The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and the shifting paradigm of welfare policy

This paper describes the design and operation of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and then proceeds with an analysis of current policy deliberations which identifies an extension of the market as predominant trend. The paper demonstrates that the conditions which historically sustained the scheme are now present to a lesser extent. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme has functioned as a universalist welfare program which conferred onto the Commonwealth Department of Health substantial powers vis-à-vis drug suppliers and professional groups. This position of dominance has been eroded, with challenges to established arrangements arising, in particular, from the enhanced bargaining position of business and wider pressures operating on the Keynesian welfare state.