About the project
The project will recognise the role nurse practitioners and participating midwives play in the delivery of health care services. It will contribute to the bigger goals of the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce and the Nurse Practitioner Workforce Plan.
Why it is important
Removing the legislative need for collaborative arrangements will:
- remove barriers to care provided by nurse practitioners and participating midwives, particularly in rural and remote areas where there:
– is a smaller healthcare workforce
– are challenges attracting and retaining GPs. - provide nurse practitioners and participating midwives more autonomy in their scope of practice
- increase use of participating midwives in First Nations settings
- support our goal of health care professionals being able to work to their full scope of practice.
Goals
We aim to remove the legislative need for collaborative arrangements between participating midwives, nurse practitioners and medical practitioners to:
- provide MBS services
- prescribe PBS medications.
Meeting our goals
To meet our goals, we will:
- change Commonwealth legislation (Health Insurance Act 1973 and National Health Act 1953) and regulations (Health Insurance Regulations 2018) to remove the legislative need for collaborative arrangements
- tell state and territory governments about the changes so they may make their own legislation changes (if needed)
- tell professional indemnity insurance providers about the changes so they can update their products
- tell the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC) about the changes
- assess whether collaborative guidelines would support existing Professional Standards for Practice, and Safety and Quality Guidelines issued by the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia
- update all public facing information on our website, the Services Australia website and MBS Online.
Who we work with
- Australian College of Midwives
- Australian College of Nurse Practitioners
- Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia
- Health sector professional indemnity insurance providers
- Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee
- State and territory governments
Status
May 2024
The Health Legislation Amendment (Removal of Requirement for a Collaborative Arrangement) Bill 2024 was passed by Parliament on 16 May 2024. The Governor-General provided Royal Assent 31 May 2024.
The date of effect of the legislation amendment is 1 November 2024. Please make sure you comply with the existing legislation and maintain your collaborative arrangements until 1 November 2024. Do not end collaborative arrangements before then.
Webinar
A summary of the information presented at the webinar (11 April 2024), including questions and answers is available.
March 2024
The Health Legislation Amendment (Removal of Requirement for a Collaborative Arrangement) Bill 2024 was introduced to Parliament on 20 March 2024.
September 2023
Depending on Government priorities and passing them through Parliament, legislative changes will start from 1 November 2024. If this date must change, we will update the webpage.
On release of this webpage, email and social media communications have directed stakeholders to it as the single source of project information. Emails and social media posts will point to future webpage updates.
If you would like to receive email notifications, please email us and give your approval to be added to the contact list.
Learn more
- Strengthening Medicare Task Force
- Nurse Practitioner Workforce Plan
- Independent review of collaborative arrangements – 2023 Report Extract
- Budget 2023-24, Budget Paper No.2, p.150
Contact
General enquiries:
