News & Events

Health

The 2010-11 Federal Health Budget provides funding for a number of measures of relevance to the eye health and vision care sector.

The Australian Government has addressed a number of the recommendations proposed by the National Preventive Health Taskforce and National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission reports of 2009. It will provide $133.2 million over four years for the establishment of an Australian National Preventive Health Agency. This agency will oversee the development of key social marketing campaigns targeting binge drinking and smoking.

Funding of $54 million will be dedicated to the establishment of the National Health Survey. In 2011-12 a representative sample of 50,000 Australians will be asked to complete the survey which will capture information such as diagnosed health, medications, medical services used and lifestyle factors such as diet and physical activity. The survey findings will support the work of the agency in tackling chronic disease.

The Australian Government also established a National Health and Hospitals Network which is funded nationally and run locally. It has delivered an additional $2.2 billion over four years to meet the growing demands of the health system. This includes funding for:

• GP Super Clinics and expanded existing GP clinics
• enhanced after-hours services
• training for nurses
• provision of funding to introduce individual electronic health records.

This brings the total level of additional funding to $7.3 billion over the next five years.

Disability

The 2010-11 Federal Budget includes a number of initiatives that will improve the lives of people with a disability.

It provides funding of $520,000 to involve people with disability, their families and carers in the Productivity Commission’s landmark inquiry into long-term disability care and support.

Changes have also been made to the Disability Support Pension to help return people with disability to the workforce, and maintain a safety-net for those in genuine need. An extra $14.9 million has been provided to the Australian Paralympic Committee’s High Performance Program and $1 million to ensure the 2012 London Paralympics is broadcast in Australia.

Overall, the 2010-11 Federal Budget contains disability measures totalling more than $20 billion. Vision 2020 Australia looks forward to the launch of The National Disability Strategy which is expected to be released at a Council of Australian Governments’ meeting before the end of the year.

Overseas Development Assistance

The 2010-11 Federal Aid Budget is titled A Good International Citizen and includes an overall increase in Australia’s overseas development assistance to $4349 million, a real increase of 9 per cent from the previous aid budget.

Notably, this budget includes a funding commitment of $30.2 million over four years for disability inclusive development. The government’s ongoing commitment to efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness is also affirmed in the Budget, and Vision 2020 Australia will continue working towards a substantial funding commitment in the 2011-12 Budget.

The Budget contains increases for the education, health and infrastructure sectors, and increases in funding for the United Nations and multilateral bodies. There is a 17.9 per cent increase in Australian NGIO funding through the AusAID NGO Cooperation Program (ANCP), and further geographical expansion of the program in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and South Asia.

More information

• Visit the Australian Council for International Development (ACFID) website for a copy of Analysis: AID BUDGET 2010/11 (PDF link)
• Visit the Department of Health and Ageing website (external link) for the Health and Ageing Portfolio Budget Statements
• Visit the Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs website (external link) for the Budget and Additional Estimates Statements
• Read Vision 2020 Australia aid budget media release