Month: March 2021

The Greens will today announce key election policies, including a ‘billionaires tax’ to help fund genuinely free public schools, dental into Medicare and a job for everyone who wants one.
With the party considering an election in November of this year still a possibility and a minority parliament the most likely outcome, Mr Bandt will push for a tax on billionaires & corporate super profits as part of dealings with a future shared power government.
Leader Adam Bandt, Greens Deputy Leader and Senator for Queensland Larissa Waters and local Greens candidate Max Chandler-Mather will speak with voters in Griffith today about how the policies will reduce inequality and improve their lives.
The policy is part of the Greens’ ‘Fight for the Future’ plan being launched today, a vision statement for the next decade that outlines 15 key policies the Greens will take to the upcoming election, including:

• A treaty with First Nations people
• A billionaire’s tax and a corporate super profit tax
• A Jobs and Income guarantee
• Bringing dental and mental health into Medicare
• Restoring fee free education to public schools, universities and TAFE
• A goal of 700% renewable energy, creating a jobs bonanza in renewables exports

The Greens will aim to win 3 new Senate seats and will target up to nine Liberal and Labor lower house seats at the next election, including Griffith, with success in any seat strengthening the Greens’ balance of power position and the likelihood of a minority government after the next election.
The Greens will seek to elevate economic issues as part of their campaign to win lower house seats, attributing their continued success in Melbourne and recently in the state seat of South Brisbane (which sits within Griffith) in large part to providing a clear progressive alternative on issues like schools, healthcare and jobs.
A 6% annual wealth tax on billionaires will help fund genuinely fee-free public schools, free dental care by getting dental into Medicare and a ‘jobs and income guarantee’, which will lift the Jobseeker rate above the poverty line to $80 a day and fund government employment programs.
With two million people without jobs or enough work, the jobs and income guarantee will ensure that everyone who wants a secure and well paid job will get one working on exciting, planet-saving, nation-building programs in industries that will tackle the climate emergency and build a more creative, inclusive and caring society.
The Parliamentary Budget Office has concluded that the billionaire’s tax will raise over $40b in the next ten years, a figure that could be higher if billionaires could be pursued for the full entrant of their wealth.
Quotes attributable to Adam Bandt MP, Leader of the Australian Greens:
“The next election will be closer than people think. At the last election, Australia was only 828 votes away from a minority Parliament. At the next election, people can kick the Liberals out and put the Greens in balance of power in both Houses of Parliament, where we will push the next government to go further and faster on tackling inequality and the climate crisis.
“In balance of power, the Greens will make billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax to help put dental into Medicare, get rid of public school fees and give a decent job to everyone who wants one on planet-saving, nation-building projects.
“The Liberals are turbocharging inequality and the Labor Party’s national conference is sounding the retreat on big reforms.
“Billionaires and the big corporations have been buying influence over the Liberal and Labor parties with political donations, which is how they avoid paying tax, keep wages low, send their profits offshore and keep on polluting.
“While everyone else has been doing it tough during the pandemic, the billionaires have been making out like bandits.
“If we want to fight inequality and the climate crisis, we need to tackle the wealth and power of the billionaires and the big corporations and make them pay their fair share.”
Quotes attributable to Senator Nick McKim, Greens Economic Justice spokesperson:
“Billionaires massively increased their wealth during a pandemic, while hundreds of thousands of people lost their job or had their hours slashed at work.
“They have amassed truly obscene amounts of wealth, often through companies that have plundered our natural environment and made the climate emergency worse.
“The very least they can do is start paying their fair share of tax.”

Find out more about the Greens’ plans:

• greens.org.au/future
• greens.org.au/taxthebillionaires

There is new hope for thousands of Australians living with breast cancer, lung cancer, osteoporosis and asthma with landmark new and amended medicines listings on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) from 1 April.
Breast cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer death in Australia and the second most common cause of death from cancer among women. In 2020, it was estimated that over 19,900 new cases of breast cancer were diagnosed.
From 1 April, Kisqali® (ribociclib) is having its listing expanded on the PBS to be used in combination with Fulvestrant Sandoz® (fulvestrant) for patients with hormone receptor positive (HR+) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 negative (HER2-) unresectable advanced or metastatic breast cancer.
Without the PBS subsidy, around 1,600 patients might pay more than $50,000 per course of treatment. Instead they will now pay $41.30 per script or $6.60 with a concession card.
Fulvestrant Sandoz® (fulvestrant) is also being made available on the PBS for the first time as monotherapy for those women in need of this targeted treatment on its own, for the treatment of hormone receptor positive (HR+) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 negative (HER2-) advanced breast cancer.
Without the PBS subsidy, over 100 patients might pay more than $7,900 per course of treatment.
Lung cancer is also one of the top 10 most common cancers in both men and women in Australia.
To support over 130 Australians with previously untreated squamous Stage IV non-small cell lung cancer, we are extending the listings for Opdivo® (nivolumab) and Yervoy® (ipilimumab) plus chemotherapy. Patients could otherwise pay over $100,000 per course of treatment without subsidy.
Around 2.7 million Australians live with asthma with many of them suffering from severe asthma. They experience episodes of wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing, chest tightness and fatigue caused by the widespread narrowing of the airways.
We are extending the listing for Dupixent® (dupilumab) which will provide a new treatment option to around 1,700 Australians suffering from uncontrolled severe eosinophilic or allergic asthma per year. Australians with these severe forms of Asthma will save around $20,600 per year through this PBS listing.
Atectura Breezhaler® (indacaterol + glycopyronum + mometasone), will provide a new treatment option for other severe forms of asthma for over 80,000 Australians suffering from this chronic disease with patients saving around $400 per year through this PBS listing.
We are also listing Evenity® (Romosozumab) on the PBS for the first time, for the treatment of severe osteoporosis in patients, providing relief to over 2,800 Australians. Patients may save around $6,300 per course of treatment.
Without these subsidies many Australians would be out of pocket thousands of dollars per treatment, instead, for all of the medicines listed or extended on April 1, patients will only have to pay $41.30 per script of $6.60 with a concession card.
Each of these listings has been recommended by the independent Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee.
Since 2013, the Australian Government has approved over 2,600 new or amended listings on the PBS. This represents an average of around 30 listings or amendments per month – or one each day – at an overall investment by the Government of $13 billion.
The Government’s commitment to ensuring that Australians can access affordable medicines, when they need them, remains rock solid.

Australia’s COVID-19 vaccination program is well under way, with more than 500,000 Australians receiving a free jab as part of the Phase 1 rollout.
There have been more than 507,000 vaccines at the close of business on Friday. 329,000 vaccines have been administered in state and territory vaccination clinics, 97,000 vaccines have been administered in general practices and more than 80,000 aged care residents have been vaccinated.
Our GP’s have played a vital role in this expansion and have not only been vaccinating over the week, but many practices are continuing to vaccinate on Saturday and Sunday this weekend.
Over 1,100 general practices, GP-led respiratory clinics and Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services are already providing vaccinations to people eligible in Phase 1b.
This will grow to a broad national footprint of more than 4,000 general practices by the end of April. These will be complemented by more than 100 Commonwealth Vaccination Clinics and more than 100 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Controlled Health Services.
The roll out for the next week and further expansion is now well underway. The first of the 50 million Australian made CSL doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine have already been distributed and will now be distributed on an ongoing basis.
As part of our Vaccination Strategy, Australia placed an absolute priority on sovereign domestic vaccine production at CSL in August last year.
That decision has ensured that Australia is one of the few countries with strong, clear domestic supplies going forwards.

Australian Greens Housing spokesperson Senator Mehreen Faruqi has said that eviction moratoriums are ending today in NSW, and on Sunday in Victoria and WA, and that renters in numerous states are facing uncertainty, mounting debt and homelessness.
Senator Faruqi said:
“We must extend eviction bans until the government has a plan for rental debt relief. Without one, our government is condemning countless people to homelessness.
“It’s unrealistic to assume that people, facing a decrease in JobSeeker and still recovering from a pandemic, will be able to afford extra rent on top of their basic necessities.
“According to Equity Economics, there will be a nine per cent national rise in homelessness this year, and double that in New South Wales. The government must act now.
“Without a plan for rental debt relief, ending eviction moratoriums means one thing and one thing only – worsening the homelessness crisis.
“This is more proof that homelessness is not inevitable, but a deliberate choice by our neoliberal government.”

Australian Greens Anti-racism spokesperson Senator Mehreen Faruqi has said that numerous investigations published today by ABC, Nine and Guardian Australia on far-right and neo-Nazi organising have underscored the need for urgent action to tackle the violent far-right.
Senator Faruqi said:
“These investigations are disturbing but not surprising. We know that the far-right is organising in Australia, and has links to international extremist groups. But the government has its head in the sand.
“This makes ASIO’s decision to back away from the term ‘right-wing extremism’ look even more naive and absurd.
“Far-right groups are on the march and trying to recruit across the country, including by appealing to anti-lockdown sentiments. Some of these groups and individuals openly praise the Christchurch terrorist and are rabidly Islamophobic and antisemitic.
“There must be a zero tolerance approach. Laws on extremism and hate speech must be enforced and strengthened. Governments must unambiguously commit to anti-racism. Community programs to counter the far-right require significant investment. There is no time to waste.”

If the Resource Super Profits Tax had not been watered down and then repealed, it would have raised $34.6 billion dollars, enough to give free dental care to every Australian by including dental in Medicare.
A new costing by the Parliamentary Budget Office, provided to the Greens, shows that the decision to give in to the big mining corporations and billionaires by axing the original “mining tax” has cost the Australian budget $34.6 billion, and bringing a super profits tax back would raise $12.7 billion in the first year.
The cost of providing free dental care to the country by including dental in Medicare has been costed by the PBO at $29 billion over nine years.
The richest three mining billionaires Gina Rinehart, Twiggy Forrest and Clive Palmer saw their wealth grow by 141% or $35 billion between them during the pandemic.
The mining industry invested $20 million in a campaign to overturn the tax, and provide millions of dollars in donations to Liberal, Labor and Nationals. The return on their investment was 1,727% and growing every year that we leave their super profits tax free.
Quotes attributable to Greens Leader, Adam Bandt MP:
“Billionaires and big mining corporations are not paying their fair share of tax.”
“If we had the original mining tax, we could have free dental care for everyone.
“Politicians in the establishment parties give billionaires and big corporations too much special treatment. They rely on their donations, and as a result, don’t make them pay their fair share of tax.
“The next election will be closer than most people think.
“If less than a thousand people changed their vote at the last election, the Greens would be in the balance of power.
“At the next election, a minority parliament is likely, and if voters put the Greens in the balance of power, we will make the billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax.
“While everyday people are struggling to afford to go to the dentist, Gina Reinhart, Twiggy Forrest and Clive Palmer increased their wealth by $35 billion during the pandemic.
“By making the billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax, we can make life better for everyone.”