Fed: High Court rejects civil conscription case against Medicare

AAP General News (Australia)
02-02-2009
Fed: High Court rejects civil conscription case against Medicare

CANBERRA, Feb 2 AAP - The High Court has rejected the notion that Medicare is unconstitutional
after two doctors argued unsuccessfully it was a form of civil conscription.

The doctors - Chee Kan Wong and Ashraf Thabit Selim - were found by a federal government
review committee to have engaged in conduct amounting to "inappropriate practice" because
of the high number of patients they saw during a given time.

In response, Dr Wong launched a High Court action claiming sections of the Commonwealth
Health Insurance Act were invalid because they amounted to civil conscription, outlawed
by the constitution.

The Federal Court had earlier ruled the sections did not compel a practitioner to render
any professional service to any person.

The sections compelled doctors to conduct their practices with the care and skill that
would be acceptable to the general body of medical practitioners, it said.

Dr Wong and Dr Selim, whose case was heard jointly with his colleague's, both appealed
to the High Court.

The court on Monday dismissed both appeals, by a 6-1 majority, saying doctors were
free to choose where and when they practise.

They were not forced to treat or not treat particular patients, it said.

Aspects of the Medicare scheme were conditions of participation but did not amount
to a practical compulsion to perform a professional service.

AAP rl/jm/jlw

KEYWORD: MEDICARE

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