Child scheme illegal?

Press, 13 July 1985, Page 5

Child scheme illegal?

PA Auckland The Minister of Health’s new temporary scheme. could be illegal, says an Auckland doctor who helped have Dr Bassett’s child medical benefit scheme declared invalid. Dr Tom Marshall said the Minister’s temporary replacement scheme, intro-

duced on Tuesday, still discriminated against child patients of doctors who had not joined Dr Bassett’s first scheme. “Our objection to the old scheme was that it was unfair in that some people entitled to the higher rate of benefit were not getting it.” The new temporary scheme was, in fact, more restrictive than the first and the correct thing for Dr Bassett to have done would

have been to make the higher child patient benefit available across the board to all child patients. Dr Marshall said lawyers were investigating whether Dr Bassett’s new scheme was legal and valid as it was being introduced under the same section of the Social Security Act as the original scheme. “If the new scheme appears to be illegal and invalid we will take action,” said Dr Marshall.