EXPLANATORY STATEMENT
Select Legislative Instrument 2005 No. 272
Minute No. 32 of 2005 – Minister for Health and Ageing
Subject: Health Insurance Act 1973
Health Insurance (General Medical Services Table) Amendment Regulations 2005 (No. 4)
Subsection 133(1) of the Health Insurance 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.
The Act provides, in part, for payments of Medicare benefits in respect of professional services rendered to eligible persons. Section 9 of the Act provides that Medicare benefits shall be calculated by reference to the fees for medical services set out in prescribed tables.
Subsection 4(1) of the Act provides that the regulations may prescribe a table of medical services (other than diagnostic imaging services and pathology services) that sets out items of medical services, the amount of fees applicable in respect of each item, and rules for interpretation of the table. Subsection 4(2) of the Act provides that, unless sooner repealed, regulations made under section 4 cease to be in force and are taken to have been repealed on the day next following the 15th sitting day of the House of Representatives after the end of a period of 12 months beginning on the day on which the regulations are notified in the Gazette.
A table of general medical services is currently prescribed by the Health Insurance (General Medical Services Table) Regulations 2005 (the Principal Regulations), which commenced on 1 November 2005.
The Regulations amend the sentinel lymph node biopsy items 30299, 30300, 30302 and 30303 in Schedule 1 to the Principal Regulations to allow benefits to be payable for surgical assistance rendered. The commencement date is retrospective to 1 November 2005 so patients who were billed for a surgical assistant’s fee since that date are not disadvantaged by a lack of coverage.
The Act specifies no conditions that need to be met before the power to make the Regulations may be exercised.
The Regulations are a legislative instrument for the purposes of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003.
The Regulations commence on 1 November 2005. The Office of Legislative Drafting and Publishing has advised that the retrospective commencement date does not affect the rights of a person or impose liabilities on a person other than the Commonwealth.
Authority: Subsection 133(1) of the Health Insurance Act 1973