Govt defends scrapping kids' health checks

The federal government has defended the scrapping of a program providing health checks for pre-schoolers, saying the services will still be provided but at half the cost to taxpayers.

Health Minister Sussan Ley says the annual cost of funding the Healthy Kids Check, scrapped in last week's budget, has increased 11-fold in seven years, with an in-depth check costing $268.80.

Healthy Kids Checks were delivered by nurses or GPs but the same check could be performed by a GP billing it as a standard consultation, she said.