EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
STATUTORY RULES 1983 NO. 88
ISSUED BY AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTER FOR HEALTH
Health Insurance Commission Regulations (Amendment)
Section 44 of the Health Insurance Commission Act 1973 (‘the Act’) provides that the Governor-General may make regulations, not inconsistent with the Act, prescribing all matters required or permitted by the Act to be prescribed or necessary or convenient to be prescribed for carrying out or giving effect to the Act.
Section 4 of the Act provides for the establishment by the Act of the Health Insurance Commission (‘the Commission’). Section 8A of the Act provides that the functions of the Commission are to conduct a medical benefits fund or a hospital benefits fund, or both, in accordance with rules determined by the Commission.
By virtue of section 8C of the Act the functions conferred on the Commission under Part IIB of the Act are additional to those conferred under section 8A. Subsection 8E(1) of that Part provides that the Commission shall perform such functions in relation to health insurance as are prescribed. Sub-section 8E(2) of the Act provides that regulations may prescribe the manner in which the Commission is to carry out a function prescribed under sub-section 8E(1).
The Government agreed to the conferring of certain additional functions on the Commission related to the establishing of the Medicare universal health insurance scheme. In accordance with the Government’s intentions, the statutory rules prescribe, for the purposes of sub-section 8E(1) of the Act, the additional functions of planning and establishing the organization required to administer a health insurance scheme to provide benefits in respect of medical, dental, optometrical and pathology services to all Australian residents. The statutory rules further prescribe, under sub-section 8E(2) of the Act, that these functions shall be performed in such a manner as to comply with any directions given from time to time by the Minister for Health. “Australian resident” is defined in the statutory rules to have the same meaning as in the Health Insurance Act 1973.
The statutory rules came into operation on the date of their notification in the Commonwealth of Australia Gazette.