people conducted exclusively for the HSU between April 7-9 found that 64 per cent of people opposed the sale and only 14 per cent supported it.

"In addition a huge majority of Australians (74 per cent) said the sale would lead to higher premiums and only a tiny group (3 per cent) said it would lead to a drop in premiums," he said.

"There is overwhelming opposition to the sale of Medibank Private and people understand it will lead to only one thing and that is premium increases.

"That is also the view of the Health Services Union which has members working in private and public hospitals.

"Premium rises will make private health insurance unaffordable and see more people dropping their cover and heading for public hospitals when they are sick.

"That is bad news for private hospitals where demand will decrease and bad news for public hospitals which are already struggling to cope with the current workload.

"The last thing public hospitals need is an increase in patient numbers without any increase in funding.

"If the Federal Government was really concerned about doing something to make private health insurance affordable for families it would not be selling Medibank Private.

"There is no good reason for the sale to proceed. Selling off public assets to benefit the corporate mates of the Federal Government is no way to improve the health system."

Newspoll Summary

Question 1: Are you in favour/against the sale of Medibank Private?
Strongly in favour 5.1 per cent. Somewhat in favour 9.0 per cent. Total 14.1 per cent.
Somewhat against 20.4 per cent. Strongly Against 43.6 per cent. Total 64 per cent.
Neither/Don't Know 21.8 per cent.
Question 2. What effect on premiums would the sale have?
Rise a lot 44.5 per cent, Rise a Little 29.5 per cent. Total 74 per cent.
Fall a little 2.3 per cent. Fall a lot 0.6 per cent. Total 2.9 per cent.
Stay the Same 14.6 per cent
Don't Know 8.5 per cent

April 19, 2006
FURTHER INFORMATION: Craig Thomson 0419 498691 or Mark Robinson 0439 411774

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