Actually o sung wu I think bulk billing for most people is a ridiculous extravagance. People earning a reasonable wage should be able to pay for insurance or their doctors bill.

We all do in my town, health care card holders included. I think it costs $17 or there about for a normal doctors visit for health care card holders. We have no bulk billing doctors.

After a decade on steroids I am on a diabetes watch with twice daily testing with a little electronic contrivance, & regular testing for my heart condition. On my doctor visits I have to see a nurse practitioner for the sugar count & the doctor for the heart. I pay $31 with my pensioner health care card subsidy.

I would love to pay only $7, but appreciate the amount I am being subsidised now. I guess I will now pay another $7, & I certainly won't begrudge it.

I always go over the $1000 a year in medication cost, & then get the rest free. I have no idea what my pills would cost, if I was paying full freight, but I know it would be heaps. You only have to compare how much we pay for a little medication at the vets for a pet, to realise we are extremely well cared for & subsidised.

How much more we can load onto the taxpayer without breaking the bank I don't know, but we must be getting close to the limit.

Hasbeen- I have never heard a story quite like yours it sounds like you live in another country altogether ! It almost sounds like you are pulling someones leg !

With the onset of this six months before you qualify for the dole scheme followed by 25hours a week of working for the dole, it very well may create a new type of low pay working class,who may undercut other workers just to avoid the poverty trap !

OK, so the Polls are out & the two Party preferred is LNP 44%, ALP 56%. However the real figured are LNP 36%, ALP 38%. Not much difference there. The 26% difference shows that the dissatisfaction with both Major Parties has grown substantially.

I know that the difference is made up of many different Parties with varying agenda. Eg.; Greens, Palmer & Religious Groups pretending to be Political Parties. The migration to these other Groups does show a huge dissatisfaction with the two Major Parties.

Will the Two Major Parties recognise this? I doubt it. I think it will just force them to become even more entrenched in their dangerous ideologies. They will spin even more lies to a gullible Public, who will be, once again, disappointed with their choice.

Hi everyone...my third time on OLO since the budget. Thing I note is that even the righties around here are probably a little taken aback by the deceit of this govt. It's one thing to vote Liberal...but what we have here is something rabid we've never seen before which operates solely from deception...not good for democracy.

O sung wu,

"True, many of the electorate will be unaffected..."

There is a whole lot of detail coming out now to show the depths of the Hockey's trickery.
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/missing-figures-show-poor-are-hit-20140518-38i05.html

"Inserted into the 2005 budget by treasurer Peter Costello and included in every budget since, the table is usually titled "Detailed family outcomes".

"It sets out the way in which the budget measures make different types of families better or worse off. In 2005 Mr Costello displayed the results for six family types at 15 different levels of incomes."

"Joe Hockey's budget is the first without it."

And:

http://www.theage.com.au/money/budgets-secret-sting-for-pensioners-and-matureage-workers-20140516-zreh5.html

"The pension concession and Commonwealth Seniors Health cards offer travel, electricity, phone and council rate discounts in an agreement with the states.
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But buried in the budget documents the government reveals it will be "terminating" this agreement after July 1, saving $1.3 billion over four years.

"It will hurt pensioners the most. This will cost $1000 to $2000 a year. No one was expecting that. Since it's not a direct payment to pensioners the government didn't want to highlight this," Biti says.

The separate abolition on September 20 of the "seniors supplement" attached to the Seniors Health card for self-funded retirees will cost couples $1320 a year.

But the biggest sting is the government's decision to count super drawdowns as part of the assets test from next January."

(and that's beside to the indexing cuts to Veterans Affairs hidden in Budget paper 2 and slated for 2017)

Australia has been royally taken to the cleaners by a sneaky dishonest govt...unprecedented!

Jayb,

"OK, so the Polls are out & the two Party preferred is LNP 44%, ALP 56%. However the real figured are LNP 36%, ALP 38%...."

Well, Lol!...if those were the polls at an election - LNP 44% and ALP 56% (two party preferred)...who do yer reckon would be the party out of govt? We have a preferential system.

What it demonstrates is that people have worked out fairly quickly that the were duped.