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  • Health-Care - The Importance Of Choice - Part 6

    Health-Care - The Importance Of Choice - Part 6
    17 Jul
    2018

    Posted by Evolve College News

    Government Changes Affecting Complementary Therapies – GST Exemption

    This week, we continue our series on health-care and the choice available to the public.

    In this series, we have looked at Conventional Medicine, Complementary Medicine and Complementary to Medicine as well as the importance of people’s choice.

    We have also looked at the Government announcement to remove certain natural therapies from the private health insurance rebate list, which will be effective from 1 April 2019, subject to the passing of legislation by Parliament. See Part 5 of our series for further information.

    This week, we continue to look at potential changes in the area of health-care therapies, this time focusing on a possible change to Goods and Services Tax (GST) exemption for certain complementary therapies.

    Are health-care services exempt from GST? 

    Currently, certain health services are exempt from GST, which means that practitioners offering such services do not charge GST, and the members of the public using them do not pay GST, on those services. However, for the exemption to apply, the relevant service must be listed as a health service in the GST Act.

    At the end of April 2018, The Labor Party announced that it would raise money through removing the exemption from GST currently afforded to certain complementary therapies.

    Which therapies? In answer, the proposed list (for which the GST exemption would be removed) is the same list which the Government announced (in 2017) would be removed from the private health insurance rebate scheme. In other words, if the Labor proposal goes through, the same therapies already announced to be removed from the private health insurance rebate list, would also be removed from the GST exemption list.

    Whether or not such a change is introduced or not remains to be seen, partly from who wins the next election, and partly from what the public response is to the changes proposed. The purpose of this update is to ensure that the extensive Evolve College News readership is up to date.

    How does this affect massage therapy? 

    Note that the above does not apply to massage therapy as it is not, on its own, subject to a GST exemption. This is explained further below.

    Massage therapy is not listed as a health service under the GST Act. Therefore, a massage therapist’s services are not exempt from GST if provided alone. If massage is provided as part of a complementary health service that is listed in the GST Act, then a GST exemption may apply, but only if: 

    • Massage is given as part of a listed health service session (e.g. physiotherapy)
    • the professional offering that service is a recognised professional in the relevant listed complementary health service (i.e., continuing the example given, a registered physiotherapist) and is also trained in massage therapy
    • The relevant (listed) health service profession (i.e. in the example, physiotherapy) recognises massage to be a standard technique or component treatment for that listed health service, and
    • The listed complementary health service profession (i.e. in the example, physiotherapy) accepts massage as being necessary for the appropriate treatment of the patient.

    If a practitioner offers massage outside those parameters listed above, then they are not entitled to claim the GST exemption for the massage.

    Practitioners and members of the public should seek tax advice on this if they have further questions, as we do not profess any expertise in GST or tax issues and this article does not offer advice. Information is also available on the Australian Taxation Office’s website.

    This concludes our focus (this week and last) on government or potential government changes regarding certain complementary therapies.

    Up-coming parts to this series 

    Next week (Part 7), we look at further measures afoot that could potentially impact the use of complementary therapies.

    In the following week (Part 8), we look at how all of this, and more, affects or could affect people’s choice of health-care, and we send a strong message to policy and decision makers about factors that should be taken into account.

    Then (in Part 9) we look at the impact all of this could have on Conventional Medicine – i.e. hospitals, doctors and the entire conventional medicine system.

    And finally, in our wrap up to this series (Part 10), we look at how all of this could affect complementary therapy practitioners or students.

    Read the prior articles in this series: 

    1. Part 1 – The Importance of Choice 
    2. Part 2 – Conventional Medicine
    3. Part 3 – Complementary Medicine
    4. Part 4 – Complementary To Medicine
    5. Part 5 – Is the public’s choice being eroded?

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