Senators have backed repeated calls from doctor groups for a “substantial” boost to Medicare rebates across all GP consults as the best way to solve doctor shortages.

The declaration was made in an interim report from a Senate inquiry that had been investigating GP and primary care services in rural and outer-metro areas.

The same inquiry made headlines last month when a committee member described pleas for assistance from burnt-out GPs as “completely self-serving”.

“We’re travelling around the country listening to complaints from people who earn hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, who are quite often the highest-paid people in country towns, and yet expect the government to further incentivise them,” Liberal Senator Hollie Hughes told a hearing in Melbourne.