Ms KEARNEY (Cooper—Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care and Assistant Minister for Indigenous Health) (09:01): I'm very pleased to speak in this chamber today on women's health. I've had the great privilege of travelling around the country listening to women about their experiences in the health system, and I have learned that every single woman has a story. From the Torres Strait to Melbourne's outer suburbs, from Hobart to the Northern Territory, to inner-city Adelaide, every woman has a story about gender bias in the health system, about being dismissed or having their symptoms minimised or about an experience of medical misogyny. Most women, sadly, have many. There are heartbreaking tales of continued pain and of ongoing suffering on women's long journeys to diagnosis. Just last week I spoke about one of my Cooper constituents, Carmen, who was told, as a young 13-year-old with crippling abdominal pain, 'Bad luck, love; women just have pain.' This is not the message our young girls should be hearing as they enter puberty. As a mother, the stories women have told me about care failures around birth trauma are confronting and visceral. As a nurse, I saw much of it firsthand. Again and again we hear the same stories that, at the most difficult times in their lives, so many women have had to fight to get the care and support they deserved, not because they were without symptoms or pain or struggle but because they were women. I know I don't need to tell women from diverse backgrounds how much harder they must fight to access the health care they deserve. If you have a disability, if you belong to the LBGTIQA+ community, if you are a First Nations woman or a migrant woman or if you live in a remote or rural area, the compounding effects of intersectionality are profound and damaging, all making it so much harder for you to access timely and specialised care that meets your specific needs. This is not good enough. It never has been. That's why, since I proudly became the Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care, I have been laser-focused on tackling gender bias in the health system. I'm not suggesting that there's some conspiracy here where men in lab coats plot against women in dark basements; this could not be further from the truth. As a nurse myself I have been part of the health system and have worked with health professionals, and I know how hard they work. We work with the information we have and in the system provided to us. The truth of the matter is that medical misogyny is institutional and systemic. It's baked into our research, our education and training and our practices. The health system has been designed for and around a 50-year-old middle-class Caucasian man, often ignoring the fact that women have very different physiology. I need everyone to listen when I say that women are not just small men, and I need every woman to hear me say, 'We have heard your stories and we are taking action.' That's why last year we invested over $160 million in women's health. This included scholarships for health professionals to do training on insertion and removal of IUDs and birth control implants like implanon. We commenced a gender audit of Medicare item numbers. We supplied free pads and tampons for First Nations women in remote communities to address period poverty. We introduced longer gynaecological consults and training for health professionals on menopause. We responded to the TGA's recommended changes to the prescription and dispensing of MS-2 Step for medical terminations, increasing access considerably. This is on top of our already significant investment of over $100 million to support women with endometriosis since coming to government. But more needs to be done, and it is being done because women's health is a priority, not just of mine but of the whole Albanese government. This is the kind of change that happens when women become a priority, not an afterthought—when women are in the room making the decisions. That's the benefit of a majority women caucus. We work with women; we don't dictate to them. That's why one of my first acts as assistant minister for health was to establish the National Women's Health Advisory Council. The council spoke to women from across the country, conducting the #EndGenderBias survey and heard of countless harrowing and alarming yet totally unsurprising stories from women across the country—stories of heavy bleeding that left women feeling anaemic, being excused as normal, stories of pain so severe that women and teenage girls had to miss school and work, setting them back for the rest of their lives, and stories of women experiencing menopause so intensely that they too considered leaving the workforce. I'd like to thank my colleagues who have shared their stories bravely in this chamber. I must admit I almost left the workforce for the same reason. When I was in my 50s and going through perimenopause, I developed menorrhagia or heavy periods. I felt consistently fatigued, weak and unwell. I did what most women would do: I spoke to my doctor about it, and he told me it was perimenopause and it will pass. One day on a busy tram to work, I unexpectedly experienced an intense flooding period. It was a mess. There was blood all over the seat, all over my clothes and all in public. I am sorry to be so graphic, but it was a shocking, humiliating experience that was overwhelming. And I too thought: 'I can't do this. I'm going to have to give up work. I can't go on.' But then, after fainting one day at work, I had some blood tests and was told by a doctor that not only was I anaemic but also my haemoglobin level was so low that he said, 'It's not compatible with life.' So much for waiting for it to pass. This is my story, and every woman has one—stories so common that the #EndGenderBias survey found two-thirds of respondents have experienced gender discrimination in our healthcare system. On top of this, we know women face dual gender biases in health care and society. We face the almost sole responsibility of family planning—physically and financially. Right now, one in two Australian women will experience an unplanned pregnancy in their lifetime. And, while long-term contraceptives, like an IUD and birth control implants, last for three to eight years and are 99 per cent effective, only one in 10 Australian women use them. This is one of the lowest uptake rates in the world. In Finland, the rate of abortions dropped by 16 per cent when they improved access to IUDs and Implanon. They are a powerful tool in the toolkit of contraceptive choice, and we know it's important that women have this choice because their health needs change throughout their lives. What many people may not realise, too, is that IUDs and birth control implants like Implanon are not just used for contraception; they're also incredibly effective for managing painful periods and heavy menstrual bleeding, symptoms of endometriosis, PCOS and menopause. A young woman spoke to me recently who told me her periods were so painful, from the age of 13, that she would often miss school and later university, curled up on the couch at home crying. She couldn't take the pill because of a genetic blood-clotting disorder and thought that this would be the rest of her life. Then, at 19, a doctor finally recommended an IUD. She had it inserted by her GP, and she did not have a period again until it was removed, over eight years later. She told me it was life changing just to be pain free. Her partner also had an IUD at 25; there was no need for contraception, just the management of heavy menstrual bleeding, and for both women it was liberating. They aren't for everyone; I know that. But everyone should have the freedom and the right to choose. They help so many women with their quality of life. Many women and girls are enabled to go back to work and school, back to financial freedom and back to living and dreaming big. But for many, cost remained a key barrier to receiving these more effective contraceptives. Many women and teenage girls don't have a spare $400-odd, which is what it currently costs. We also know there is limited availability of health practitioners trained to insert IUDs and birth-control implants, reducing the number of women taking them up, especially in regional and remote parts of our country. That's why, on the weekend, I was so proud to announce over half a billion dollars for a women's health package, alongside my wonderful colleagues Minister Gallagher and Minister Butler and my dear parliamentary colleague Senator Marielle Smith, who did an incredible job with the Senate inquiries that informed this package. If anyone in this building missed it—and I'll be shocked if you did, because we've been pretty loud and excited on this side of the House—we're making oral contraceptives, including Yaz and Yasmin, cheaper via the PBS, saving some women up to $350 a year. This is the first time in 30 years that a new contraceptive has been added to the PBS. Women should be able to afford their choice of contraceptive, and now, thanks to an Albanese Labor government, they can. We're making getting an IUD and birth control implants like Implanon cheaper as well, saving women around $400. We're ensuring our highly skilled nurse practitioners can deliver these services to women. We'll establish eight centres of excellence across the country to help upskill and grow the number of health professionals who can provide these services. We're increasing our very popular endometriosis and pelvic pain specialist centres from 22 to 33, right across the country, plus we are expanding their remit to cover perimenopause and menopause. We're transforming menopausal care in this country through reducing the cost of menopause medications, saving some women up to $577 a year on hormone therapy. That is life-changing. Women tell me that estradiol and progesterone treatments have completely changed their lives. Now, the cost of that will not be prohibitive. It will be accessible to everyone. For the first time, there will be a Medicare item number for a menopause consultation with a GP, which women can access annually, putting a much needed focus on this part of a woman's health journey. We're establishing the first-ever national guidelines for menopause care, investing in a national campaign to inform women of the best care available to them, to break down taboos and to try to do away with the misinformation and the dodgy products being promoted to women on the internet. We are also using it to encourage support in workplaces. The changes we're introducing are all about providing more choice, accessibility and affordability for all women, and hasn't the reception been resounding. Medical colleges, professional colleges, women's organisations and women right across the country have raised their voice in a chorus of support. I don't know whether it's a collective sigh of relief or a cheer, but they are realising that this is a government that is working for them. Only last year, the Minister for Women released Working for Women: A Strategy for Gender Equality, including the groundbreaking announcement that we will pay superannuation on government-paid parental leave. This is the kind of policy you get when you have a Minister for Women like Minister Gallagher—one who listens, one who understands the challenges facing women across the country and one who is committed to fairness and gender equality. These are principles which are entrenched in the heart of the Labor Party—the same principles that the Labor Party built Medicare on, and we are the ones who will strengthen it and who will continue to make the health system work better for everyone. In the hands of Minister Butler, an absolute champion of women's health and Medicare, we have witnessed what our healthcare system is capable of under a Labor government. The minister has delivered much needed reforms to strengthen Medicare by tripling the bulk-billing incentive. This record investment created an additional six million bulk-billed GP visits between November 2023 and December 2024. A stronger Medicare is what you get with a Labor health minister. We've seen the introduction of 60-day prescribing, making medicines more affordable for a range of ongoing health conditions. Cheaper medicines are what you get with a Labor health minister. Half a billion dollars for women's health is what you get with a Labor health minister. As Minister Butler said, you can't be serious about strengthening Medicare without a serious focus on women. We cannot take women's health care and, in fact, anyone's health care in this country for granted because, if it were down to those opposite, our freedom and choice would be stripped away. If the Leader of the Opposition's coalition was serious about women's health, they would have spoken with women. They would have come up with their own health policy. They're matching ours because they recognise that women have a problem with them. It was stark under Scott Morrison, and it is stark under the current Leader of the Opposition. While they've matched our commitment, I do not trust them to keep it, and I certainly do not trust them to deliver it. It seems all to obvious that when bereft of genuine policies of their own, all they can do is cling to the coat-tails of ours. When the Leader of the Opposition was health minister himself, it was during the early years of the Abbott government. Many of you will recognise the era I'm referring to. It was the one where Tony Abbott promised not to cut funding to Medicare before he was elected, only to backtrack immediately once in power, announcing billions of dollars of cuts to the healthcare system and millions from the preventive health system, and he proposed to introduce co-payments to see a doctor. The Leader of the Opposition will never live down being voted the worst health minister in Australian history by healthcare professionals. The choice between who is best for health care is stark this coming election. Our women's health package signals to the women of Australia that this is a government committed to working for you and your health. I hope the women of Australia have been listening, because this is for you. For every menopausal or perimenopausal woman who has had flooding periods, night sweats or brain fog, this is for you. For every woman who hasn't been able to afford their choice of contraception, this is for you. For every woman who has had agonising pelvic pain and been told, 'It's all in your head,' or, 'Just suck it up,' and that women should be in pain, this is for you. Women deserve better; everyone deserves better. That's what you get with an Albanese Labor government.