Calls to ditch ‘dumb tax’ on SA GPs
Payroll taxes add about $10 more to each visit to the GP, according to the Australian Medical Association, which has called on the state government to ditch the levy.
Additional costs are pushing South Australians away from seeing a general practitioner (GP) and towards the state’s already crowded hospitals, warns one local doctor.
The extra approximately $10 added to a visit to the GP is particularly impacting vulnerable populations according to Dr Vikas Jasoria, who believes the tax is “counterintuitive” and detrimental to patient care.
Dr Jasoria is one local GP who has joined the South Australian branch of the Australian Medical Association in calling for payroll taxes to be scrapped for general practices.
Earlier this month, AMA SA said the election commitment by both major parties in Queensland to scrap payroll tax on GPs was a “wake-up call for the South Australian government”.
Payroll taxes – a levy calculated on wages paid to employees – are having an “adverse impact” on South Australians, AMA SA Vice President Peter Subramaniam said.
“Most South Australian patients who are not bulk billed are paying at least $10 more to see their GP because of the state government’s payroll tax,” he said.
“Some may have even noticed that they’re getting one bill for the consultation and a separate bill to cover the tax.
“How is it fair that South Australians should be slugged with an additional cost, when they’re accessing the same essential care as their Queensland counterparts?”
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Unlike the South Australian Business Chamber, which has been calling for payroll tax reform rather than total abolition for some months now, the AMA is calling for a total scrap of the levy.
“Any barrier to accessing primary health care must be removed, to keep the community healthy and out of our stressed hospital system,” Subramaniam said.
“The Premier, the Treasurer and the Health Minister should acknowledge the AMA SA’s concerns and take steps to wind back this short-sighted tax.”
Treasurer Stephen Mullighan said the state government “utterly rejects the AMA’s claim – it has no basis in fact”.
“The fact is 76 per cent of all GP consultations in SA are bulk-billed – and the government has abolished payroll tax on the wages GPs earn when they are providing bulk-billed consultations,” Mullighan said.
“SA has ensured we have provided the most generous and lenient arrangements to enable those GPs liable for payroll tax to come into compliance with their long-standing obligations.
“We are aware that those GPs charging a gap fee to their patients often increase their gap fees from 1 July each year, and we understand that practice has continued this year, as it has in the past.”
Dr Vikas Jasoria is a director of three GP clinics in Adelaide. Photo: Supplied.Dr Jasoria is a GP and the director of three large medical, – two in Parkside and Unley, and one at Craigmore in Adelaide’s north.
“As a result of that, I’ve got a really good lens on the different population subtypes that we have in Adelaide,” Dr Jasoria said.
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“The patients that come to see me at Unley are doctors, lawyers; they can all afford to live in the area and they all can afford to pay.
“A bigger problem occurs in areas like Craigmore, and the problem in the north is people are living hand to mouth.”
He said he’d seen some payments from patients at the Craigmore clinic bounce because “people just do not have money in their account”.
“We are in the middle of a cost of living crisis, and then to add on an extra $10 for the doctor… it’s a problem,” he said.
“People say that doctors are greedy. That’s not true, because if we don’t run a business that is profitable and viable then the clinic actually shuts down and the 1500 to 2000 patients a week that we see don’t have a doctor – and where do they go?”
He said the “dumb tax” was “playing with people’s lives”, and health outcomes are suffering as a result.
“This is about people accessing basic care for themselves, their children, and their families,” he said.
“If you add payroll tax to my business we have to find that income from somewhere, and there’s very few places we can find income. It’s either we reduced our expenses – which we try as much as we can – or we have to increase our revenue.
“We increase our revenue by seeing more patients, so patients get seen much faster which is not really acceptable to us because we believe in excellence in what we do.
“So then it comes down to charging patients more for the service we provide. It is being passed onto the consumer, and we’re talking about healthcare here – people’s lives.”
With the cost of seeing a GP rising, more South Australians are having to make tough decisions; either see a GP less frequently or not at all, or try their luck at the hospitals which are already stressed.
“They’re waiting longer and longer before they come in – so potentially coming in sicker – or they’re not coming in at all,” Dr Jasoria said.
“Or they’re going to the hospital and what we know for sure is that hospitals cannot cope anyway.
“In one of the richest countries in the world, we’re not providing effective healthcare because we have a short-sighted tax on primary healthcare.”
